by Paul Helfrich
1/2400 SMS Ostfriesland (GHQ)
I recently sent in some photos of ships from GHQ's "Great War" series - the SMS Baden and the HMS Queen Elizabeth - and I made the mistake of saying both were at Jutland. Boy, is my face red - in truth, neither was. The QE's sisters were, but the Queen herself was under repair at the time. And the Baden was not yet in commission. Thanks to the alert readers who caught my error.
In an attempt to partially redeem myself, here's a ship that was at Jutland: the battleship SMS Ostfriesland. She was undamaged in the battle but struck a mine on her way back to Wilhelmshaven. She was repaired and back in service by July.
At war's end, she was surrendered to the Allies and eventually (April 1920) turned over to the US Navy. The ship was taken to New York and examined in dry dock before going back to sea.
She met her end as part of Gen. Billy Mitchell's much-ballyhooed demonstrations of bombing from aircraft in the summer of 1921. As part of the PR buildup accompanying those demonstrations, the Ostfriesland was hyped to the press as "the unsinkable Ostfriesland," when in reality she was a fairly typical battleship of 1908-09 vintage, basically obsolete even in 1921. After being hit by some of the heaviest bombs in the Army Air Corps' arsenal, she sank on July 21, 1921, off the Virginia Capes.
The model is of GHQ's typical high quality. The GHQ line is certainly the most economical way to build up your own Grand or High Seas Fleet - space-efficient, too!
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