SMS was a German pre-dreadnought battleship of the , built around the turn of the 20th century for the (Imperial Navy). Named for the Emperor Charlemagne, was built in Hamburg, at the Blohm and Voss shipyard. She was laid down in September 1898 and launched in October 1899. A shipyard strike and an accidental grounding delayed her completion until February 1902; she was therefore the last member of her class to enter service. The ship was armed with four guns in two twin gun turrets and had a top speed of .
served with the active fleet until 1908, participating in the normal peacetime routine of training cruises and fleet maneuvers. By 1908, the new "all-big-gun" dreadnought battleships were entering service. As these rendered her obsolete, was withdrawn from active service and placed in the Reserve Division. At the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, the ship was placed back in active duty as a coastal defense ship in V Battle Squadron, though by February 1915 she was again placed in reserve. was briefly used as a training ship and ended her career as a prison ship for prisoners of war in Wilhelmshaven. After the German defeat in November 1918, she was sold to ship-breakers and scrapped in 1920.
Design
After the German (Imperial Navy) ordered the four s in 1889, a combination of budgetary constraints, opposition in the (Imperial Diet), and a lack of a coherent fleet plan delayed the acquisition of further battleships. The former Secretary of the (Imperial Navy Office), Leo von Caprivi became the Chancellor of Germany in 1890, and (Vice Admiral) Friedrich von Hollmann became the new Secretary of the . Hollmann requested the first pre-dreadnought battleship in 1892, but the Franco-Russian Alliance, signed the year before, put the government's attention on expanding the Army's budget. Parliamentary opposition forced Hollmann to delay until the following year, when Caprivi spoke in favor of the project, noting that Russia's recent naval expansion threatened Germany's Baltic Sea coastline. In late 1893, Hollmann presented the Navy's estimates for the 1894–1895 budget year, and now the approved the new ship, and over the following three years, he secured approval for two further ships. In June 1897, Hollmann was replaced by (Rear Admiral) Alfred von Tirpitz, who quickly proposed and secured approval for the first Naval Law in early 1898. The law authorized the last two ships of the class, and .
was long overall and had a beam of and a draft of forward and aft. She displaced as designed and up to at full load. The ship was powered by three 3-cylinder vertical triple-expansion steam engines, each driving one screw propeller. Steam was provided by four Marine-type and eight cylindrical boilers, all of which burned coal and were vented through a pair of tall funnels. s powerplant was rated at , which generated a top speed of . She had a cruising radius of at a speed of . She had a normal complement of 39 officers and 612 enlisted men.
The ship's armament consisted of a main battery of four 24 cm (9.4 in) SK L/40 guns in twin gun turrets, one fore and one aft of the central superstructure. Her secondary armament consisted of eighteen 15 cm (5.9 inch) SK L/40 guns carried in a mix of turrets and casemates. Close-range defense against torpedo boats was provided by a battery of twelve 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/30 quick-firing guns all mounted in casemates and twelve machine cannon in single mounts. The armament suite was rounded out with six torpedo tubes, all in above-water swivel mounts. The ship's belt armor was thick, and the main armor deck was thick. The conning tower and main battery turrets were protected with of armor plating, and the secondary casemates received of armor protection.