SMS Monarch

A painting showing SMS Wien and the other ships of the Monarch class on maneuvers
History
Austro-Hungarian Empire
Name:	SMS Monarch
Ordered:	May 1892
Builder:	Pola Naval Arsenal
Laid down:	31 July 1893
Launched:	9 May 1895
Sponsored by:	Archduchess Maria Theresa
Commissioned:	11 May 1898
Decommissioned:	14 March 1918
Fate:	Scrapped, 1921
General characteristics
Class and type:	Monarch-class coastal defense ship
Displacement:	5,785 tonnes (5,694 long tons) (full load)
Length:	99.22 m (325 ft 6 in)
Beam:	17 m (55 ft 9 in)
Draught:	6.4 m (21 ft 0 in)
Installed power:	8,600 ihp (6,400 kW) 5 × cylindrical boilers
Propulsion:	2 × Shafts 2 × Vertical triple-expansion steam engines
Speed:	17.5 knots (32.4 km/h; 20.1 mph)
Range:	3,500 nmi (6,500 km; 4,000 mi) @ 9 knots (17 km/h; 10 mph)
Complement:	26 officers and 397 enlisted men
Armament:	2 × 2 - 240 mm (9.4 in) Krupp guns 6 × 1 - 150 mm (5.9 in) Škoda guns 10 × 1 - 47 mm (1.9 in) Škoda guns 4 × 1 - 47 mm (1.9 in) Hotchkiss guns 2 × 450 mm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes
Armour:	Waterline belt: 120–270 mm (4.7–10.6 in) Deck: 40 mm (1.6 in) Gun turrets: 250 mm (9.8 in) Casemate: 80 mm (3.1 in) Conning tower: 220 mm (8.7 in)

SMS Monarch  ("His Majesty's Ship Monarch") was the lead ship of the Monarch-class coastal defense ship built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy in the 1890s. After their commissioning, Monarch and the two other Monarch-class ships made several training cruises in the Mediterranean Sea in the early 1900s. Monarch and her sisters formed the 1st Capital Ship Division of the Austro-Hungarian Navy until they were replaced by the newly commissioned Habsburg-class pre-dreadnought battleships at the turn of the century. In 1906 the three Monarchs were placed in reserve and only recommissioned during the annual summer training exercises. After the start of World War I, Budapest was recommissioned and assigned to 5th Division together with her sisters.

The division was sent to Cattaro in August 1914 to attack Montenegrin and French artillery that was bombarding the port, and Monarch remained there for the rest of the war. The ship was decommissioned in early 1918 and became an accommodation ship. She was awarded to Great Britain by the Paris Peace Conference in 1920. The British sold her for scrap and she was broken up in Italy beginning in 1921.

At only 5,785 tonnes (5,694 long tons) maximum displacement, the Monarch class was less than half the size of the battleships of other major navies at the time, and were officially designated as coast defense ships.Austria-Hungary's only coastline was on the Adriatic Sea, and the Austro-Hungarian government believed that the role of its navy was solely to defend the nation's coast.