Built as a steel hulled minelayer by Schiff & Maschinenbau AG ‘Germania Werft’, Kiel for the Ottoman Navy.
1910 Ordered.
04 December 1911 launched under the name NUSRET.
Displacement 365 ton, dim. 40.2 (L. bpp.) x 7.5 x 3.4m.
Powered by two 3-cyl triple expansion steam engines, manufactured by shipbuilder, 1.200 hp., twin shafts, speed 12 knots.
Armament 2 – 47mm OF guns, and could carry 40 mines.
Crew ?
1913 Commissioned.
08 March 1915 she sailed from Nara, loaded 26 mines at the Çimenlik Iskele, and laid these mines in the Erenköy Bay, (in the entrance of the Dardanelles) in the early morning of the 9th, parallel to the Asiatic shore.
By German observes it was noted that British and French warships were manoeuvring in this area when she bombarded Ottoman positions. By the Allies this bay was declared clear of mines, and safe to manoeuvre.
At that time the NUSRET was under command of Lieutenant Tophaneli Hakki, she laid mines every 100 meter and 5 meter below the sea-level.
18 March 1915 a important Allied bombardment was planed to destroy the Ottoman forts and shore batteries, in the afternoon the French BOUVET turned away in the Erenköy Bay and hit one of this mines laid by the NUSRET, within minutes she capsized and was lost taken around 600 men with her.
Two British warships the HMS IRRESITBLE and OCEAN both manoeuvring in Erenköy Bay were also lost after running on these mines, and an other three were heavily damaged.
The loss of this warships was a turning point in this war, when it was decided by the Allies to send not more capital warships in the Dardanelles, instead the ill fated and hastily planned Gallipoli landings by the Allies was carried out.
Between 1918 and 1926 was she laid up at Istanbul or used for mine clearing in the Sea of Marmara.
Between 1926 and 1927 was she refitted by the Gölcük Shipyard.
Armament 2 – 57mm QF guns and could carry 60 mines.
1937 Renamed in YARDIM (Help or Helper) and in service as a diver support ship.
1939 Again named NUSRET.
1955 Decommissioned and laid up at Gölcuk in the Turkish Army and Naval base and shipyard.
1962 Sold to K Kalkavan and Ismail Kaptanoghu managed by the Sea Transportation Company and used as a cargo vessel till 1966, renamed CAPTAIN NUSRET. (Who has her dimensions and tonnage?)
1979 Sold to A.Tombul.
1980 Sold to Mustafa Okan Kardesler Company.
1989 She was in a terrible condition, and once in Mersin harbour she was rescued by the harbour cranes when she got a heavy list.
1990 She sank in Mersin harbour when she left for Magosa, the same year she was refloated, and was donated by the owners to Mersin City Hospital and the Turkish Red Crescent.
But the hospital and the Red Crescent could not do much with the wreck in the mud of the harbour of Mersin.
In a rapport made by the city of Mersin, it was given that the ship had lost all her identity, after she was converted in a cargo ship, also that she was lengthened, and that she had not any historical value anymore.
Some of the remains are displayed at the Navy Museum, Besiktas, Istanbul.
21 January 2002 was ownership given by the Turkish Ministry of Culture to the municipality of Tarsus, and Tarsus decided to restore the ship the NUSRET and after restoration will be placed into Gallipoli Park at Tarsus.
I found in a web-site
http://www.ntvmsnbc.com/news/250400.asp that on 30 December 2006 the restored warship NUSRET was placed in Mersin’s Çanakkale Park and during a ceremony on that day was opened as a public museum.
There is a replica of the NUSRET near Çemenlik Castle, Çanakkale in the Dardanelles, have seen the replica many times when I was passing the Dardanelles with a cargo of fruit for Russia.
Turkey 1955 FDC.
Source: Mostly copied from
http://www.iit.edu/~agunsal/canakkale/n ... usret.html
