Archimede-class submarine

The Archimede" class were a group of four submarines built for the (Royal Italian Navy) in the early 1930s. The boats fought in the Spanish Civil War (under the Nationalist flag) and in World War II. Under Spanish colors, these boats were known as the General Mola" class, and remained in service until 1959.
Design.
The ships were designed by the firm Cavallini and were a partially double hulled design. They were an enlarged version of the with ballast tanks rearranged, greater range, fuel and torpedo capacity for ocean service. Like most of the later ocean-going submarines of the Italian navy, their deck armament consisting of two 100 mm guns was conceived to deal with armed merchantmen in surface combat. That was the case of the submarine , which between 5 and 14 January 1941 sank the British steamers "Shakespear" and "Eumaeus" off Cabo Verde after a protracted gunfire action. Another example occurred when the "Torricelli" faced three British destroyers and a sloop while surfaced in the Red Sea. Before being sunk, the submarine hit the sloop and damaged the destroyer . "Khartoum" exploded near Perim after a torpedo fault set a fire that reached her magazines later that day. They also mounted two anti-aircraft machine guns. The number of torpedoes was increased from 12 on the "Settembrini" class to 16.
Boats.
All boats were built by the shipyard of Franco Tosi at Taranto, between 1930 and 1934.
"Torricelli" and "Archimede" took part in the Spanish Civil war under the Italian flag since 1936, carrying out undercover operations. Eventually both submarines were secretly delivered to the Spanish rebel navy on April 1937.