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About SMS Wespe
SMS Wespe was the lead ship of the Wespe class of ironclad gunboats built for the German Kaiserliche Marine 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. Wespe saw little active service after her initial sea trials in 1877, being commissioned for short training periods in 1880, 1881, and 1885. She was refitted twice during her career to strengthen her armament, in 1883 and 1892–1894. Wespe was struck from the naval register in 1909 and then used as a barge. In 1911, she was sold to the Dutch firm Hollandsche Aanneming Maatschappij and converted into a cutter suction dredger. While being towed from the Dutch East Indies to Australia in 1926, she sank in a storm off Newcastle, New South Wales; all three of her crew survived.
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