Brower J. Anatomy of the Ship. The Battleship 'Bismarck'

London: Conway Maritime Press, 2005. — 161 p."Bismarck" (1939) was the sixth, and to date the last German ship named in honour of Otto von Bismarck, who is considered the founder of the German Empire. Born in 1815, he became Germany's first Chancellor in 1871, and remained in this position until 1890. The first "Bismarck" was a 3,300-ton flush-decked corvette launched on 25 July 1877 and commissioned on 27 August 1878. She was used mainly as a training vessel before being stricken and used as a barrack hulk in 1891. The second ship, SS "Furst Bismarck", a liner of 8,430 tons built for the Hamburg-American line, was launched on 29 November 1890. After making regular runs between Hamburg and New York, she was sold to the Russian navy in 1904. The third ship was the 10,690-ton armoured cruiser "Furst Bismarck" launched on 25 September 1897. She remained in active service until 1915, when converted for use as a training and office vessel, and was sold for scrap on 17 June 1919. The fourth ship was again a liner tor the Hamburg-American line. SS "Furst Bismarck" displaced 8,320 tons and was launched on 10 June 1905. In 1913 she was renamed Friedrkhsruhe and renamed again as Ambois, which sailed under the French flag before being-scrapped in 1925. The SS "Bismarck", a large three-funneled liner of 56,550 tons was to be the fifth vessel named in honour of the Chancellor. Although launched on 20 June 1914 as another Hamburg-American line vessel, construction was halted due to the First World War. As part of the Treaty of Versailles at the end of the war, the liner was completed in March 1922 and handed over to the British, who renamed her RMS "Majestic". When "Majestic" was commissioned, she was the largest liner afloat. The final "Bismarck" (and subject of this book) was built in 1939. She and her sister ship "Tirpitz", launched in April 1939, were the largest and heaviest warships ever completed by any European nation.