SMS Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand SMS " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was an Austro - Hungarian pre - dreadnought battleship commissioned into the Austro - Hungarian Navy on 5 June 1910 . She was named after Archduke Franz Ferdinand . The first ship of her class to be built , she preceded by more than six months . Her armament included four 30 . 5 cm ( 12 in ) guns in two twin turret s , and eight 24 cm ( 9 . 4 in ) guns in four twin turrets . She participated in an international naval protest of the Balkan Wars in 1913 , during which she helped enforce a blockade of Montenegro . She was also one of the first ships to deploy seaplanes for military use . During World War I , she saw limited service in the 2nd Division of the 1st Battle Squadron , including mobilization to assist the escape of the German ships SMS " Goeben " and SMS " Breslau " and the bombardment of Ancona in 1915 . At the end of the war , she was ceded to Italy as a war prize and was eventually scrapped in 1926 . Construction . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was built at the Stabilimento Tecnico Triestino dockyard in Trieste . She was laid down on 12 September 1907 and launched from the slipway on 8 September 1908 . The teak used on her deck was the only material Austria - Hungary purchased abroad to build her . A month and a half after her launch , she was towed to the harbor in Muggia for completion . During a severe storm that night , she broke loose from her moorings ; with no crewmen aboard , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " drifted for several hours before running aground just off Izola . The following morning , the navy located her and started to refloat her . Completion was delayed by a welders ' strike in 1908 and a riveters ' strike in 1909 . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was the first ship of the class to be completed , and she was commissioned into the Austro - Hungarian Navy on 5 June 1910 . At long , with a beam of and a draft of 8 . 1 m ( 26 ft 7 in ) , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " normally displaced . With full combat load , she displaced up to . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " , like the other ships of the " Radetzky " class , was smaller and not as well - armed as other battleships in contemporary navies . Despite these shortcomings , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was one of Austria - Hungary ' s first true deep - water fighting ships . She was powered by two 4 - cylinder vertical triple expansion steam engines rated at 19 , 800 indicated horsepower and had a maximum speed of . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was the first warship in the Austro - Hungarian Navy to use oil and coal - fired boilers . She had a maximum range of at a cruising speed of . The ship ' s primary armament consisted of four 30 . 5 cm ( 12 in ) 45 - caliber guns in two twin gun turret s . Eight 24 cm ( 9 . 4 in ) guns in four wing turrets formed the heavy secondary battery . The tertiary battery consisted of twenty 10 cm ( 3 . 9 in ) L / 50 guns in casemate d single mounts and four 3 . 7 cm ( 1 . 5 in ) L / 44 guns . Three 45 cm ( 17 . 7 in ) torpedo tube s were also carried , two on the beam and one in the stern . Service history . The ship was assigned to the Austro - Hungarian fleet ' s 1st Battle Squadron after her 1910 commissioning . In 1912 , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " and her two sister ships conducted two training cruises into the eastern Mediterranean Sea . On the second cruise into the Aegean Sea , conducted from November to December , she was accompanied by the cruiser and a pair of destroyers . After returning to Pola , the entire fleet mobilized for possible hostilities , as tensions flared in the Balkans . The following year , she participated in an international naval demonstration in the Ionian Sea to protest the Balkan Wars . Ships from other navies included the British pre - dreadnought , the Italian pre - dreadnought , the , and the German light cruiser . The most important action of the combined flotilla , which was under the command of British Admiral Cecil Burney , was to blockade the Montenegrin coast . The goal of the blockade was to prevent Serbian reinforcements from supporting the siege at Scutari , where Montenegro had besieged a combined force of Albanians and Ottomans . Pressured by the international blockade , Serbia withdrew its army from Scutari , which was subsequently occupied by a joint Allied ground force . The first seaplane s used in combat , supplied by French manufacturer Donnet - Lévêque , were operated from " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " and her two sisters during the blockade . However , the Austro - Hungarian Navy was not satisfied with the operation , as the ships lacked enough deck space for the planes , as well as a lack of cranes with which they could easily hoist the planes onto the decks . The planes were later moved to a hangar at the navy yard in Teodo . By 1913 , the four new dreadnoughts of the — the only dreadnought s built for the fleet — were coming into active service . With the commissioning of these dreadnoughts , the navy shifted " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " and her sisters to the 2nd Division of the 1st Battle Squadron . World War I . The ship was named after Archduke Franz Ferdinand , whose assassination on 28 June 1914 triggered World War I . At that time , the battleships in the Austro - Hungarian Navy consisted of the " Radetzky " class , the " Tegetthoff " class , and the older and es . Along with the remainder of the Austro - Hungarian Navy , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was mobilized in late July 1914 to support the flight of and . The two German ships broke out of Messina , which was surrounded by the British navy , and reached their allies in Turkey . The flotilla had advanced as far south as Brindisi in southeastern Italy when news of the successful breakout reached Vienna . The Austro - Hungarian ships were recalled before seeing action . On 23 May 1915 , between two and four hours after the Italian declaration of war reached the main Austro - Hungarian naval base at Pola , " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " and the rest of the fleet departed to bombard the Italian coast . Their focus was on the important naval base at Ancona , and later the coast of Montenegro . The bombardment of Montenegro was part of the larger Austro - Hungarian campaign against the Kingdoms of Montenegro and Serbia , who were members of the Entente , during the first half of 1915 . The attack on Ancona was an immense success , and the ships were unopposed during the operation . The bombardment of the province and the surrounding area resulted in the destruction of an Italian steamer in the port of Ancona itself , and an Italian destroyer , was severely damaged further south . On the shore , the infrastructure of the port of Ancona , as well as the surrounding towns , were severely damaged . The railroad yard in Ancona , as well as the port facilities in the town , were damaged or destroyed . The local shore batteries were also rendered inactive . Additional targets that were damaged or destroyed included wharves , warehouses , oil tanks , radio stations , and the local barracks . 63 Italians , both civilians and military personnel alike , were killed in the bombardment . By the time Italian ships from Taranto and Brindisi arrived at Ancona , the Austro - Hungarians were safely back in Pola . The objective of the bombardment of Ancona was to delay the Italian Army from deploying its forces along the border with Austria - Hungary by destroying critical transportation systems . The surprise attack on Ancona succeeded in delaying the Italian deployment to the Alps for two weeks . This delay gave Austria - Hungary valuable time to strengthen its Italian border and re - deploy some of its troops from the Eastern and Balkan fronts . The only damage in the ensuing days to " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " appears to have been after the battleships returned to Pola . A collision occurred between the ship and an unknown Austro - Hungarian destroyer on 30 May , while both were attempting to avoid an aerial bombardment from an Italian airship ; the destroyer sank . Aside from the attack on Ancona , the Austro - Hungarian battleships were confined to Pola for the duration of the war . Their operations were limited by Admiral Anton Haus , the commander of the Austro - Hungarian Navy , who believed that he would need to husband his ships to counter any Italian attempt to seize the Dalmatian coast . Since coal was diverted to the newer " Tegetthoff " - class battleships , the remainder of the war saw " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " and the rest of the Austro - Hungarian Navy acting as a fleet in being . This resulted in the Allied blockade of the Otranto Strait . With his fleet blockaded in the Adriatic Sea , and with a shortage of coal , Haus enacted a strategy based on mines and submarines designed to reduce the numerical superiority of the Allied navies . Postwar fate . According to the terms of the Armistice of Villa Giusti , which ended hostilities between Italy and Austro - Hungary , the latter was to transfer three battleships to Venice . Italy originally intended to seize the three remaining " Tegetthoff " - class ships , but Italian frogmen sank three days before the Armistice took effect . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " was substituted in her place . The pre - dreadnought served as a showpiece of the Italian victory parade held in March 1919 . She was formally ceded to Italy under the terms of the Treaty of Saint - Germain - en - Laye , signed in September 1919 , and was moved to Venice by sailors of the " Regia Marina " ( Royal Italian Navy ) . " Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand " did nothing while in Italian custody ; she was scrapped in 1926 . Notes . Footnotes Citations References . Other sources