Lissa, Battle of

The Battle of Lissa (sometimes called Battle of Vis) takes place on July 20, 1866 in the Adriatic Sea near the Dalmatian island of Lissa ("Vis" in Croatian) and is a decisive victory for an outnumbered Austrian Empire force over a superior Italian force.

It is the first major sea battle between ironclads and one of the last to involve deliberate ramming.The Italian navy fires roughly 1450 shots during the engagement, but fails to do any serious damage to an Austrian ship while losing two battleships.

One of the main reasons of this bad performance is due to internal rivalry between the Italian fleet commanders: for example, Italian Vice Admiral Albini, with his group of ships, never participates in the battle.

The engagement is made of several small battles: the main is between seven Austrian and four Italian ironclads and shows the ability of Tegetthoff to divide the bigger opponent and destroy the surrounded ironclads left alone.

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