SMS Friedrich Carl (1867)

Friedrich Carl in the late 1880s or early 1890s
Class overview
Operators	Prussian Navy  Imperial German Navy
Preceded by	Prinz Adalbert
Succeeded by	Kronprinz
History
German Empire
Name	SMS Friedrich Carl
Builder	Société Nouvelle des Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée, Toulon
Laid down	1866
Launched	16 January 1867
Commissioned	3 October 1867
Stricken	22 June 1905
Fate	Scrapped, 1906
General characteristics
Type	Armored frigate
Displacement	Full load: 6,932 t (6,823 long tons)
Length	94.14 m (308 ft 10 in)
Beam	16.60 m (54 ft 6 in)
Draft	6.90 m (22 ft 8 in)
Installed power	6 × boilers 3,550 PS (3,501 ihp)
Propulsion	1 × single-expansion steam engine 1 × screw propeller
Sail plan	Barque-rigged
Speed	13.5 knots (25.0 km/h; 15.5 mph)
Range	2,210 nmi (4,090 km; 2,540 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Crew	33 officers 498 enlisted men
Armament	2 × 21 cm (8.3 in) L/22 guns 14 × 21 cm (8.3 in) L/19 guns
Armor	Waterline belt: 127 mm (5.0 in) Conning tower: 114 mm (4.5 in)

SMS Friedrich Carl ^[a] was an ironclad warship built for the Prussian Navy in the mid-1860s. The ship was constructed in the French Société Nouvelle des Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée shipyard in Toulon; her hull was laid in 1866 and launched in January 1867. The ship was commissioned into the Prussian Navy in October 1867. The ship was the third ironclad ordered by the Prussian Navy, after Arminius and Prinz Adalbert, though the fourth ship to be acquired, Kronprinz, was ordered after but commissioned before Friedrich Carl.

Friedrich Carl served with the fleet from her commissioning in 1867 until 1895, when she was removed from front-line service to serve as a training ship. During the Franco-Prussian War in 1870–1871, the ship formed part of the main German squadron commanded by Vizeadmiral (Vice Admiral) Eduard von Jachmann. Engine trouble, however, plagued the ship and two of the other three vessels in the squadron; as a result, they made only two sorties from the port of Wilhelmshaven to challenge the French blockade. Neither resulted in combat.

Friedrich Carl was also deployed to Spain during an insurrection in 1873, during which she assisted in the seizure of three rebel vessels in two engagements. The ship was refitted at the Imperial Dockyard in Wilhelmshaven in the 1880s. She was renamed Neptun in 1902 and used as a harbor ship until June 1905, when she was removed from the naval register. The following year, she was sold to ship breakers in the Netherlands and dismantled for scrap.
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