HMS Shannon (1875)

The eighth HMS Shannon was the first British armoured cruiser. She was the last Royal Navy ironclad to be built which had a propeller that could be hoisted out of the water to reduce drag when she was under sail, and the first to have an armoured deck.

Design

Shannon was built in response to two threats. The instructions of the Admiralty to the designer, Nathaniel Barnaby, were to design an ironclad "capable of competing with the second class Ironclads of foreign navies". This meant in particular the ten French armoured corvettes of the Alma and La Galissonnière classes, though the ironclads of the smaller navies of Asia, and the Americas also featured. The British counter to these ships were the Audacious and Swiftsure classes of second-class ironclad of the 1860s. Shannon 's design was in the lineage of these ships, though the tactical landscape was changing. At the same time as Shannon was being planned, the Russian navy launched the first armoured cruisers, General Admiral and her sister Gerzog Edinburgski. These ships were intended for the traditional cruiser mission of commerce raiding, but were armoured and armed on the same scale as a second-class ironclad. The existence of these ships mean that Shannon was now expected to act as a counter to them, and perform the commerce protection missions which had previously been the preserve of unarmoured cruisers, most recently the Inconstant.

HMS Shannon

Nine ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Shannon, after the River Shannon, the longest river in Ireland:

HMS Shannon (1757)

HMS Shannon was a 28-gun Coventry-class sixth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy.

Construction

The Shannon was one of five frigates of the class built of fir rather than oak. Fir was cheaper and more abundant than oak and permitted noticeably faster construction, but at a cost of a reduced lifespan; the four fir-built Coventry-class vessels that did not get captured lasted an average of only nine years before being struck off.

References

HMS Shannon (1806)

HMS Shannon was a 38-gun Leda-class frigate of the Royal Navy. She was launched in 1806 and served in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812. She won a noteworthy naval victory on 1 June 1813, during the latter conflict, when she captured the American Navy's USS Chesapeake in a singularly bloody battle.

Career

Construction and commissioning

Josiah and Thomas Brindley built Shannon at Frindsbury in Kent and launched her on 5 May 1806. She was to spend her first seven years under the command of Captain Philip Broke, who was transferred from Druid, and took command of Shannon in June that year.

Home waters

Shannon was quickly put into service. She formed part of a squadron under Commodore Owen that was patrolling off the French port of Boulogne. On 8 October she took part in the bombardment of the town using Congreve rockets.

Her next task was sailing in 1807 with Meleager to protect the whale fishery off Greenland. Despite encountering ice on 7 May 1807, they were able to push through, reaching the southern part of Spitsbergen on 17 June. There the two ships surveyed the Bay of Magdalena, at a latitude of 80°N. They eventually reached a latitude of 80° 6' N before the ice stopped them. They then turned westwards and reached the coast of Greenland on 23 July. The island of Shannon is named after the ship. Shannon spent the early autumn cruising from Shetland. She then left, returning to Yarmouth by the end of September, where she cruised off the Downs. She put into Spithead on 28 September to undergo a refit.