HMS Pallas (1865)
This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (October 2020) |
History | |
---|---|
United Kingdom | |
Name | HMS Pallas |
Builder | Woolwich Dockyard |
Laid down | 19 October 1863 |
Launched | 14 March 1865 |
Completed | 6 March 1866 |
Fate | Sold on 20 April 1886 |
General characteristics | |
Displacement |
|
Length | 225 ft (69 m) |
Beam | 50 ft (15 m) |
Draught |
|
Propulsion | Humphreys & Tennant compound horizontal
I.H.P. = 3,580 |
Sail plan | Ship-rigged, sail area 16,716 sq ft (1,553.0 m2) |
Speed |
|
Complement | 253 |
Armament |
|
Armour | Belt, battery & bulkheads 4.5 inches (110 mm) |
HMS Pallas was a purpose-built wooden-hulled ironclad of the
Background and design
She was built as a
Pallas was the first warship in the Royal Navy to be fitted with compound expansion engines, and a high performance was expected from them; her specification claimed a speed under power of fourteen knots, which was necessary if she were to ram enemy ships who were themselves under way. On her trials, however, riding light, she achieved only 12.5 knots (23.2 km/h), while piling up an enormous bow wave. After her bow contour was hastily modified she was able to just reach 13 knots (24 km/h), which in the event of armed conflict would have been insufficient to allow her to fulfil her designed ramming function against any enemy ship with an operational power plant.
In spite of this assessment, the fact that the 12.54-knot Austro-Hungarian ironclad SMS Erzherzog Ferdinand Max (1865) was later able to successfully ram an enemy screw-propelled warship which was under way - and indeed sink it - suggests that Pallas' modest speed, while a hindrance to her employment as a ram, would not have entirely prevented an enterprising commander from taking advantage of her fixed underwater weaponry in battle, had a suitable tactical opportunity arisen. As with many tactical aspects of early ironclad warships, the practicability of ramming in a fleet action was poorly understood by naval planners at the time of Pallas' commissioning.
Service history
HMS Pallas was commissioned at Portsmouth.[
Citations
- ^ "Shipping Disasters". Liverpool Mercury. No. 6489. Liverpool. 12 November 1868.
References
- ISBN 0-87021-924-3.)
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link - ISBN 1-55750-075-4.
- Roberts, John (1979). "Great Britain (including Empire Forces)". In Chesneau, Roger & Kolesnik, Eugene M. (eds.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905. New York: Mayflower Books. pp. 1–113. ISBN 0-8317-0302-4.