Fighting Sailing Ships in WWI

[Chantry]

During WWI, in an effort to deal with the German submarines, the Royal Navy converted some 58 civilian ships into Q Ships among which were a number of either all sail powered or sail powered with an auxiliary engine.  Many were armed with a 4" gun and several 3" guns as well as machine guns.  Despite the slowness and potential steering problems due to wind, several of the sailing ships managed to sink German submarines.

 

There was one Q Ship captain (not sure if a sailing ship or motorized ship) who had a standing order in the log book, which he required all the officers aboard to sign their names, that if a torpedo was sighted coming at the ship the officer of the deck was required to do his best to steer the ship INTO the path of the torpedo so it would hit the ship.  The captain hoped that having a torpedo hit the ship would draw the submarine in close enough to engage them with gunfire.  I'll note that many Q ships carried wood or drums or other cargo that keep the ship afloat even after a torpedo hit.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q-ship

[Rip Snorter]

More yet, another source https://www.maritimeprofessional.com/blogs/post/qships-13809

[Pariah, SASS #26619]

And on the other side, the German navy had SMS Seeadler, a fully-rigged sailing ship that functioned as a commerce raider during the war. Her voyage of 225 days (and 15 Empire cargo ships taken/sunk) made for a great sea drama during the ugly dawn of mechanized warfare. There was a great book written after the war about her captain, Felix von Luckner: The Sea Devil, by Lowell Thomas.  

[Church Key, SASS # 33713]

My father's school ship when he attended the Massachusetts Nautical School (now the Massachusetts Merchant Marine Acadamy) in 1930-33 was originally the USS Ranger an Alert class gunboat commissioned in 1876 and later renamed the USS Nantucket. She operated as a gunboat in WWI. Was finally decommissioned in 1940 and scrapped in 1958. USS Ranger