She saw active service during World War I, performing convoy, escort and minesweeping tasks, anti-submarine operations and shore bombardment missions.
She was part of the escort force for the Austro-Hungarian dreadnought Szent István during the action that resulted in the sinking of that ship by Italian torpedo boats in June 1918.
In 1910, the Austria-Hungary Naval Technical Committee initiated the design and development of a 275-tonne (271-long-ton) coastal torpedo boat, specifying that it should be capable of sustaining 30 knots (56 km/h; 35 mph) for 10 hours.
[1][2] At the same time, the committee issued design parameters for a high seas or fleet torpedo boat of 500–550 t (490–540 long tons), top speed of 30 kn and endurance of 480 nautical miles (890 km; 550 mi).
In such circumstances, there would be a need for a torpedo boat that could sail from the Austro-Hungarian Navy (German: kaiserliche und königliche Kriegsmarine, Hungarian: Császári és Királyi Haditengerészet) base at the Bocche di Cattaro (the Bocche or Bay of Kotor) to the strait during the night, locate and attack blockading ships and return to port before morning.
[2] Despite having developed these ideas, the Austro-Hungarian Navy then asked shipyards to submit proposals for a 250 t (250-long-ton) boat with a maximum speed of 28 kn (52 km/h; 32 mph).
[4] The 250t-class, T-group boats had short raised forecastles and an open bridge, and were fast and agile, well designed for service in the Adriatic.
[12] Around the time of her commissioning, one 8 mm (0.31 in) Schwarzlose M.7/12 machine gun was included in the armament of all boats of the class for anti-aircraft work.
[16] As the 250t-class boats came into service, they joined the 1st Torpedo Flotilla, which was initially led by the Novara-class scout cruiser Saida and later by her sister Helgoland.
[17] Not long after being commissioned, 76 T joined the rest of the 1st Torpedo Flotilla in an attempt to engage part of the French fleet operating in the southern Adriatic on 17 October 1914.
The French were sailing in the vicinity of the island of Vis, but departed south during the night of 17/18 October, and the Austro-Hungarian flotilla was unable to launch an attack.
[18] On 15 and 16 March 1915, 76 T, along with the old destroyer Magnet and 250t-class boats 75 T and 79 T, escorted the newly commissioned dreadnought battleship Szent István from the main Austro-Hungarian naval base at Pola – in the upper Adriatic – to the island of Pago to conduct firing exercises.
[19] Led by Helgoland, the whole 1st Torpedo Flotilla steamed to the Ionian Sea over the period 11–15 April 1915 in search of the French fleet base, but the operation was unsuccessful.
[18] Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary on 23 May 1915,[20] and hostilities in the Adriatic, which had thus far mostly involved intermittent forays by the French fleet,[21] immediately intensified.
[20] On 27 July, a flotilla led by the scout cruisers Admiral Spaun and Novara, and escorted by the Huszár-class destroyers Scharfschutze and Uskoke along with 76 T, 75 T and 79 T shelled the Italian railway line between Ancona and Pesaro.
[25] During 1915, in addition to the operations mentioned above, 76 T also conducted three anti-submarine patrols and was often tasked with covering seaplanes returning from bombing missions over Italy.
[27] On 3 May, 76 T, along with 92 F, 93 F, 98 M, 99 M and 100 M were accompanying the Huszár-class destroyers Csikós, Pandur, Velebit and Scharfschutze supporting seaplanes returning from an attack on Porto Corsini and Ravenna.
During this mission they were involved in a surface action with an Italian force led by the flotilla leaders Cesare Rossarol and Guglielmo Pepe accompanied by the Rosolino Pilo-class destroyers Giuseppe Missori and Francesco Nullo.
On 21 October, 76 and the Kaiman-class boat 60 escorted the German submarine SM UB-40 on a mission to interdict shipping off the North African coast.
In response to these blockades, the new commander of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, Konteradmiral Miklós Horthy, decided to launch an attack on the Allied defenders with battleships, scout cruisers, and destroyers.
[33] On 14 October, 76 was part of a force which included her sisters 88, 97 and 100, providing anti-aircraft cover for the steamship Brünn as the latter was attempting to free the stranded hospital ship Oceania.
[44] In 1920, under the terms of the previous year's Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, by which rump Austria officially ended World War I, she was allocated to the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (KSCS, later Yugoslavia).
[47] In 1932, the British naval attaché reported that Yugoslav ships engaged in few exercises, manoeuvres or gunnery training due to reduced budgets.
[52] She was allocated to Maridalmazia, the military maritime command of Dalmatia (Comando militare marittimo della Dalmazia), which was responsible for the area from the northern Adriatic island of Premuda south to the port of Bar in the Italian governorate of Montenegro.
The German troops aboard Milano were permitted to land, but the Italians began evacuating their forces from the Bay of Kotor on the evening of 10 September.
Several vessels departed for Allied ports in Italy or for Malta over the following day, including T1, Giuseppe Cesare Abba, the former Yugoslav Uskok-class torpedo boat ME47 and some auxiliary minesweepers, carrying about 400 Italian personnel.
[59] She was commissioned as Golešnica by the Yugoslav Navy (Serbo-Croatian Latin: Jugoslavenska Ratna Mornarica, JRM; Југословенска Pатна Mорнарица) initially as a stražarski brod (guard ship) with the designation SBR 91.
Golešnica was allocated to the JRM's 6th Division, which largely consisted of escort destroyers, and was also employed in a training role, until she was struck off the naval register in 1955.