HMS Thunderer (1872)
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| History | |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom | |
| Name | Thunderer |
| Builder | Pembroke Dockyard |
| Cost | £368,428 |
| Laid down | 26 June 1869 |
| Launched | 25 March 1872 |
| Completed | 26 May 1877 |
| Out of service | 1909 |
| Fate | Sold for scrap, 13 July 1909 |
| General characteristics (as built) | |
| Class and type | ironclad turret ships |
| Displacement | 9,330 long tons (9,480 t) |
| Length | |
| Beam | 62 ft 3 in (19.0 m) |
| Draught | 27 ft 6 in (8.4 m) |
| Installed power |
|
| Propulsion | 2 shafts; 2 Direct-acting steam engines |
| Speed | 12.5 knots (23.2 km/h; 14.4 mph) |
| Range | 4,700 nmi (8,700 km; 5,400 mi) @ 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) |
| Complement | 358 |
| Armament | 4 × 12-inch (305 mm) rifled muzzle-loading guns |
| Armour |
|
HMS Thunderer was one of two
Background and description
The Devastation class was designed as an enlarged, ocean-going, version of the earlier
Thunderer had two
The Devastation class was armed with four
]While both gun turrets were rotated by steam power, the new forward guns were loaded by hydraulic power, unlike the original guns which were hand worked. Thunderer was the first ship to have hydraulic loading gear.[7] From 1874, the forward turret alone was converted to hydraulic power operation for training (turret traverse), elevation and ramming. This allowed the turret crew to be reduced from 48 to 28; the aft turret remaining hand-worked as a comparison.[8] Power operation was considered successful, although it was later implicated in the 1879 explosion.[9]
The Devastation-class ships had a complete wrought iron
Construction and career
Thunderer, the fifth ship of her name to serve in the Royal Navy,
On 14 July 1876, Thunderer suffered a disastrous
Thunderer was commissioned in May 1877 for service with the Reserve Fleet Particular Service Squadron and was then assigned to the Channel Squadron. During this time, she was fitted with experimental 16-inch (406 mm) torpedoes.[17] She sailed for the Mediterranean in 1878 under the command of Captain Alfred Chatfield.[18] Leaving Gibraltar for Malta in November 1878, Thunderer ran aground and was damaged. She was refloated and resumed her voyage. She was repaired at Malta.[19]
The ship suffered another serious accident on 2 January 1879,
"Both turret guns were being fired simultaneously, and evidently one did not go off. It may seem hard to believe such a thing could happen and not be noticed, but from my own experience I understand it. The men in the turret often stopped their ears, and perhaps their eyes, at the moment of firing, and then instantly worked the run-in levers, and did not notice how much the guns had recoiled. This no doubt occurred. Both guns were at once reloaded, and the rammer's indicator, working by machinery, set fast and failed to show how far the new charge had gone."[21]
The accident contributed to the Royal Navy changing to
The ship was assigned to the Portsmouth Reserve in January 1888 before beginning a major modernisation the following year. Her guns were replaced by four breech-loading
The ship rejoined the Mediterranean Fleet in March 1891, but was forced to return home in September 1892 with persistent boiler problems and she was reduced to the Chatham reserve. Thunderer became the guard ship at Pembroke Dock in May 1895 and remained there until she returned to the Chatham reserve in December 1900.[17] The ship was refitted there as an emergency ship in 1902,[27] but was taken out of service five years later. Thunderer was sold for scrap for £19,500[17] on 13 September 1909.[28]
The Devastation class became more popular among the civilian population and in the Royal Navy as the ships got older.
"I also agree with my friend Captain Colomb that we have no type of ship to my fancy equal to the Dreadnought or the good old Thunderer. Give me the Thunderer, the hull of the Thunderer; she had bad engines, she was not arranged as I would like inside, she was badly gunned as we all know, and she had not enough light gun or sufficient armaments; but she carried 1,750 long tons (1,780 t) of coal, could steam at 10 knots from here to the Cape, and could fight any ship of her class on the salt water."[17]
Notes
- ^ Gardiner, pp. 81–82
- ^ a b c Chesneau & Kolesnik, p. 23
- ^ a b Burt, p. 12
- ^ Parkes, p. 200
- ^ Parkes, p. 198
- ^ Hodges, p. 13
- ^ Parkes, pp. 195–96
- ^ Hodges, p. 19
- ^ a b "The Thunderer's Gun at Woolwich". The Engineer: 45. 18 July 1879.
- ^ Parkes, pp. 195, 199
- ^ Colledge, p. 351
- ^ Silverstone, p. 272
- ^ Phillips, pp. 199–201
- ^ "Model, one of two, of boilers of H.M.S. "Thunderer"". Science Museum Group Collection Online. Science Museum Group. Retrieved 9 March 2022.
- ^ McEwen, pp. 182–84
- ^ Parkes, p. 195
- ^ a b c d e Parkes, p. 202
- ^ Phillips, p. 202
- ^ "Grounding of the Thunderer". Liverpool Mercury. No. 9619. Liverpool. 12 November 1878.
- ^ "Explosion On Board H.M.S. Thunderer". Aberdeen Journal. No. 7451. Aberdeen. 4 January 1879.
- ^ a b Parkes, p.198
- ^ Gardiner, p. 98
- ^ "The Thunderer". Glasgow Herald. No. 12192. Glasgow. 18 January 1879.
- ^ a b Parkes, pp. 201–02
- ^ Phillips, p. 208
- ^ Parkes, p. 201
- ^ "Naval & Military intelligence". The Times. No. 36809. London. 2 July 1902. p. 7.
- ^ Winfield & Lyon, p. 255
References
- Ballantyne, R. M. & Sturton, Ian (2010). "Life Aboard HMS Thunderer". Warship International. XLVII (4): 339–349. ISSN 0043-0374.
- Brown, David K. (2010). Warrior to Dreadnought: Warship Development 1860–1905. Barnsley, UK: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78383-019-0.
- Burt, R. A. (2013). British Battleships 1889–1904. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-59114-065-8.
- Chesneau, Roger & Kolesnik, Eugene M., eds. (1979). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860-1905. Greenwich, UK: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-8317-0302-4.
- ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.
- Gardiner, Robert, ed. (1992). Steam, Steel and Shellfire: The Steam Warship 1815–1905. Conway's History of the Ship. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 1-55750-774-0.
- McEwen, Alan (2009). Historic Steam Boiler Explosions. Sledgehammer Engineering Press. ISBN 978-0-9532725-2-5.
- Hodges, Peter (1981). The Big Gun: Battleship Main Armament 1860–1945. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-144-0.
- Parkes, Oscar (1990). British Battleships (reprint of the 1957 ed.). Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-075-4.
- Phillips, Lawrie; Lieutenant Commander (2014). Pembroke Dockyard and the Old Navy: A Bicentennial History. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7509-5214-9.)
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link - Silverstone, Paul H. (1984). Directory of the World's Capital Ships. New York: Hippocrene Books. ISBN 0-88254-979-0.
- Winfield, R.; Lyon, D. (2004). The Sail and Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815–1889. London: Chatham Publishing. OCLC 52620555.
External links
