page_title: SMS Nixe
section_title: 1897–1930
hierarchical_section_title: SMS Nixe / Service history / 1897–1930
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. S.M.S. Nixe unter Segel
context_page_description: SMS Nixe was a steam corvette built for the German Kaiserliche Marine in the 1880s. She was laid down in August 1883, launched in July 1885, and commissioned into the fleet in April 1886. Hopelessly out of date even by the time she was ordered in 1882 and possessing insufficient gun power or speed, she was nevertheless completed as designed. In addition to those shortcomings, she proved to be difficult to handle in service and was particularly affected by wind.
  Nixe served as a training ship for naval cadets and apprentice seamen for nearly fifteen years. During this period, she went on overseas training cruises, frequently to South America, the West Indies, or the Mediterranean Sea. She was used as a headquarters ship for the High Seas Fleet from 1906 to 1910, when the Reichstag cut funding for the vessel. She was stricken from the naval register in June 1911 and used as a barracks ship until April 1923, when she was renamed Hulk C and sold to a private shipping company, which converted her into a lighter and used in that role from 1925 to 1930 under her original name, when she was broken up.
context_section_description: Nixe returned to service on 1 April 1897; in late September she began the winter training cruise to the West Indies, and while on the return voyage, she was diverted to Kamerun to participate in the funeral ceremonies for the funeral of Ndumbe Lobe Bell, the pro-German leader of the Duala people, on 12 December. Nixe left Kamerun on 12 January 1898 and arrived in Kiel on 19 March, after which she underwent periodic maintenance. The ship went on training cruises in the Baltic, and on 15 August she began the next overseas cruise, which went to South America, including stops in Brazil and Argentina. While in São Francisco do Sul, Brazil, a portion of her crew visited the German enclave in Joinville. Nixe reached Kiel on 1 April 1899 and went into the shipyard for another overhaul.
  After returning to service, Nixe started the next major training cruise in mid-May, which again went to the West Indies. While in the Caribbean Sea, a revolution broke out in Venezuela, prompting the German government to order Nixe to visit the ports of La Guaira and Puerto Cabello to protect German interests from the violence. On 6 November, she was replaced by the corvettes Stosch and Moltke, allowing Nixe to resume her training duties before returning to Kiel on 26 March 1900. She began the year's training program on 25 May with a short cruise to Vlissingen, the Netherlands from 31 May to 6 June. 
  She then went on a training cruise to visit St. Petersburg, Russia. On returning from the trip, she was decommissioned to free her crew for other purposes, as the navy was facing a shortage owing to the expedition to China to participate in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion. The navy had planned to modernize the ship in 1901, but the loss of the corvette Gneisenau off Málaga forced the Admiralität to reduce the modernization to a simple reduction in her rigging. She was not recommissioned until 1 November 1906, however, and she was used only as a headquarters ship for the High Seas Fleet.
  The Reichstag did not allocate funds for the reactivation of Nixe in the 1910 fiscal year, however, and so she had to be decommissioned again on 18 May. Nixe was stricken from the naval register on 24 June 1911, the last sailing ship of the Imperial Navy still on the register, and converted into a barracks ship at Kiel. She served on that capacity, attached to the Naval Gunnery School, into the 1920s. On 1 April 1923, she was renamed Hulk C, and was sold to a private firm. Converted into a sea-going lighter and renamed Nixe, she was operated by the firm Emil Retzlaff, based in Stettin, until 1930, when she was broken up in Wewelsfleth.
caption: Nixe underway, c. 1892
exif: {}