Design and description
The ships were designed as scout cruisers (esploratori), essentially enlarged versions of contemporary destroyers. [1] They had an overall length of 103.75 meters (340 ft 5 in), a beam of 9.74 meters (31 ft 11 in) and a mean draft of 3.3 meters (10 ft 10 in). [2] They displaced 1,784 tonnes (1,756 long tons ) at standard load, and 2,040 tonnes (2,010 long tons) at deep load. Their complement was 8 officers and 161 enlisted men. [3]
The Mirabellos were powered by two Parsons geared steam turbines, each driving one propeller shaft using steam supplied by four Yarrow boilers. The turbines were rated at 44,000 shaft horsepower (33,000 kW ) for a speed of 35 knots (65 km/h; 40 mph) and Carlo Alberto Racchia reached a speed of 35.4 knots (65.6 km/h; 40.7 mph) from 43,190 shp (32,210 kW) during her sea trials. [2] The ships carried enough fuel oil to give them a range of 2,300 nautical miles (4,300 km; 2,600 mi) at a speed of 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph). [3]
Carlo Alberto Racchia's main battery consisted of a single Cannone da 152 mm (6 in)/40 A Modello 1891 gun forward of the superstructure. The gun was backed up by seven Cannone da 102 mm (4 in)/35 S Modello 1914 guns in single mounts protected by gun shields, one aft the superstructure and the remaining guns positioned on the broadside amidships. [4] Anti-aircraft (AA) defense for the Mirabello-class ships was provided by a pair of Cannone da 76 mm (3 in)/40 Modello 1916 AA guns in single mounts. [2] They were equipped with four 450-millimeter (17.7 in) torpedo tubes in two twin mounts, one on each broadside. [4] Carlo Alberto Racchia also could carry 100 mines. [2]
Modifications
The gun proved to be too heavy for the ships and its rate of fire was too slow so it was replaced when the ships were rearmed with eight Cannone da 102/45 S, A Modello 1917 guns arranged with single guns fore and aft of the superstructure and the other on the broadside. The 76 mm guns were replaced by a pair of Cannone da 40 mm (1.6 in)/39 AA guns in single mounts in 1920–1922. It is uncertain if Carlo Alberto Racchia received these guns before her loss. [2]
Service history
World War I
After commissioning, Carlo Alberto Racchia was stationed at Brindisi, Italy. During World War I, she operated in the Adriatic Sea, participating in the Adriatic campaign against Austria-Hungary and the German Empire, taking part primarily in small naval actions involving clashes between torpedo boats and support operations for Allied motor torpedo boat and air attacks on Central Powers forces.
On the night of 14–15 May 1917, the Battle of the Strait of Otranto began when the Austro-Hungarian Navy staged a two-pronged attack against the Otranto Barrage in the Strait of Otranto aimed both at destroying naval drifters — armed fishing boats that patrolled the anti-submarine barrier the barrage formed — and, as a diversionary action, at destroying an Italian convoy bound from the Kingdom of Greece to the Principality of Albania. At 04:10 on 15 May, after receiving news of the attack, Carlo Alberto Racchia, the protected cruiser Marsala, the scout cruiser Aquila, the destroyers Impavido, Indomito, and Insidioso, and the British Royal Navy light cruiser HMS Liverpool made ready for sea at Brindisi. At 05:30 the formation left Brindisi together with the British light cruiser HMS Dartmouth and two other destroyers, joining various Allied naval formations steering to intercept the Austro-Hungarians. At 07:45 the Allied force sighted the Austro-Hungarian destroyers Balaton and Csepel. At 08:10, while Aquila and the Italian destroyers steered to attack the two Austro-Hungarian ships, Carlo Alberto Racchia, Dartmouth, Liverpool, and Marsala headed toward the Austro-Hungarian naval base at Cattaro in an attempt to cut off their retreat. Aquila and the Italian destroyers opened fire on Balaton and Csepel at 08:15. In the ensuing exchange of gunfire, Balaton suffered damage and immediately afterwards Aquila was hit and immobilized at 09:05. The Austro-Hungarian scout cruisers Helgoland, Novara, and Saida closed with Aquila. Dartmouth, the British light cruiser HMS Bristol, and the Italian destroyers Antonio Mosto and Giovanni Acerbi placed themselves between Aquila and the Austro-Hungarian ships and opened fire on them at 09:30 at a range of 8,500 metres (9,300 yd). The three Austro-Hungarian scout cruisers retreated toward the northwest and the British and Italian ships pursued them at distances of between 4,500 and 10,000 metres (4,900 and 10,900 yards), continuing to fire. The battle ended at 12:05 when the ships approached Cattaro, where the fleeing Austro-Hungarian ships took shelter under the cover of Austro-Hungarian coastal artillery batteries and the Austro-Hungarian armored cruiser Sankt Georg and destroyers Tátra and Warasdiner sortied to intervene in the engagement. After the battle ended, Aquila was towed back to port for repairs. [6]
On 16 July 1917, Carlo Alberto Racchia put to sea together with her sister ship Augusto Riboty to provide distant support for a bombing raid on Durrës (known to the Italians as Durazzo) on the coast of Albania by 18 aircraft departing from Brindisi and Vlorë (known to the Italians as Valona) in Albania. During the night of 4–5 October 1917 Carlo Alberto Racchia and Aquila supported an air attack against Cattaro.
On 2 October 1918, while British and other Italian ships bombarded Austro-Hungarian positions at Durrës, Carlo Alberto Racchia and the battleship Dante Alighieri, the scout cruisers Cesare Rossarol, Guglielmo Pepe, and Alessandro Poerio and the destroyers Ippolito Nievo and Simone Schiaffino provided cover for the bombardment force, tasked with countering any attempt by Austro-Hungarian Navy ships based at Cattaro to interfere with the bombardment.
By late October 1918, Austria-Hungary had effectively disintegrated, and the Armistice of Villa Giusti, signed on 3 November 1918, went into effect on 4 November 1918 and brought hostilities between Austria-Hungary and the Allies to an end. After getting underway from Brindisi, Carlo Alberto Racchia and her sister ship Carlo Mirabello arrived at the island of Vis (known to the Italians as Lissa) at 0900 on 9 November and took possession of it for the Kingdom of Italy. [10] The war ended two days later with the armistice between the Allies and the German Empire on 11 November 1918.
Post-war
On 20 March 1920, Carlo Alberto Racchia left Taranto, Italy, to move to Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire. After arriving at Constantinople, she began patrols of the Bosporus and the Black Sea. [11]
Upon the conclusion of World War I, Italian troops had taken custody of 14,000 Russian troops that Austria-Hungary had captured during the war, and Italy had interned the Russians on the island of Asinara off the coast of Sardinia. At the initiative of the Italian Socialist Party, the Italian government decided to return the Russians to Russia, where the Russian Civil War was raging, and turn them over to the Bolsheviks. [11] [12] On 19 July 1920, Carlo Alberto Racchia got underway from Constantinople to escort a convoy made up of the steamers Calvi, Melpomene, and Thalia, which had embarked the Russians, for a voyage to Odessa. [11] [12] At 11:00 on 21 July 1920, Carlo Alberto Racchia was steaming 9 nautical miles (17 km; 10 mi) southwest of Cape Fontana and 19 nautical miles (35 km; 22 mi) from Odessa when she was shaken amidships by the explosion of a mine, perhaps one laid by the Ottoman Navy during World War I. [11] The explosion killed 10 men and injured nine, [11] and the ship sustained fatal damage. After her crew abandoned ship in an orderly fashion, Carlo Alberto Racchia sank by the bow in 11 metres (36 feet) of water about 40 minutes after the explosion. [11] Calvi rescued her survivors. [11]
After unsuccessful attempts to recover her wreck, the Regia Marina struck Carlo Alberto Racchia from its naval register in 1922. [11]
In 1938, eighteen years after Carlo Alberto Racchia sank, the Regia Marina reclassified the Mirabello-class ships as destroyers. [13]
The Mirabello-class were a group of three destroyers built for the Regia Marina during World War I. Carlo Alberto Racchia was sunk by a mine in the Black Sea during the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War in 1920. The remaining two ships, obsolescent by 1938, were re-rated as destroyers and participated in World War II. Carlo Mirabello was also lost to a mine while escorting a convoy in 1941. The last surviving ship, Augusto Riboty, was reconfigured as a convoy escort in 1942–1943. The torpedo tubes were removed and depth charges and 20 mm (0.79 in) anti-aircraft guns added. She survived the war and was supposed to be transferred to the Soviet Union as war reparations in 1946, but she was obsolescent so money was accepted instead, and she remained in the italian navy until the early 1950s. The ship was scrapped five years later.
The Battle of the Strait of Otranto of 1917 was the result of an Austro-Hungarian raid during the Adriatic Campaign of World War I on the Otranto Barrage, an Allied naval blockade of the Strait of Otranto. The battle took place on 15 May 1917, and was the largest surface action in the Adriatic Sea during World War I. The Otranto Barrage was a fixed barrier, composed of lightly armed naval drifters with anti-submarine nets coupled with minefields and supported by Allied naval patrols.
Cesare Rossarol was an Italian scout cruiser. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served during World War I, participating in the Adriatic campaign until she was sunk in 1918.
Marsala was a protected cruiser built by the Italian Regia Marina in the 1910s. She was the second and final member of the Nino Bixio class, which were built as scouts for the main Italian fleet. She was equipped with a main battery of six 120-millimeter (4.7 in) guns and had a top speed in excess of 26 knots, but her engines proved to be troublesome in service. Marsala spent World War I based at Brindisi; she was involved in the Battle of the Otranto Straits in May 1917, where she briefly engaged Austro-Hungarian cruisers. Marsala's career was cut short in November 1927 when she was stricken from the naval register and sold for scrap, the result of her unreliable engines and drastic cuts to the naval budget.
SMS Csepel was one of six Tátra-class destroyers built for the kaiserliche und königliche Kriegsmarine shortly before the First World War. Completed in 1913, she helped to sink an Italian destroyer during the action off Vieste in May 1915 after Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary. Two months later the ship participated in an unsuccessful attempt to recapture a small island in the central Adriatic Sea from the Italians. In November and early December Csepel was one of the ships conducting raids off the Albanian coast to interdict the supply lines between Italy and Albania. She was hit one time during the First Battle of Durazzo in late December. Her stern was blown off by a French submarine in early 1916 and her repairs were not completed until early 1917.
SMS Balaton was one of six Tátra-class destroyers built for the kaiserliche und königliche Kriegsmarine shortly before the First World War. Completed in 1913, she did not participate in the attacks on the Italian mainland after Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary in May 1915. Two months later the ship bombarded a small island in the Central Adriatic Sea during an unsuccessful attempt to recapture it from the Italians. In November and early December Balaton was one of the ships conducting raids off the Albanian coast to interdict the supply lines between Italy and Albania. She played a minor role in the 1st Battle of Durazzo in late December. Balaton participated in several unsuccessful raids on the Otranto Barrage in 1917, although she sank an ammunition ship during the Battle of the Strait of Otranto. She was transferred to Italy in 1920 in accordance with the peace treaties ending the war and renamed Zenson. The Regia Marina used her for spare parts; she was discarded in 1923 and subsequently scrapped.
Augusto Riboty was one of three Mirabello-class scout cruisers built for the Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy) during World War I. She was in commission from 1917 to 1950, taking part in the Adriatic Campaign of World War I, and during the interwar period she was at Split during postwar unrest there. Reclassified as a destroyer in 1938, she was the most active Italian destroyer of World War II, during which she participated in the Battle of the Mediterranean on the Axis side in the service of Fascist Italy from 1940 to 1943, then on the Allied side from 1943 to 1945 as a unit of the Italian Co-Belligerent Navy. She was scrapped in 1951.
Carlo Mirabello was one of three Mirabello-class scout cruisers built for the Italian Regia Marina during World War I. She took part in the Adriatic campaign of World War I, seeing action in the largest surface action of that campaign, the Battle of the Strait of Otranto, in May 1917. During the interwar period, she made a cruise to 19 countries and took part in the Italian intervention in the Spanish Civil War, and she was reclassified as a destroyer in 1938. During World War II, she fought in the Battle of the Mediterranean, taking part in the Adriatic campaign and operating in the Adriatic Sea and Ionian Sea until she struck a mine and sank in 1941.
Insidioso was an Italian Indomito-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1914, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign and seeing action in the Battle of the Strait of Otranto in 1917. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was stricken in 1938. Reinstated in 1941, she was captured by Nazi German forces in 1943 during World War II. She then served in the German Kriegsmarine as TA21 until she was sunk in 1944.
Rosolino Pilo was the lead ship of the Italian Rosolino Pilo-class destroyers. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign and seeing action in the Battle of the Strait of Otranto in 1917. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she served in the Mediterranean and Adriatic campaigns of World War II. Briefly captured by Nazi Germany in 1943, she served on the Allied side in the Italian Co-belligerent Navy for the remainder of the war. She served in the postwar Italian Navy and was reclassified as a minesweeper in 1952. She was stricken in 1954.
Pilade Bronzetti was an Italian Rosolino Pilo-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1916, she served in World War I, participating in the Adriatic campaign. Her crew supported Gabriele D'Annunzio′s actions in Fiume in 1920, and as a consequence she was renamed Giuseppe Dezza in 1921. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she took part in the Mediterranean campaign of World War II until the Italian armistice with the Allies, prompting Nazi Germany to capture her. Subsequently operating in the Kriegsmarine as TA35, she participated in the Adriatic Campaign of World War II until she was sunk in 1944.
Antonio Mosto was an Italian Rosolino Pilo-class destroyers. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign and seeing action in the Battle of the Strait of Otranto in 1917. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she participated in the Mediterranean and Adriatic campaigns of World War II. In 1943, she switched to the Allied side, operating as part of the Italian Co-belligerent Navy for the remainder of the war. She served in the postwar Italian Navy and was reclassified as a minesweeper in 1953. She was stricken in 1958.
Ippolito Nievo was an Italian Rosolino Pilo-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served in World War I, participating in the Adriatic campaign, during which she took part in motor torpedo boat raids and operated on convoy escort duty. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was stricken in 1938.
Simone Schiaffino was an Italian Rosolino Pilo-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served in World War I, participating in the Adriatic campaign, including the Battle of the Strait of Otranto. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she took part in the Mediterranean campaign of World War II until she was sunk in 1941.
Ardito was the lead ship of the Italian Ardito-class destroyers. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1913, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was discarded in 1931.
Giovanni Acerbi was the second of four Giuseppe Sirtori-class destroyers built for the Italian Regia Marina during World War I. She played an active part in the later stages of that war's Adriatic campaign, including a significant role in that campaign's largest surface action, the Battle of the Strait of Otranto in 1917. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was serving in the Red Sea Flotilla when Italy entered World War II in June 1940. She was disabled in September 1940, stripped of her armament, and either scuttled or sunk in 1941.
Impavido was an Italian Indomito-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1913, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign and seeing action in the Battle of the Strait of Otranto. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was stricken in 1937.
Indomito was an Italian Indomito-class destroyer. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1913, she served in World War I, playing an active role in the Adriatic campaign and seeing action in the Battle of the Strait of Otranto in 1917. Reclassified as a torpedo boat in 1929, she was stricken in 1937 and subsequently scrapped.
Alessandro Poerio was an Italian scout cruiser, the lead ship of the Alessandro Poerio class. Commissioned into service in the Italian Regia Marina in 1915, she served during World War I, participating in the Adriatic campaign, initially operating in the upper Adriatic Sea and later in the southern Adriatic. She took part in 66 operations during the war, often supporting raids by Italian motor torpedo boats. She was reclassified as a destroyer in 1921 due to her light displacement. Like her sister ships, Cesare Rossarol and Guglielmo Pepe, she was named after a famous Neapolitan light cavalryman who helped defend Venice from attacks by the Imperial Austrian Army during the revolutions in 1848.
Aquila was an Italian Regia Marina scout cruiser in commission from 1917 to 1937. She was laid down for the Royal Romanian Navy as the destroyer Vifor but the Kingdom of Italy requisitioned her while she was under construction. She served in the Regia Marina during World War I, seeing action in the later stages of the Adriatic campaign. In 1928, she took part in rescue operations in the Adriatic Sea for the sunken Italian submarine F 14.
Kingdom of Italy 
