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HMS Gadfly
Four ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS ''Gadfly'': * was a screw gunboat launched in 1856 and broken up in 1864. * was an flatiron gunboat launched in 1879. She was sent to the Cape of Good Hope in April 1886 and became a coal lighter named ''YC 230'' in 1900. She was sold in 1918. * was a coastal destroyer In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed in ... launched in 1906, and renamed ''TB 6'' later that year. She was sold in 1920. * was a launched in 1915 and transferred to the War Department in 1923. {{DEFAULTSORT:Gadfly, Hms Royal Navy ship names ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against France. The modern Royal Navy traces its origins to the early 16th century; the oldest of the UK's armed services, it is consequently known as the Senior Service. From the middle decades of the 17th century, and through the 18th century, the Royal Navy vied with the Dutch Navy and later with the French Navy for maritime supremacy. From the mid 18th century, it was the world's most powerful navy until the Second World War. The Royal Navy played a key part in establishing and defending the British Empire, and four Imperial fortress colonies and a string of imperial bases and coaling stations secured the Royal Navy's ability to assert naval superiority globally. Owing to this historical prominence, it is common, even among non-Britons, to ref ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gunboat
A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies. History Pre-steam era In the age of sail, a gunboat was usually a small undecked vessel carrying a single smoothbore cannon in the bow, or just two or three such cannons. A gunboat could carry one or two masts or be oar-powered only, but the single-masted version of about length was most typical. Some types of gunboats carried two cannons, or else mounted a number of swivel guns on the railings. The small gunboat had advantages: if it only carried a single cannon, the boat could manoeuvre in shallow or restricted areas – such as rivers or lakes – where larger ships could sail only with difficulty. The gun that such boats carried could be quite heavy; a 32-pounder for instance. As such boats were cheap and quick to build, naval forces favoured swarm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flatiron Gunboat
Flat-iron gunboats (more formally known as Rendel gunboats) were a number of classes of coastal gunboats generally characterised by small size, low freeboard, the absence of masts,Some Rendel-type gunboats were fitted with masts (the British ''Medina'' class, the Russian ''Sivutch'' class and at least some of the Chinese alphabeticals); they are included in the article for completeness and the mounting of a single non-traversing large gun, aimed by pointing the vessel. They acquired their nickname from the physical similarity with the flat iron used for ironing clothes during the 19th century. The first flat-iron gunboat was launched in 1867, and the last in 1894, with the vast majority being built in the years 1870 - 1880. They were designed as a cheap coastal defence weapon, a role they failed to achieve successfully; they found their greatest utility in offensive coastal bombardment. Strongly built, they lasted in some cases into the late 20th century, and saw action in both W ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lighter (barge)
A lighter is a type of flat-bottomed barge used to transfer goods and passengers to and from moored ships. Lighters were traditionally unpowered and were moved and steered using long oars called "sweeps" and the motive power of water currents. They were operated by skilled workers called lightermen and were a characteristic sight in London's docks until about the 1960s, when technological changes made this form of lightering largely redundant. Unpowered lighters continue to be moved by powered tugs, however, and lighters may also now themselves be powered. The term is also used in the Lighter Aboard Ship (LASH) system. The name itself is of uncertain origin, but is believed to possibly derive from an old Dutch or German word, ''lichten'' (to lighten or unload). In Dutch, the word ''lichter'' is still used for smaller ships that take over goods from larger ships. Lighters, albeit powered ones, were proposed to be used in 2007 at Port Lincoln and Whyalla in South Australia to load ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Destroyer
In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed in 1885 by Fernando Villaamil for the Spanish NavySmith, Charles Edgar: ''A short history of naval and marine engineering.'' Babcock & Wilcox, ltd. at the University Press, 1937, page 263 as a defense against torpedo boats, and by the time of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, these "torpedo boat destroyers" (TBDs) were "large, swift, and powerfully armed torpedo boats designed to destroy other torpedo boats". Although the term "destroyer" had been used interchangeably with "TBD" and "torpedo boat destroyer" by navies since 1892, the term "torpedo boat destroyer" had been generally shortened to simply "destroyer" by nearly all navies by the First World War. Before World War II, destroyers were light vessels with little endurance for unattended o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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