24 occurred February 1912: Sinking action of Turkish ships

24/02/14

At dawn the armored cruisers Giuseppe Garibaldi (commander, vessel captain Mattia Giavotto) with the insignia of the commander of the 2nd Division (2nd Squad) and Francesco Ferruccio (commander, vessel captain Michelangelo Leonardi) move in front of Beirut while the auxiliary cruiser Duke of Genoa (commander, frigate captain Luigi Arcangeli) operates to interrupt the telegraph line north of the city.

The Ferruccio is positioned in such a way as to preclude the escape of the Turkish units while the Garibaldi is brought a short distance from the port entrance to order surrender. At the end of the ultimatum, the Ferruccio slowly crosses at the head of the outer wharf and the Garibaldi penetrated inside the port to recognize the objectives, opens fire and after a few minutes sinks the battleship Avnillah even with the use of two torpedoes and the Angora torpedo boat. Once the action is completed, the units direct to carry out the reconnaissance of the Mersin roadstead (southern coast of Turkey) the day after, which they will find empty of war units.

[The day before (Friday 23) the Minister of the Navy orders the Commander-in-Chief of the United Naval Forces to capture or destroy the two Ottoman units in port in Beirut, the armored gunboat Avni Illah and the torpedo boat Angora which constituted a latent threat to traffic Italian in the Eastern Mediterranean. Rear Admiral Paolo Thaon di Revel is in charge of the action with the use of the armored cruisers Giuseppe Garibaldi (commander, vessel captain Mattia Giavotto), his flag ship, and Francesco Ferruccio (commander, vessel captain Michelangelo Leonardi) specially seconded from the 2nd Naval Division (2nd Squad), on a block cruise along the coasts of Anatolia and Syria and the auxiliary cruiser Duca di Genova (commander, frigate captain Luigi Arcangeli) on a surveillance cruise off Alexandria in Egypt]

Source: Military Navy