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The German battleship Bismarck proved conclusively to the British Admiralty that the German Navy was equipped with sophisticated warships that possessed awesome capabilities. Designed as a commerce raider, this famed Tirpitz class battleship relied on speed and endurance to overtake and destroy its foes. Over eight hundred feet in length, this leviathan displaced more than 42,000 tons and attained speeds in excess of thirty knots. Eight powerful fifteen-inch guns were fitted in four main turrets. In May of 1941, the Bismarck was destroyed in one of modern naval history's most famous battles. In a desperate attempt to gain access to the North Atlantic shipping lanes, the Bismarck was intercepted by a well-coordinated British Naval effort. During the unrelenting battle, concentrated gunfire from the German raider devastated the British Battleship Hood, but the feared German warship finally succumbed to repeated gunfire, bombing, and torpedo attacks.