High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! SMS Schlesien was one of the five Deutschland class of pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Kaiserliche Marine between 1904 and 1906. Named after the German province of Schlesien, she was built at the Schichau-Werke shipyard in Danzig, where she was launched on 28 May 1906. She was commissioned into the navy on 5 May 1908. The ships of her class were already outdated by the time they entered service, being inferior in size, armor, fire power and speed to the new post-Dreadnought battleships.