Chinese turret ship Dingyuan

The Dingyuan was a pre-dreadnought battleship and the flagship of the Chinese Beiyang Fleet. Her sister ship was the CHINESE TURRET SHIP Zhenyuan.

Background
As part of his drive to create a modern navy following the Sino-French War, Viceroy Li Hongzhang turned to shipbuilders in Europe, notably in Great Britain and Germany for the latest technology. After extensive negotiations, a contract valued at 1.7 million taels of silver (6.2 million German Goldmark) was signed with the German Vulcan shipyards in Stettin to build an enlarged version of their Sachsen class frigates, which in terms of displacement, armor, and armament would raise the Beiyang Fleet to an equal status with the fleets of the European powers stationed in the Far East. The keel was laid on 31 March 1881, and the ship launched on 28 December 1881, under the supervision of the Qing Envoy to Germany, Xu Jingcheng. Sea trials began on 2 May 1883.

Design
Dingyuan was an "armoured turret ship" design, with a length of 94.5 m, width of 18.4 m and draught of 5.94 m. She was protected by an armoured belt 30 cm thick, which was considered  to be able to resist any naval artillery available at the time.

Dingyuan was powered by a coal-fired reciprocating steam engine, with four cylindrical boilers, and with a rating of 6000 hp, which gave a speed of 14.5 nmi per hour, and a range of around 4500 nmi at 10 kn. Her main armament was four 305 mm Krupp guns paired in two barbettes. These barbettes were mounted asymmetrically forward of amidships – the one on the port side was mounted further forward than the barbette on the starboard side. These guns had a range of 7.8 km, firing with a muzzle velocity of 500 metres per second. Another two 150 mm Krupp guns were installed in turrets at the extreme bow and stern. These guns had a range of 11.0 km. The armament also included six 37 mm guns and three above the waterline torpedo tubes. The complete crew was around 363 officers and men.

Two torpedo boats were also carried on board, enlarging the Dingyuan's striking distance and battle effectiveness. To meet the demands on ship, 20 desalinators were installed which could serve 300 people fresh water daily.

Service record
The delivery of the Dingyuan, sailed by a German crew, started in 1884, but was stopped following a request from the French who were in the middle of a conflict with China which culminated with the Sino-French War (1884–1885). Dingyuan was a very powerful ship and would have drastically altered the balance of power in China’s favor had it and her sister ship been available at the time of the conflict.

After peace was concluded on 3 July 1885, and Dingyuan, Zhenyuan and the cruiser CHINESE CRUISER Jiyuan finally received permission to transit the Suez Canal under a German merchant flag and arrived in Tianjin in China on 29 October 1885.

Dingyuan was based out of Lüshunkou, the chief naval station of the Beiyang Fleet. In 1886, she participated in show of force, touring Hong Kong, the Japanese port of Nagasaki, Korean ports of Busan and Wonsan, and the Russian naval base of Vladivostok together with Zhenyuan and four cruisers. While in Nagasaki on 13 August 1886, a number of drunken sailors from Zhenyuan became involved in a brawl in a local brothel, during which a Japanese police officer was fatally stabbed. Attributing the issue to lax discipline, Qing Admiral Ding Ruchang suspended shore leave for a day, but allowed 450 sailors to go ashore on 15 August. Contrary to an agreement with local authorities, many were armed. Anticipating trouble due to increasing anti-Chinese sentiment by the local population, the Japanese police deployed additional men, but were unable to prevent a riot from erupting between stone-throwing locals and the men from Zhenyuan. In what came to be called the Nagasaki Incident, 6 sailors were killed and 45 wounded, along with five Japanese policemen killed and 16 wounded. In handling the diplomatic incident, the British military advisor to the Qing military, Captain William M. Lang took a hard line against Japanese authorities, refusing to make any apologies or reparations, and reminding the Japanese of the overwhelming firepower of his fleet and threatening war. However, the incident was resolved through diplomatic efforts.

Dingyuan served as Admiral Ding Ruchang's flagship from the start of the First Sino-Japanese War. At the Battle of the Yalu River on 17 September 1894, refused orders from Admiral Ding which would have exposed the ship to fire from the Japanese squadron, and opened fire from an extreme range. Due to a design defect, Dingyuan was unable to fire its main battery directly forward without destroying its flying bridge – a fact that the captain was well aware of. Admiral Ding and most of his staff were incapacitated by this incident. Japanese fire also damaged the Dingyuan’s ability to signal other ships in the fleet. Although Dingyuan was more powerful than any ship in the Japanese fleet at the time, ammunition for her main guns was in short supply, of the wrong size, or was defective through years of internal corruption, lack of funding and incompetence. At the end of the battle, Dingyuan was able to escape to Lüshunkou. She was then ordered to Weihaiwei when Lüshunkou was threatened during the Battle of Lushunkou.

In early 1895, the remnants of the Beiyang Fleet was based at Liugong Island within Weihaiwei. During the Battle of Weihaiwei, the Imperial Japanese Army seized the landward fortifications of the naval base, the Japanese navy attacked from seaward. On 5 February 1895, the Dingyuan was seriously damaged after being hit by a Japanese torpedo and later cannon fire. Captain Liu Buchan ordered the ship scuttled, before committing suicide on the surrender of the Beiyang Fleet by Admiral Ding Ruchang.

Reconstruction
To commemorate this period of history, the Weihai Port Bureau and local Weigao Group invested 50 million yuan (approximately US$6 million) to construct a replica Dingyuan. The replica's construction began on a scale of 1:1 on December 20, 2003. The duplicate Dingyuan is now a floating museum. Inside are records of Dingyuan, the Beiyang Fleet, the First Sino-Japanese War and life-at-sea exhibits.