Spanish battleship Jaime I Jaime I was the third and final member of the of dreadnought battleship s of the Spanish Navy . She had two sister ships , " España " and " Alfonso XIII " . " Jaime I " was built by the SECN shipyard ; she was laid down in February 1912 , launched in September 1914 , and completed in December 1921 . She was armed with a main battery of eight guns and could steam at a speed of . " Jaime I " served in the Spanish fleet from 1921 to 1937 . She and her sisters participated in the Rif War , where they provided gunfire support to Spanish Army forces . During the conflict , she was damaged by a rebel coastal battery . The ship served with the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War . Nationalist bombers attacked the ship twice and on 17 June 1937 , she was destroyed by an accidental explosion . The wreck was later raised and scrapped . Technical characteristics . " Jaime I " was long at the waterline and long overall . She had a beam of and a draft of ; her freeboard was amidships . Her propulsion system consisted of four - shaft Parsons steam turbines and twelve Yarrow boilers . The engines were rated at and produced a top speed of . " Jaime I " had a cruising radius of at a speed of . Her crew consisted of 854 officers and enlisted men . " Jaime I " was armed with a main battery of eight / 50 guns , mounted in four twin gun turret s . One turret was placed forward , two were positioned en echelon amidships , and the fourth was aft of the superstructure . This mounting scheme was chosen in preference to superimposed turrets , as was done in the s , to save weight and cost . Her secondary battery consisted of twenty guns mounted in casemate s along the length of the hull . They were too close to the waterline , however , which made them unusable in heavy seas . She was also armed with four 3 - pounder guns and two machine guns . Her armored belt was thick amidships ; the main battery turrets were protected with the same amount of armor plate . The conning tower had thick sides . Her armored deck was thick . Service history . " Jaime I " was laid down at the " Sociedad Española de Construcción Naval " shipyard in Ferrol on 5 February 1912 . She was launched on 21 September 1914 , less than two months after the start of World War I . Spain remained neutral during the conflict , but because Britain supplied much of the armament and other building materials , work on " Jaime I " was considerably delayed . The ship was ready to go to sea by 1917 , but she was not completed until well after the end of the war ; work was finally finished on 20 December 1921 . Upon her completion , she joined her two sister ships in the 1st Squadron of the Spanish fleet . " Jaime I " saw action against insurgents in Morocco in the Rif War during the early 1920s along with her two sisters . Rif insurgents operating a coastal battery damaged the ship in 1924 . She fought with the Spanish Republican Navy in the Spanish Civil War . At the outbreak of the Nationalist revolt , wireless operators in the navy headquarters Madrid intercepted radio messages from General Francisco Franco to rebels in Morocco . They alerted the crews aboard " Jaime I " and other ships , who mutinied against their rebellious officers and ensured the ships would remain under Republican control . The vessels were nevertheless crippled by poor discipline for some time , as they had murdered many of their officers , and distrusted those that were not killed . On the first months of the war , " Jaime I " shelled a number of rebel strongholds , among them Ceuta , Melilla and Algeciras . In Algeciras she hit with her secondary armament the Nationalist gunboat " Eduardo Dato " , which was burned down to the waterline , although she was later repaired and returned to service . During Civil War , " Jaime I " was damaged by a Nationalist air attack at Malaga on 13 August 1936 ; a single , small bomb struck the ship in the bow and caused minimal damage . On 21 May 1937 , she was attacked again while in drydock at Cartagena for repairs after a recent grounding . Three bombs hit the ship , that again caused only minor damage . On 17 June , while at Cartagena , she was wrecked by an accidental internal explosion and fire , although sabotage is suspected . She was refloated , but determined to be beyond repair . She was officially discarded on 3 July 1939 , and broken up in 1941 .