Zhenyuan () was an ironclad battleship built for the Chinese Beiyang Fleet. She was the second and final member of the , which included one other vessel, , both of which were built in Germany in the early 1880s. Delivery of the two ironclads was delayed by the Sino-French War of 1884–1885. The ships were armed with a main battery of four guns in a pair of gun turrets, making them the most powerful warships in East Asian waters at the time.
In the 1880s and early 1890s, the Beiyang Fleet conducted a routine of training exercises and cruises abroad, with emphasis placed on visits to Japan to intimidate the country. The latter resulted in the Nagasaki Incident in 1886 and contributed to a rise in hostility between the two countries that culminated in the First Sino-Japanese War in 1894. She saw action at the Battle of the Yalu River on 17 September, where the Japanese Combined Fleet sank much of the Beiyang Fleet, though both Zhenyuan and Dingyuan survived despite numerous hits. The survivors then retreated to Port Arthur for repairs, but after that city was threatened by the Japanese army, fled to Weihaiwei. While entering the port, Zhenyuan struck an uncharted rock and was badly damaged; she was used as a stationary artillery battery during the Battle of Weihaiwei in February 1895, but Japanese forces captured the city's fortifications, which forced the Chinese to surrender the fleet.
Zhenyuan was seized as a war prize, repaired, and commissioned into the Imperial Japanese Navy as Chin Yen. She frequently toured Japan in the late 1890s and early 1900s to celebrate Japan's victory over China. Obsolescent by the time of the Russo-Japanese War, she nevertheless saw action at the Battle of the Yellow Sea in August 1904 and the Battle of Tsushima in May 1905. She also supported the invasion of Sakhalin in July 1905. After the war, Chin Yen became a training ship, serving in that role until 1911, thereafter being sold to ship breakers in 1912.
Design
Following the direct intervention of the imperialist European powers in the mid-19th century, including the First and Second Opium Wars, where their superior steam-powered fleets overwhelmed the small Imperial Chinese Navy that still relied on traditional junks, the Chinese began a naval construction program in the 1880s to meet these threats more effectively. They enlisted British and German assistance, and two s were ordered from Germany.
Zhenyuan was long overall, with a beam of and a draft of . She displaced normally and up to at full load. She was powered by a pair of compound steam engines that each drove a screw propeller. Steam was provided by eight coal-fired fire-tube boilers that were ducted into a pair of funnels amidships. She was capable of a top speed of from . Her crew consisted of 350 officers and enlisted men.
The ship carried a main battery of four 25-caliber breech-loading guns in two twin-gun turrets that were placed en echelon forward. These were supported by a secondary battery of two 15 cm MRK L/35 guns in a pair of single turrets, one at the bow and the other at the stern. For defense against torpedo boats, she carried a pair of 3-pounder, Hotchkiss revolver cannon and eight Maxim-Nordenfelt quick-firing guns in casemates. She was also equipped with three or torpedo tubes.
She was protected by compound armor that was 14 in for the armor belt, which covered the central part of the ship were the ammunition magazines and propulsion machinery spaces were located. An armor deck that was thick provided horizontal protection. Her conning tower was covered with of armor plate on the sides. The barbettes for the gun turrets were 12–14 in thick. A strake of armor that was 8 in thick protected the casemate guns.
Modifications
Upon her acquisition by Japan in 1895, the ship was significantly modernized, including new fire-control directors for the main battery and more powerful secondary and tertiary batteries. The Japanese had initially considered replacing the main battery guns, but the project proved to be beyond the capabilities of Japanese shipyards at the time.
The old, slow-firing 5.9 in guns were replaced with quick-firing guns; the forward turret was retained, but the stern mount was replaced with an open mount with a gun shield. Two more of the guns were installed abreast of the main mast, both in the same shielded mount as the stern gun. The Dingyuan-class ships suffered from trim problems as a result of their heavy main battery turrets being placed forward, which caused them to nose down and ship water; it also hampered their steering ability. The addition of the 6-inch guns further aft helped to counterbalance the weight of the main battery, significantly improving both defects. The light battery was revised to a pair of 6-pounder Hotchkiss guns and eight of the Hotchkiss 3-pounders, all in individual mounts.
Displacement and other dimensions remained the same, but by that time, the propulsion system was only capable of producing for a speed of . Her crew was reduced significantly, despite the addition of the 6-inch guns, to 250 officers and enlisted men.
Service history
Chinese service
Zhenyuan was ordered in 1881 and was laid down at the AG Vulcan shipyard in Stettin, Germany in March 1882; her name means "striking from afar" in Chinese. Work proceeded quickly and she was launched on 28 November 1882, though fitting-out work continued into early 1884. She was completed in April that year, but the outbreak of the Sino-French War in August prevented both Dingyuan-class ships from being delivered until 1885. Both vessels were manned by German crews, sailing on 3 July 1885 under the German flag in company with the also German-built protected cruiser . The three ships arrived in Tianjin in November, where they were transferred to Chinese control. Li Hongzhang, the Viceroy of Zhili and director of China's naval construction program, inspected the vessels following their arrival. The two ironclads were then commissioned into the Beiyang Fleet, which was based in Port Arthur. The ships steamed south to Shanghai for the winter of 1885–1886.
In the 1880s, the Beiyang Fleet was occupied with an annual routine of winter training cruises to the South China Sea, often in company with the Nanyang Fleet. This cruise typically involved visits to Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong provinces, and sometimes went as far south as stops in Southeast Asia. The rest of the year was spent in northern waters off Zhili, Shandong, and Fengtian provinces, conducting training exercises. Training cruises to foreign ports were conducted in the mid-1880s and early 1890s, both to train navigational skills on voyages far from shore and to show the flag. Discipline aboard the ships of the Beiyang Fleet was poor, which contributed to a low state of readiness of the ships. During this period, the fleet was commanded by Admiral Ding Ruchang, while Zhenyuan was captained by Lin Taizeng, who was promoted to the rank of rear admiral shortly after taking command in 1885. Lin served as Ding's deputy through 1894. At the time, China lacked dry docks large enough to handle Zhenyuan and Dingyuan, forcing the navy to rely on shipyards in Japan or in British Hong Kong for periodic maintenance.
The two Dingyuan-class ships began their training routine in April 1886 in joint maneuvers with the units of the Nanyang Fleet, which culminated in a naval review in Port Arthur. They received the British vessels of the China Station from 19 to 20 May. Zhenyuan, Dingyuan, and four cruisers began the first of their overseas cruises in August 1886, which included stops in Hong Kong, Busan and Wonsan in Korea, Vladivostok, Russia, and Nagasaki, Japan. While at the latter port in August, Chinese crewmen became involved in an altercation with Japanese locals that resulted in the deaths of eight Chinese sailors and two Japanese policemen, with forty-two Chinese and twenty-nine Japanese injured. The so-called Nagasaki Incident was characterized by the Japanese press as an attempt by China to intimidate Japan, leading to calls for naval expansion to counter the Beiyang Fleet. The Japanese government ordered three protected cruisers in response. The Japanese also refused to allow the Chinese ironclads to return for repairs in their shipyards, hampering the ability of the Beiyang Fleet to keep the vessels operational.
The year 1887 passed less eventfully, with the ships spending the bulk of the year in the Bohai Sea. Late in the year, another group of four European-built cruisers arrived, further strengthening the fleet and necessitating extensive maneuvers in 1888 to familiarize the crews with the rest of the fleet. The Beiyang Fleet adopted the same black, white, and buff paint scheme used by the Royal Navy at the time, repainting their vessels at some point in 1888. In 1889, the fleet was divided into two divisions; Dingyuan and several cruisers were sent on a tour of Korean ports while Zhenyuan and the rest of the fleet remained in the Bohai Sea for exercises. The two divisions rendezvoused in Shanghai in December, thereafter proceeding to Hong Kong for Zhenyuan and Dingyuan to be drydocked. They then cruised off Korea, where Zhenyuan ran aground in November 1890, forcing another return to Hong Kong for repairs.
Another visit to Japan came in June and July 1891, the first since the Nagasaki Incident; the fleet stopped in Kobe on 30 June and Yokohama on 14 July. At the latter port, a large Japanese delegation of senior military commanders and members of the imperial family received the ships. Another voyage to Japan took place the following year. Coupled with the Nagasaki Incident, these voyages contributed to the growing tensions between China and Japan, since Hongzhang intended them to make clear Chinese naval strength at a time the Japanese fleet was small and poorly developed. At the core of the dispute was control over Korea, which since the Convention of Tientsin of 1884, was treated as a co-protectorate of China and Japan.
First Sino-Japanese War In early 1894, the Donghak Peasant Revolution broke out in Korea, prompting China to send an expedition of 28,000 to suppress the rebels. Japan viewed this as a violation of the Tientsin Convention and deployed 8,000 troops in response, leading to the outbreak of the First Sino-Japanese War on 1 August. The Chinese fleet was no match for the new Combined Fleet of Japan, as years of insufficient naval budgets had not allowed Hongzhang to update the vessels—funds he had planned to use to add new quick-firing guns to Zhenyuan and Dingyuan were instead appropriated for the 60th birthday of the Dowager Empress Cixi—and the Chinese lacked effective commanders and sufficiently trained crews. At the time, the American soldier of fortune Philo McGiffen served as the ship's executive officer to advise Lin. And to add to China's disadvantages during the war, the Japanese had broken the Chinese diplomatic codes in 1888, giving them access to China's internal communications.
As the Chinese made preparations in August for action, they removed the gun shields from the main battery turrets. Experience at the Battle of Pungdo had revealed the thin shields created numerous splinters when struck by enemy fire, and these fragments had inflicted numerous casualties to the gun crews of the cruiser Jiyuan at Pungdo. The crews also placed bags of coal around the gun batteries as a form of improvised armor. The ships were repainted light gray to make them more difficult to observe at sea. The ships of the Beiyang Fleet then steamed to Taku to take on supplies, thereafter doing little for the next month.
Battle of the Yalu River