Laid down: 7/8/26
Commissioned: 15/1/30
Full Load Displacement: 8,130 tons
Draft: 20.6 ft
Speed: 32.5 kts
Range: 3,100 nautical miles at 13 kts
Armor: 50mm side, 40mm deck
Armament: 9x 150mm (120 rpg), 6x 88mm (400 rpg), 8x 37mm (1200 rpg), 8x 20mm (2200 rpa), 12x 533 torpedo tubes, 120 mines, 2 floatplanes.

Koln spent the first month of the war laying mines in the North Sea. In November she joined the pocket battleship Lutzow (then still named Deutschland) and light cruiser Leipzig on shipping sweeps in the Skagerrak from the 2 1 " to the 25'h. On December 12, she departed Wihelmshaven with Leipzig and Nurnberg to escort home destroyers minelaying off the coast of England. She ended up escorting the badly damaged Leipzig back to at Brunsbuttel, arriving on December 14. 1939.

On April 4, 1940 Koln embarked 640 troops, mostly of the 159th regiment, for the invasion of Norway and departed the same day from Wilhelmshaven with the light cruiser Konigsberg and the training ship Bremse. At sea they joined with two torpedo boats, the tender Carl Peters, five S-boats, and two auxiliaries to form the group landing at Bergen. Despite some resistance from Norwegian coastal defenses the landing was successful and Bergen captured on April 9th. After an unsuccessful attack by 12 RAF Wellingtons and 12 Hampdens, Koln sailed from Bergen late that day with the two torpedo boats and arrived back at Wilhelmshaven two days later.

On May 16, Koln departed Wilhelmshaven with the Grille and an escort of three destroyers and two torpedo boats to lay mines at Fisher Bank in the North Sea, returning to Wilhelmshaven on the 18th. After a second mine-laying sortie Koln became a gunnery training ship in the Baltic. From June until August of 1940 she had a refit at Kiel, during which she landed three torpedo tubes.

On September 23, 1941 Koln departed from Swinemunde with the battleship Tirpitz, the pocket battleship Admiral Scheer, the light cruiser Nurnberg, three destroyers, and five torpedo boats to wait at the mouth of the Gulf of Bothnia for Soviet warships that were expected to flee to Sweden. The Soviets didn't show. Koln returned to Gdynia on the 29th.

On October 11, Koln sailed from Gdynia with three torpedo boats. Next day she hurled 285 rounds at Soviet coastal defenses near Ristna on Hiiu Island. The Soviets returned fire but achieved no hits. The Koln fired another 256 rounds at Ristna two days later. Despite an unsuccessful attack by the submarine Sch 323, Koln returned to Gdynia on October 14.

On July 9, 1942 Koln left Swinemunde, laid mines in the Skagerrak, and arrived at Trondheim on July 15. From there she sailed to Narvik, but a planned mine-laying sortie to Novoya Zemlya was canceled. On August 10 she departed from Narvik with the pocket battleship Scheer, heavy cruiser Hipper and five destroyers. The British submarine Tigris tried to attack this force, but failed. The group arrived at Alta Fjord the next day.

In January 1943 Koln sailed from Alten Fjord, bound for Kiel. She stopped at Narvik and Trondheim before reaching Kiel on February 8, 1943. She was decommissioned on March 1, and became an accommodation ship. In February 1944, she was towed to Konigsberg to begin a refit that lasted until June. During that four of her 37mm guns were removed and ten 20mm weapons added. She was then used for training until October when she was employed to lay mines in the Skagerrak. She was laid up for the rest of the year, however, due to defective propeller shafts that limited her maximum speed to 15 knots.

Damaged by near misses during an RAF raid in December, Koln arrived at Wilhelmshaven on January 14, 1945. There she was sunk by US B-24s on March 30 with her aft turrets and AA guns still above the water. On May 2 Koln was blown up.

More WWII German Light Cruisers

Introduction
Emden
Konigsberg
Karlsruhe
Koln
Leipzig
Nurnberg