Ark Royal vs Bismark

[renrich]

When the "pocker battleships" were launched the question was, how to counter them? They were faster than almost all the ships which could outgun them and outgunned any ship which could catch them. The simple answer which was proven at The Plate was that several cruisers, if well handled, could defeat them. The Spee had to concentrate her 11 inch guns to try and disable the CA because of her 8 inch guns. She did disable Exeter but her 5.9s which were only broadside guns could not effectively counter the two CLs. Once the CA was disposed of, the eleven inchers could fend off the CLs but by that time Spee had been damaged fairly severely.

Probably an encounter between two County class CAs or two Pensacola class CAs would have had the same outcome. The Exeter was a very "light" heavy cruiser with only six-eight inch guns and the two CLs were rather small but very efficient CLs.

 

[Markus]

Sort-of. Wasn´t pocket-BB doctrine calling for steering away from cruisers to use the 11" guns´ range advantage as long as possible? But AGS steered towards the three cruisers. IIRC she had misidentified them as one CL and two DD.

 

[tail end charlie]

With regard to the Graf Spee, it encountered 3 small or medium cruisers which hit her with 8 and 6 inch shells and caused enough damage to reneder her un sea worthy. I know there were many factors involved with the GS but since she would always be fighting a running battle shouldnt she have had more guns facing backwards?

My point was almost every Battleship big or small seemed to suffer damage large or small which rendered them unserviceable for months or years. I must confess I dunt understand all the posts here about armour and armament on here but it seems to me to make a ship able to withstand any shell and torpedo attack it would be so heavy slow and costly it would be useless or too expensive to lose.

 

[renrich]

The Graf Spee was a compromise like all ships. Her armor was only cruiser like and IMO her armament design was faulty. Her 5.9s were behind splinter shields and their traverse was limited to less than 180 degrees. Since the Spee correctly took on the CA with her heavy armament, that left the two CLs who separated from the CA to only be engaged by four 5.9s at most at any one time. Four guns against sixteen. IMO she should have mounted a triple 5.9 as in Nurnberg superimposed in gunhouses over each main battery turret and had her 4.1 AA guns heavied up to 5 inch dual purpose guns. She then could have engaged the CLs with three guns each and the 5 inchers would have been able to contribute also. The 5 inchers would have been adequate for sinking merchantmen also.

 

[Glider]

Unfortunately she would also have been much larger and heavier, which have defeated the whole concept before it started.

 

[tail end charlie]

The Graf Spee was a compromise like all ships. Her armor was only cruiser like and IMO her armament design was faulty. Her 5.9s were behind splinter shields and their traverse was limited to less than 180 degrees. Since the Spee correctly took on the CA with her heavy armament, that left the two CLs who separated from the CA to only be engaged by four 5.9s at most at any one time. Four guns against sixteen. IMO she should have mounted a triple 5.9 as in Nurnberg superimposed in gunhouses over each main battery turret and had her 4.1 AA guns heavied up to 5 inch dual purpose guns. She then could have engaged the CLs with three guns each and the 5 inchers would have been able to contribute also. The 5 inchers would have been adequate for sinking merchantmen also.

Renrich you are describing the single action of the river plate and its all true. However every increase in armour and guns turrets and torpedo protection is more weight which means more power bigger engines etc etc etc. The ships that the GF sank could have been sunk by any ship carrying one 5 inch gun. The whole thing seems to lead to a massive ship costing a fortune and manned by thousands of skilled men which can only be repaired in one or two places.

 

[Glider]

Personally I would have simply dropped the 5.9 and 4.1 guns plus the torpedos and replaced them with a uniform Heavy AA gun in the 4.5 - 5in range.

 

[Shortround6]

The Graf Spee pre-dated the the 9 gun cruisers and their turrets (or the design) may not have been available when the Graf Spee was designed/built.

The Weight of even the Koln type Triple turret was over 5 times greater than the single mount guns so for the weight of 2 triple turrets you could have 10 single mounts with change left over.

Mounting the triple turrets in superfiring positions would mean a longer hull and more hull weight.

Mounting the triple turrets in superfiring positions means that they are at least a deck height higher than the single mounts and that affects the ships stability. Something else would need to be cut, the ship made wider or ballast carried in the bottom to restore stability, or a combination.

Upping the the AA armament gives same problems.

The Graf Spee's were built to a treaty limit of 10,000 tons. They were supposed to be replacements for the old Deutschland pre-dreadnaughts. While the class was over weight by at least 20% the lack of experience with welding, diesel engines and such items as aluminum furniture/fittings by foreign navies made it hard to call "foul".
adding 40-60 feet of length, a bit more beam and extending the length of the armor belt would have pushed things a bit too far. Other naval architects may have strongly suspected the Graf Spee's were over weight as it was but not be able to prove it. using the 'improvements' as given would have pushed things into the unbelievable with any excuse range.
The Design and construction of these ships pre-dates Hitler's rise to power and while the Weimar Republic may have chaffed under the Versailles Treaty they may not have been willing to push things as hard. Or perhaps the lack of response to these treaty violation helped embolden Hitler later?

 

[renrich]

Leipzig was launched in 1929 with triple 5.9s. Deutschland was launched in 1931 so triple 5.9 mounts design must have been available. I am (obviously) no naval architect but if one looks at the profile of the pocket BBs there looks like there is room between the eleven inch turrets fore and aft for a superimposed triple mount gunhouse before encountering the main superstructure without having to lengthen the ship. I specifically mention gunhouses rather than turrets for the 5.9s in order to save weight. The Pensacolas used gunhouses rather than turrets in order to save weight at the sacrifise of protection and they had triple eight inchers over twins. No question that there would have been more weight up high but the Pensacolas and the Deutschlands were remarkably similar as far as physical dimensions and it looks like that the switch might have been doable. The ammunition arrangement for the 5.9s would have been simplified also.

 

[delcyros]

Only DEUTSHLAND and SCHEER fall under the rules of Versailles. By 1932, it was considered to be rejected for substantial parts when Germany retreated it´s delegations from the Geneve Peace talks and the signing of a Treaty with the US, Britain, France and Italy at dec., 11th, 1932, which ended the naval rules of Versailles (From this point onwards, Germany was entitled to buildt any ships under the same conditions like the aformentioned nations).

Admiral SCHEER was also affected by this but the plans closed already and only light improvements to the superstructure (larger CT, more AA and controll) could be made on this ship laid down summer 1931.

Consequently, the plans for the third ship, already approved for with the first rate early in 1932 were not fully closed and only little work begun on Panzerschiff C (later to be known GRAF SPEE), laid down in oct. 1932. Therefore, the ship could become much larger from this point on (it was considered for a moment to drastically improve armour protection and install High pressure Steam turbines for a higher speed instead). Altough the changes were substantial (better armour protection, new TDS and belt with better splinterprotection generally), the new situation was not fully exploited.
The ship was Treaty compliant when redesign was affected to it.

superfiring triple 5.9in turrets certainly are a possibility. I would rather drop them completely, install a different armour scheme and put a uniform 8.8cmL71 AAA on it´s sides. Instead of triple turrets, I would have preferred quad turrets, which were considered...

 

[Shortround6]

You are correct on the timing of the triple 5.9 turrets. My mistake and I apologize.

I am not sure about the 'room' you speak of. On two of the ships the space to the rear of the forward turret was occupied by an armoured conning tower with a large rangefinder mounted on the roof. The space just forward of the rear turret was occupied by an anti aircraft mount which can be shifted to space left by removal of side 5.9 in guns. But just forward of that is the aft fire control station with another large rangefinder. A third rangefinder was mounted on the foretop. These rangefinder/firecontrol stations/directors could control either/both the 11in guns or the 5.9s and allowed for the engagement of multiple targets (up to the number of directors) at the same time. Eliminating directors in favor of center line guns may actually decrease the ships ability to fight multiple opponents.
The American distinction between gun mounts and turrets may be an exercise in semantics. Both types had roller paths and shell hoists. The main distinction seems to be the distance down into the ship each went and the powder handling arrangements. The "mounts" seem to have located the powder handling rooms much higher in the ship or relied on hand passage of powder from lower down to the powder hoists/powder rooms. The "turrets" had broken powder hoists ( two non-connecting powder hoists) to bring the powder up from deep in the ship.
The Royal Navy 4.7in gun houses on the L&M classes were actually on center pivots with non-rotating shell and powder (case) hoists, not quite the same thing.

The weight of the American "mounts" is given as 437 tons for a triple and a twin compared to the 600tons for the German triple 11in turret (rotating weight). the weight of a Koln turret is about 134 tons (rotating weight) and a max armour of 30mm. Protection isn't going to get much lighter than that.

 

[renrich]

SR, not a problem on the timing of the triple mounts. I have done a lot of study on the Pensacolas since one of my uncles was a CGM(chief gunner's mate) on CA25, Salt Lake City, when PH occurred through 1943, when he was transferred to New Jersey, I think. In Janes the housings on the main guns of CA24 and CA25 are called gunhouses while in later cruisers they are called turrets. The main difference I can see is that the gunhouses have only 1.5 inch armor. They are also called gunhouses in Leipzig which have 2 inch armor. Perhaps the difference between gunhouses and turrets is the thickness of armor. It is surprising to me about the similarity in size between the Pensacolas and the pocket BBs. The BBS have a slightly greater beam by about four feet and look beamier longitudinally but they are almost the same length. IN fact, in the movie, "Pursuit of the Graf Spee" the Graf Spee copies a picture of a US cruiser in Janes to disguise herself with an extra funnel and it is a Pensacola. In pictures I have there looks like there is room behind A turret by relocating the range finder and behind Y turret by relocating the AA gun for the triple 5.9s.

It seems to me that the pocket BBs were designed for the guerre de course with their long range and relative high speed and heavy armament but light armor. Therefore they must have expected that they would have to face multiple cruisers in battle. Those broadside 5.9s would be more than adequate to sink merhant ships but are very awkward when facing warships with their limited traverse if the main guns are being used against a single target. In a stern chase against two CAs, the two CAs would only have to contend with one triple eleven inch turret and possibly two 5.9s and they were County Class, they would always have eight- eight inch guns bearing and with their superior speed could sheer out and perhaps bring more guns to bear.

Incidently, if one is interested in WW2 cruiser pictures, google USS Salt Lake City and because she had such a distinguished battle record, there are a number of web sites with many interesting photos including some when she was in action.

 

[delcyros]

DKM GRAF SPEE´s armour concept is alongside ideas formulated in the interwar period with A/N schemes beeing considered to be important. She is well armoured and protected for a cruiser of her period, while many contemporary cruisers lack either armour thickness or coverage.

The idea behind her concept was to keep shells out of the ship´s vitals or- in case of the embedded vitals- if that´s not possible to detonate them in the main bulwark space with the major longitudinal armoured torpedo bulkhead behind acting as a splinter catcher thus providing additional protection to the vitals.

Most contemporary cruisers had insufficiant armour protection in the three main areas of protection:

(A) underwater protection
(B) protection of the embedded vitals (ship controll, magazines and machinery spaces)
(C) protection of the exposed vitals (comm tubes, conning towers, firetops, barbettes and turrets)

[A] underwater protection:
Except for the longitudinal major seperating bulkhead provided to the japanese heavy cruisers starting with MOGAMI, no other cruiser employed a full blown anti torpedo defense consisting of longitudinal armoured bulkheads. In DEUTSCHLAND, these were made from Nickel Steel armour and couldn´t be put down to the ships bottom owing to weight considerations (and this in fact created a zone of weakness) and terminated at the joint with the double bottom. The system was unsound against torpedoes but it was also designed to augment the rather light 50-80mm thick main armour belt and when beeing torpedoed by HMS SPEARFISH in april 1940, the whole stern collapsed and she shipped some 1,300ts of water. The torpedo hit outside the TDS but it remains unlikely that such a massive blast could be contained by the narrow TDS amidships. It was tested in june 1941 when she suffered another torpedohit by a Bristol Beaufort. Despite the rather light warhead of this torpedo, the TB bulged in (as designed) but the lower joint failed echoing the design weakness of the bulkhead mentioned above, allowing much water to flood the port machinery spaces.
It may be questioned whether or not a full blown TDS is benefitial on a cruiser sized ship like DEUTSCHLAND, generally but the RMA sticked to the idea. The next ship SCHEER had a slightly thinner bulkhead (40mm) made from a new and extra ductile new Ww material, but still running not down to the bottom of the ship. Only GRAF SPEE had a 45mm Ww bulkhead reaching from the main armour deck down to the bottom of the ship (inclined 15 deg). I already mentioned that inclined bulkheads tended to fail on real life impacts (which is why RN, the DKM, the FN and the USN abandoned them in their last designs).

Nevertheless it represented some kind of protection not aviable to any cruiser at her own time. Effectively, the armoured bulkhead also catched diving projectiles (only japanese cruisers had main belts which in theory could do this, running down highly tapared, to the ships bottom).

protection of the embedded vitals
Main belt protection of GRAF SPEE was strong. The 100mm thick belt extended for a height of two decks or 4.7m (15.5ft) and covered the whole citadell externally while beeing inclined 12 deg. In addition there were splinterproof bulkheads running both, behind (TDS) and in top of the belt (40mm thick for two deck heights).
In contrast to this, the side belt of other Treaty Cruisers varied between 3in and 4in (only locally at the magazines, sometimes not externally but internally like in the COUNTY´s), with the coverage beeing very small (in japanese cruisers the height coverage was aviable for less than 5ft instead of the more than 15ft in the GRAF SPEE, rendering any kind of belt hits unprobable in the first place).
The armour decks were 40mm (1.57in) thick over the machinery spaces and 70mm (2.75in) thick over the magazines, which compares favourably with period contemporaries which typically showed figures of in between 1.0in and 1.5in for the machinery spaces and 1.5in - 2.25in for the magazines respectively (PENSACOLA-class, NORTHHAMPTON-class, NEW ORLEANS-class, TRENTO-class, COUNTY class, TAKAO-class, MYOKO-class). Only the french ALGERIE and the italian ZARA-class cruisers approached or exceeded that level of protection in some areas (100-150mm main belt, 70-80mm over magazines, 25mm over machinery spaces) but both fell short in others. Japanese cruisers of this period typically had that level of thickness (4 to 5in belts) but the coverage was very low, often less than 5ft for max. belt thickness before taper began to reduce it and the deck armour was light (~30mm). There was no additional protection with internal splinterbelts provided to any of these designs except for ALGERIE.

[C] protection of the xposed vitals
The CT of GRAF SPEE was 150mm (5.91in) thick, which compares favourably against all but the newest CA designs (typically 3 to 4in except for the newest US designs which tended to have up to 7in armoured CT´s). Her Barbette´s were armoured 130 to 140mm thick (5 to 5.5in), a good level better than the 1 to 3in typically found in Treaty cruisers (with the exception of ZARA and the BALTIMORE-class) and while most other cruisers of her period had extremely thin turret protection (1in typically in japanese, british cruisers and old US cruisers, 3-4in in italian and french cruisers and 5in in the newest ZARA-class and BALTIMORE´s), GRAF SPEE´s main turrets were provided with 145mm (5.7in) to 170mm (6.7in) thick armour.

The most critical component in her fighting against cruisers is that it´s main battery could defeat any of them with HE rounds (typically able to defeat 1.75in US STS aequivalent of armour with lateral fragmentation in some 3 ft. distance and able to defeat up to 4in of armour with HE/common at contact, which puts all of the aforementioned designs at risk through turret and /or deck perforation), while a truly modern hard capped, small filler APC was necessary to deal with the very sound armour protection system of GRAF SPEE. These didn´t contributed to the effect behind the plate in the same way like HE did, for comparison: An 11.13in HE shipped some 48.06lbs of high explosive, while an 8in APC contained typically 3 to 4lbs of high explosive. The damage GRAF SPEE traded the few time it engaged with it´s main battery prooved that it wasn´t even encessary to hit them, one turret of HMS AJAX was rendered unservicable by splinters while beeing straddled by 11.1in HE and straddles or shorts ruptured the hull of HMS EXETER in many places. The decision to armour Treaty cruisers weight efficiently A/N was putting them at risk here. More armour applied to larger surfaces may have helped moren than a thick but eventually to narrow main belt and GS wouldn´t need to use APC against them, putting the soft or lightly armoured parts of the ships at risk of the nondelay HE or short delay HE/base fused. This allows the PBB to overpower a cruiser. It requires a well protected ZARA- or a BALTIMORE-class cruiser to force a PBB to shift entirely to HE/base fused or APC.

 

[Juha]

Hello Delcyros
IMHO its a bit odd to compare, according to You, post-treaty ship to smaller and older treaty cruisers and anyway, New Orleans class had 9 × 8 inch/55 caliber guns, 8 × 5 inch/25 caliber guns and 8 × .50 caliber machine guns, and armour 3-5 inch belt, 1.25-2.25 inch deck, 1.5-8 inch turrets, 5 inch barbettes (6.5 inch barbettes in CA 38) and 5 inch CT and that in treaty hull. Or better still USS Wichita, commissioned 16 Feb 39, nearly 600t overweight after it got its 7th and 8th 5"/38 DP guns (+200t ballast), 4"-6" belt on 0.63" STS, 2.25" deck, 7" barbettes, 8"-1.5" turrets, 6" CT with 2.25" roof. So not a big difference in protection between AGS and the smaller Wichita but AGS's deeper belt.

On the hit that disabled Ajax rear turrets, all British and Commonwealth sources I have read speaks on one hit, not a near miss, which disabled both rear turrets, Y was only jammed. The most exact I have seen is:
CHAPTER 4 — The Battle of the River Plate | NZETC
The Royal New Zealand Navy CHAPTER 4 — The Battle of the River Plate

CHAPTER 4 The Battle of the River Plate

…The Ajax received her first direct hit at 7.25 a.m. when an 11-inch delay-action shell struck her after superstructure. It penetrated 42 feet, passing through several cabins and then the trunk of 'X' turret, wrecking the machinery below the gunhouse and finally exploding in the Commodore's sleeping quarters, doing considerable damage. A part of the base of the shell struck 'Y' barbette1 close to the training rack and jammed the turret. Thus, this hit put both the after turrets and their four guns out of action. It also killed four and wounded six of the crew of 'X' turret...

Juha

 

[Juha]

On AGS protection, according to Koop's and Schmolke's Pocket Battleships of the Deutchland class (2000) AGS had only 80mm belt incl 12 deg, and that was fairly deep, with the narrow 50mm belt under it the whole belt was deep. Horizontal armour was according the book 17mm upper deck plus 20-40mm armoured deck. So according to that info late US treaty cruisers had more or less same armour protection but thicker but narrower belt, so IMHO AGS hasn't very strong protection for 14.890t standard displacement ship. Because AGS armour wasn't adequate against US 118kg AP shells, I would say that it would have been hard pressed against Wichita.

Juha

 

[Glider]

On AGS protection, according to Koop's and Schmolke's Pocket Battleships of the Deutchland class (2000) AGS had only 80mm belt incl 12 deg, and that was fairly deep, with the narrow 50mm belt under it the whole belt was deep. Horizontal armour was according the book 17mm upper deck plus 20-40mm armoured deck. So according to that info late US treaty cruisers had more or less same armour protection but thicker but narrower belt, so IMHO AGS hasn't very strong protection for 14.890t standard displacement ship. Because AGS armour wasn't adequate against US 118kg AP shells, I would say that it would have been hard pressed against Wichita.

Juha

A fair comment but of course shells fly in both directions and one hit by an 11in, is almost certain to do significant damage as penetration is almost guaranteed.

 

[delcyros]

Koop/Schmolke based his data of the AGS belt on Breyer. This information is already outdated with new primary sources found in the Bundesarchiv. Researcher from the Gröner circle have unearthed documents of the original Baubeschreibung and it gives firm evidence of 100mm Wh/n.A. instead (with plates treated to a very hard tensile strength of 96 Kg/mm³ or 275 BHN). This and other armour improvements also perfectly explain the difference in armour weight between SCHEER and GRAF SPEE. The 100mm main belt of AGS covered 2/3 of it´s waterline length, ranged from frame 29 to 148 and was inclined by 13 degrees (DEUTSCHLAND: 12 deg and SCHEER: 14 deg).
The lower armour deck was only 20mm thick between the 40mm thick splinterbulkheads and under the 20mm locally armoured weatherdeck. It was 40mm thick between splinterbulkhead and main torpedo bulkhead and 30mm from there out to the main belt. Around the main turrets, 70mm thick plating has been applied on the main armour deck to cover the magazines.

It should also be mentioned that only the PBB´s, HIPPERs and post WICHITA-class US CA applied face hardened armour to their respective exposed vitals, rendering them almost immune to the usual capped common projectiles in service in the navies (particularely british 8in SAP / SAPC and 6in CPC and japanese soft capped AP). This resembles a very strong armour protection by the standarts of any cruiser. I considered the WICHITA-class CA towards the BALTIMORE´s.
Older US CA were not splinterproof against the 11.1in projectile in turret and deck protection. 1.5in US STS (armour deck, CT deck turret decks) can be handily defeated by 11.1in HE projectiles without penetration, while 8in APC are not able to inflict damage other than by pure penetration and 8in HC is of no use at all. The thickest main armour protection 5 to 8in US class A is useless against 11.1in APC effective penetration unless very long distances are achieved (acc. to GKdos100 penetration graph for the 300Kg L3,7APC in excess of 23,000 yards against KCn). Against newer CA´s, the PBB would probably have shifted to either APC at long range and base fused, capped HE (good against the relatively thin deck protection of cruisers) at shorter distances. Against normal Treaty cruisers such as seen in the River Plata engagement, nose fused HE or base fused HE would be perfectly ok (AGS almost depleted her main ammo outfit except for the APC rounds).

Thanks for the pointer on River Plate. It was ACHILLES whiches turret was damaged by a near miss/straddle, not AJAX.

 

[Juha]

Hello Delcyros
Also Koop/Schmolke claimed that their info is based on originals in Bundesarchiv. Anyway, Exeter's 8" were able to knock out both the water and the oil purification plants of AGS,especially the loss of later was fatal and forced the retreat to Montevideo. So if a British 116kg SAPC could do that IMHO US 8"118kg AP could do that also, saying nothing on US 152kg 8" APs which Baltimores had.

None of Achilles turrets were knocked out during River Plate, all 4 functioned to the end of the battle but its main director was momentally knocked out, 4 KIA plus 3 WIA by shell fragments from a 11" near miss.

IIRC already New Orleans-class had Class A armour instead of Class B used in older US CAs

Hello Glider
of course 11" was much deathlier but on the other hand 9 8" had clearly higher ROF than 6 11"

Juha

 

[delcyros]

The 203,4mm (8in) SAP hit from EXETER penetrated the 40mm upper splinterbulkhead and wrecked an auxilary Diesel engine behind, situated close to the funnel base which drove the oil preprocessing (preheater) plant below the armour deck, not the plant itselve. The penetration may be done by any 8in gun or even 6in if properly delay fused. The damage was repaired by the damage controll crew in Montevideo by fixing cables to another aux. engine.
The immideate impression of danger was large from this hit but after examinations were held it was found to be repairable. Impression of recent authors and mine as well was that this hit ultimately doomed the ship but this is an error. The timeline of the letters and communiquès send by Langsdorff makes that abundantly clear, the plant was repaired.
Damage to GRAF SPEE in the action was therefore insignificant and mostly superficial (except for two 6in CPC hits in the unprotected upper forecastle, which made high speed cruise in open waters questionable and would have required a welded fix in the first place) and didn´t threaded either her ability to navigate nor her ability to drive fast, nor her ability to shoot effectively. Altough one must agree that the hit distribution heavily engaged the aiming point, thus the CT without knocking out either firecontroll or rangefinders. Altough three 6in CPC hits were also made on the main turrets, they had little effect. There was no flooding in the ship after the end of the action and all fires were all put downl.

-Koop/Schmolke didn´t had access to the Baubeschreibung, The Gröner circle already published it´s findings and Koop/Schmolke accordingly have agreed to use them in their post 2005 editions of their book (not sure if this is already implemented). There was no 80mm thick main belt on AGS.

Any 8in armed cruiser is at disadvantage when trading hits with a PBB, except maybe in a surprise, close range knivefight, when the higher rate of fire may carry the day (here the four each additional broadside 5.91in and 4.1in mixed battery is no sluch either in trading rapid hits). Tests carried out against the target ship HANNOVER in 1934 showed that any hit with 28.3cm inside the embedded vitalia will knock the machinery out of service, unlike lighter projectiles such as 15cm and 20.3cm. The PBB is thus constantly able to overpower a single cruiser unless multiple cruisers with good skill or excellent tactics are employed against it.

 

[Juha]

Hello Delcyros
thanks for the clarification, On 8" shells, now it's of course clear that effect of a 11" shell was clearly bigger than thet of 8", but KM didn't have US 152kg shells for their tests, but it had clearly better penetration power than older US 118kg AP shell.

Checked the use of Class A armour in US CAs, Wichita was the first to which it was used.

Juha