SMS Camaeleon
| History | |
|---|---|
| Name | Camaeleon |
| Namesake | SMS Camäleon |
| Operator | Imperial German Navy |
| Builder | AG Weser, Bremen |
| Laid down | 1878 |
| Launched | 21 December 1878 |
| Commissioned | 10 November 1879 |
| Decommissioned | 22 September 1891 |
| Stricken | 28 June 1909 |
| Fate | Converted to a barge |
| General characteristics | |
| Class & type | Wespe-class gunboat |
| Displacement | |
| Length | 46.4 m (152 ft 3 in) |
| Beam | 10.6 m (34 ft 9 in) |
| Draft | 3.2 to 3.4 m (10 ft 6 in to 11 ft 2 in) |
| Installed power |
|
| Propulsion | |
| Speed | 11.2 knots (20.7 km/h; 12.9 mph) |
| Range | 700 nmi (1,300 km; 810 mi) at 7 knots (13 km/h; 8.1 mph) |
| Complement |
|
| Armament | 1 × 30.5 cm (12 in) MRK L/22 gun |
| Armor | |
SMS Camaeleon was an ironclad gunboat of the Wespe class built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy) in the 1870s. The ships, which were armed with a single 30.5 cm (12 in) MRK L/22 gun, were intended to serve as part of a coastal defense fleet. Because Camaeleon was a purely defensive vessel, she saw little active use, apart from brief stints in active service for sea trials in 1880, followed by short training periods in through the 1880s and into the early 1890s. She spent the rest of her career in the reserve fleet, first in the Baltic Sea and then in the North Sea. Camaeleon was eventually struck from the naval register in 1909 and sold for use as a storage hulk the following year, though her ultimate fate is unknown.