page_title: SMS S36 (1914)
section_title: Dover Barrage
hierarchical_section_title: SMS S36 (1914) / Service / Dover Barrage
caption_attribution_description: German torpedo boats under US control following World War I, in the New York, US. Two of the ships are identifiable by clearly visible hull number. Second from left G-102, third from left S-132. S-132 was scuttled at Scapa Flow in shallow water, was then quickly refloated and given to the US. Commissioned in June 1920 for voyage to US, was decommissioned in Norfolk in August, then sunk as target on 15 July 1921. [1] The first ship on the left is almost certainly V-43, the third of German torpedo boats taken to US after World War I. Fourth ship from left is named Redwing as identified from related photo.
context_page_description: SMS S36 was a 1913 Type Large Torpedo Boat of the Imperial German Navy during World War I, and the 12th ship of her class. She was equipped with of three single mounted 8.8 cm SK L/45 naval guns and with six 50 cm torpedo tubes, two forward and four aft; twenty-four mines could also be carried. She was launched on 17 October 1914 and commissioned on 4 January 1915. S36 took part in the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in 1915 and the Battle of Jutland in 1916. In late 1916 she served in the English Channel and took part in a number of engagements, including the Battle of Dover Strait during which a British merchant ship and a destroyer were sunk by her Half-Flotilla. She was scuttled at Scapa Flow in 1919.
context_section_description: In October 1916, the 3rd and 9th Flotillas were ordered to reinforce the German naval forces based in Flanders, in order to disrupt the Dover Barrage, a series of anti submarine minefields and nets that attempted to deter U-boat activities in the English Channel, and to directly attack cross-Channel shipping. The twenty torpedo boats of the two flotillas, including S36, still part of the 17th Half Flotilla of the 9th Flotilla, left Wilhelmshaven on 23 October, reaching Belgium the next day. The 9th Flotilla took part in a large scale raid into the English Channel on the night of 26/27 October 1916, and was assigned the role of attacking Allied shipping while other torpedo boats went after the Dover Barrage, with the 17th Half Flotilla operating north of the Varne Bank. The 17th Half Flotilla sank the merchant ship The Queen, and then, on their journey home, encountered the British destroyer Nubian, which was one of six destroyers that had set out from Dover in response to the attacks on the Dover Barrage. Not knowing the identity of the ships of the 17th Half Flotilla, the commander of Nubian challenged them. Nubian was met with concentrated gunfire and was struck by a German torpedo, completely disabling the ship. Some time later, the 17th Half Flotilla encountered another British destroyer, Amazon, which was again uncertain of the identity of the German ships, and was also heavily damaged by German shellfire. Other German units sank several drifters that were part of the Dover Barrage, and the old destroyer Flirt.
caption: Several German-built Großes Torpedoboot pictured in the US after the war.
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