 two battlecruisers to hunt down and destroy von Spee's squadron, accomplished at the Battle of the Falkland Islands on 8 December 1914.
Scharnhorst was 144.6 meters (474 ft 5 in) long overall and had a beam of 21.6 m (70 ft 10 in) and a draft of 8.37 m (27 ft 6 in). The ship displaced 11,616 tonnes (11,433 long tons) as designed and 12,985 t (12,780 long tons) at deep load. She was powered by three triple-expansion steam engines with eighteen coal-fired water-tube boilers. Her engines were rated at 25,644 indicated horsepower (19,123 kW), for a top speed of 22.5 knots (41.7 km/h; 25.9 mph). Scharnhorst's crew consisted of 52 officers and 788 enlisted men; of these, 14 officers and 62 enlisted men were assigned to the squadron commander's staff and were additional to the standard complement.
Scharnhorst's primary armament consisted of eight 21 cm (8.2 inch) SK L/40 guns,[b] four in twin gun turrets, one fore and one aft of the main superstructure, the other four mounted in single-gun wing turrets. Secondary armament included six 15 cm (5.9 inch) SK L/40 guns in casemates and eighteen 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/35 guns mounted in casemates. She was also equipped with four 45 cm (18 in) submerged torpedo tubes. One was mounted in the bow, one on each broadside, and the fourth was placed in the stern. The ship's armored belt was 15 cm thick and the gun turrets had 18 cm (7.1 in) thick faces. Her deck was 3.5 to 6 cm (1.4 to 2.4 in) thick, with the heavier armor protecting the ship's engine and boiler rooms and ammunition magazines.
Named for Generalleutnant (Lieutenant General) Gerhard von Scharnhorst, a Prussian military reformer during the Napoleonic Wars, Scharnhorst was laid down at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg, Germany on 22 March 1905, with the construction number 175. She was launched on 23 March 1906, and Generalfeldmarschall (Field Marshal) Gottlieb Graf von Haeseler gave a speech and christened the ship at her launching ceremony. She was commissioned into the fleet a year and a half later on 24 October 1907. She then began sea trials; while conducting speed tests she exceeded her design speed by one knot, reaching 23.5 knots (43.5 km/h; 27.0 mph).
From 6 to 11 November, her trials were interrupted by a voyage to Vlissingen in the Netherlands and Portsmouth in Britain in company with Kaiser Wilhelm II's yacht Hohenzollern and the light cruiser Königsberg. On 14 January 1908, Scharnhorst ran aground off the Bülk Lighthouse and suffered serious underwater damage. Repairs were made at Blohm & Voss, and lasted until 22 February. She then resumed her trials, which continued until the end of April. On 1 May, she replaced Yorck as the flagship of the reconnaissance forces of the High Seas Fleet, under the command of Konteradmiral (Rear Admiral) August von Heeringen. During the rest of the year, she participated in the normal peacetime routine of training exercises and fleet maneuvers.
East Asia Squadron
On 11 March 1909, Scharnhorst was assigned to the Ostasiengeschwader (East Asia Squadron); Yorck replaced her as the reconnaissance squadron flagship. After completing preparations for the voyage, Scharnhorst left Kiel on 1 April; aboard was Konteradmiral Friedrich von Ingenohl, who was to take command of the East Asia Squadron upon his arrival. On 29 April, Scharnhorst rendezvoused with Fürst Bismarck, the flagship of the East Asia Squadron, in Colombo. There, Scharnhorst took over the role of squadron flagship. At the time, the squadron also included the light cruisers Leipzig and Arcona and several gunboats and torpedo boats. In July and August, Scharnhorst went on a cruise in the Yellow Sea and in August surveyed ports in the area. She spent December and early January 1910 in Hong Kong for the Christmas and New Year's festivities, in company with Leipzig and the gunboat Luchs.
In January 1910 Scharnhorst, Leipzig, and Luchs went on a tour of East Asian ports, including Bangkok, Manila, and stops in Sumatra and North Borneo. By 22 March, Scharnhorst and Leipzig had returned to the German port at Tsingtao. In the meant