Eight ships of the
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 F ...
have borne the name HMS ''Centaur'', after the half-human, half-horse
centaur
A centaur ( ; grc, κένταυρος, kéntauros; ), or occasionally hippocentaur, is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse.
Centaurs are thought of in many Greek myths as being ...
of
Greek mythology
A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the Cosmogony, origin and Cosmology#Metaphysical co ...
:
* was a 24-gun
sixth rate
In the rating system of the Royal Navy used to categorise sailing warships, a sixth-rate was the designation for small warships mounting between 20 and 28 carriage-mounted guns on a single deck, sometimes with smaller guns on the upper works and ...
launched in 1746 and sold in 1761.
* was a 74-gun
third rate
In the rating system of the Royal Navy, a third rate was a ship of the line which from the 1720s mounted between 64 and 80 guns, typically built with two gun decks (thus the related term two-decker). Years of experience proved that the third r ...
ship of the line
A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two colu ...
, formerly the French ship ''Centaure''. She was captured at the
Battle of Lagos
The naval Battle of Lagos took place between a British fleet commanded by Sir Edward Boscawen and a French fleet under Jean-François de La Clue-Sabran over two days in 1759 during the Seven Years' War. They fought south west of the Gulf of C ...
in 1759, and foundered in a hurricane in 1782.
* was a 74-gun third rate launched in 1797, decommissioned in 1816, and broken up in 1819.
* was a wooden paddle
frigate
A frigate () is a type of warship. In different eras, the roles and capabilities of ships classified as frigates have varied somewhat.
The name frigate in the 17th to early 18th centuries was given to any full-rigged ship built for speed and ...
launched in 1845 and scrapped in 1864.
* HMS ''Centaur'' was to have been an
armoured cruiser
The armored cruiser was a type of warship of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was designed like other types of cruisers to operate as a long-range, independent warship, capable of defeating any ship apart from a battleship and fast eno ...
, but she was renamed in 1890, prior to her launch in 1891.
* was a and lead ship of the ''Centaur'' subclass. She was launched in 1916 and sold for scrap in 1934.
* HMS ''Centaur'' was to have been a
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 ...
. She was ordered in 1942, but was subsequently redesigned as a and renamed HMS ''Tomahawk'' in 1943. She was eventually launched in 1946 as .
* was a , launched in 1947 and scrapped in 1970.
See also
* for non-Royal Navy ships of the name.
References
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Centaur, Hms
Royal Navy ship names