HMS Sirius
HMS Sirius
Class overview
NameEclipse class
Builders
  • Devonport Dockyard
  • Portsmouth Dockyard
  • Chatham Dockyard
  • Sheerness Dockyard
  • Deptford Dockyard
Operators Royal Navy
Preceded byAmazon class
Succeeded byFantome class
Built1867–1870
In service1867–1921
Completed7
Scrapped7
General characteristics (as built)
TypeWooden screw sloop (later corvette)
Displacement1,760 long tons (1,790 t)
Tons burthen1,268 bm
Length212 ft (64.6 m) (p/p)
Beam36 ft (11.0 m)
Draught16 ft 6 in (5.0 m)
Depth21 ft 6 in (6.6 m)
Installed power1,946–2,518 ihp (1,451–1,878 kW)
Propulsion
Sail planBarque or Ship rig
Speed12–13 knots (22–24 km/h; 14–15 mph)
Complement180
Armament

The Eclipse class was a class of seven 6-gun wooden screw sloops built for the Royal Navy between 1867 and 1870. They were re-armed and re-classified as 12-gun corvettes in 1876. Two further vessels were proposed but never ordered.

Design

A development of the Amazon class, they were designed by Edward Reed, the Royal Navy's Director of Naval Construction. The hull was of wooden construction, but with iron cross-beams, and a ram bow was fitted.[1]

Propulsion

Propulsion was provided by a two-cylinder horizontal steam engine driving a single screw. Spartan, Sirius and Tenedos had compound steam engines, and the remainder of the class had single-expansion steam engines.

Sail plan

All the ships of the class were built with a ship rig, but this was replaced with a barque rig.

Armament

The Eclipse class was designed with two 7-inch (6½-ton) muzzle-loading rifled guns mounted in traversing slides and four 64-pounder muzzle-loading rifled guns.[1] They were re-classified as corvettes in 1876, carrying a homogenous armament of twelve 64-pounder muzzle-loading rifled guns.

Ships

NameShip BuilderLaunchedFate
DanaePortsmouth Dockyard21 May 1867Lent to the War Department as a hulk in 1886 and sold on 15 May 1906[1]
BlancheChatham Dockyard17 August 1867Sold to Castle for breaking in September 1886
EclipseSheerness Dockyard14 November 1867Lent to the War Department for use as a storage hulk between 1888 and 1892. Anchored in the Hamoaze as a floating magazine and No. 3 (Devonport) Division, Metropolitan Police barracks on census night in 1911. Sold in 1921.[1]
SiriusPortsmouth Dockyard24 April 1868Sold to Castle for breaking at Charlton in 1885[1]
SpartanDeptford Dockyard14 November 1868Sold to Castle for breaking on 7 November 1882[1]
DidoPortsmouth Dockyard23 October 1869Hulked in 1886. Renamed Actaeon II in 1906. Sold to J B Garnham for breaking on 17 July 1922[1]
TenedosDevonport Dockyard13 May 1870Sold to G Pethwick of Plymouth for breaking in November 1887[1]
Proserpine--Authorised on 18 December 1866 but never ordered[1]
Diomede--Authorised on 18 December 1866 but rescinded on 30 April 1867[1]

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Winfield, pp. 290–91

Bibliography

  • Ballard, G. A. (1938). "British Sloops of 1875: The Smaller Ram-Bowed Type". Mariner's Mirror. Cambridge, UK: Society for Nautical Research. 24 (April): 160–75.
  • 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.
  • Winfield, R.; Lyon, D. (2004). The Sail and Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815–1889. London: Chatham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-86176-032-6. OCLC 52620555.
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