HDMS ''Hauch'' was a Danish

gunboat A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies. History Pre-steam ...

, launched in 1862 and under command the following year. It was named after the naval officer , who died during the Battle of Copenhagen, while bravely defending the decommissioned

frigate A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat. The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and ...

''Kronborg'' against three Royal Navy

ships of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two colum ...

. ''Hauch'' can be viewed as a scaled-down version of the preceding six gunboats of the ''Thura'' class. ''Hauch'' was built entirely in iron and the smaller size meant that it could only accommodate a single cannon. The 30 lb

smoothbore A smoothbore weapon is one that has a barrel without rifling. Smoothbores range from handheld firearms to powerful tank guns and large artillery mortars. History Early firearms had smoothly bored barrels that fired projectiles without signi ...

cannon was not very accurate and was replaced by a smaller, but

rifled In firearms, rifling is machining helical grooves into the internal (bore) surface of a gun's barrel for the purpose of exerting torque and thus imparting a spin to a projectile around its longitudinal axis during shooting to stabilize the proj ...

18 lb cannon in 1864. Towards the end of her career the armament consisted of two small smoothbore cannons ( falconets), used for warning shots during fisheries inspection duties. The steam engine was reused from the scrapped gunboat ''

Støren is the administrative centre of Midtre Gauldal municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. The village is located in the Gauldalen valley at the confluence of the rivers Gaula and ''Sokna''. Støren is located on the European route E06 highway ...

''. This engine lasted until 1886, when it was replaced by a new

Burmeister & Wain Burmeister & Wain was a large established Danish shipyard and leading diesel engine producer headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded by two Danes and an Englishman, its earliest roots stretch back to 1846. Over its 150-year history, it g ...

200 HP steam engine.

Duty

''Hauch'', under command of Lieutenant William August Carstensen and a crew of 25 entered service in July 1893 as flagship of a steamship squadron of rear admiral C.E. van Dockum. The squadron consisted of HDMS ''Absalon'', HDMS ''Esbern Snare'', HDMS ''Fylla'', HDMS ''Willemoes'', HDMS ''Buhl'', HDMS ''Krieger'' and HDMS ''Marstrand''. However, the ship did not live up to expectations. It was first and foremost too slow, most likely due to the small length, as it was designed to fit the

locks Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

on the

Eider Canal The Eider Canal (also called the Schleswig-Holstein Canal) was an artificial waterway in southern Denmark (later northern Germany) which connected the North Sea with the Baltic Sea by way of the rivers Eider and Levensau. Constructed between 1 ...

. The ship was under command of lieutenant Peter Urban Bruun with a crew of 24 during the

second Schleswig War The Second Schleswig War ( da, Krigen i 1864; german: Deutsch-Dänischer Krieg) also sometimes known as the Dano-Prussian War or Prusso-Danish War was the second military conflict over the Schleswig-Holstein Question of the nineteenth century. T ...

in 1864, but never engaged in fighting. After the war it was considered to sell the ship, but instead ''Hauch'' was placed on land for the next 16 years. Here she remained until 1880, where a need for a fisheries inspection vessel arose.

Marine surveys

left, HDMS ''Hauch'' in her later years, where experiments with rigging her with sails were performed Between 1880 and 1896 ''Hauch'' served as a fisheries inspection vessel for the Kattegat and Danish Straits, typically from March through November. The zoologist

C.G. Johannes Petersen Carl Georg Johannes Petersen (24 October 1860 – 11 May 1928) was a Denmark, Danish marine biology, marine biologist, especially fisheries biologist. He was the first to describe communities of benthos, benthic Marine (ocean), marine invertebrates ...

participated in many of the cruises, in particular in the years 1883-1886. This resulted in a report on the scientific results of the investigations, often seen as the first major contribution to the research field marine benthic ecology, as

realised that there were pronounced patterns in the distribution of the different species. Certain species seemed to always occur together, which led him as the first to define the concept of a benthic community. ''Hauch'' was decommissioned in 1900. The engine was removed and reused in refitting the steam ferry ''

Sallingsund Until 1 January 2007 Sallingsund municipality was a municipality (Danish, '' kommune'') in the former Viborg County in the northwest of the Salling Peninsula, a part of the larger Jutland peninsula in northwest Denmark. The municipality covered an ...

'' into a fisheries research vessel. The hull of ''Hauch'' was sold for scrap in 1901 for 2,100 kroner.

References

External links

The registry of ''Hauch''. From archive.org
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hauch (1862) Research vessels of Denmark Gunboats of the Royal Danish Navy Ships built in Copenhagen 1862 ships