HMS ''Minerva'' was an protected cruiser built for 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 ...

in the mid-1890s.

Construction and operational history

The ship was laid down at Chatham Dockyard,

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, on 4 December 1893, and was floated out on 23 September 1895.

Pre-1914

HMS ''Minerva'' served in the

Channel Squadron Channel, channels, channeling, etc., may refer to: Geography * Channel (geography), in physical geography, a landform consisting of the outline (banks) of the path of a narrow body of water. Australia * Channel Country, region of outback Austral ...

after her launch. Captain Charles Home Cochran was appointed in command on 25 September 1900, and she again served in the Channel Squadron from March 1901, including as

guard ship A guard ship is a warship assigned as a stationary guard in a port or harbour, as opposed to a coastal patrol boat, which serves its protective role at sea. Royal Navy In the Royal Navy of the eighteenth century, peacetime guard ships were usual ...

Cowes Cowes () is an English seaport town and civil parish on the Isle of Wight. Cowes is located on the west bank of the estuary of the River Medina, facing the smaller town of East Cowes on the east bank. The two towns are linked by the Cowes Floa ...

in early 1902. . At the 1901 Census of England and Wales she was recorded as being at Gibraltar with the Training Squadron. She was used in the spring of 1902 for a series of trials to compare her cylindrical boilers with the

Belleville boiler There have been a vast number of designs of steam boiler, particularly towards the end of the 19th century when the technology was evolving rapidly. A great many of these took the names of their originators or primary manufacturers, rather than a m ...

s of HMS ''Hyacinth'', with the performance of the boilers being compared at various powers in tests in the

English Channel The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" (Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), (Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Kana ...

, followed by long sea runs to the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...

and back. While the Belleville

water-tube boiler A high pressure watertube boiler (also spelled water-tube and water tube) is a type of boiler in which water circulates in tubes heated externally by the fire. Fuel is burned inside the furnace, creating hot gas which boils water in the steam-gene ...

s of ''Hyacinth'' proved to be more efficient than ''Minerva''s cylindrical boilers, and lighter, but on the long runs to and from the Mediterranean, ''Hyacinth''s boilers proved prone to leaks, and suffered a burst boiler tube.Brassey 1902, pp. 165–173. The results of these and similar trials led to the use of Belleville boilers in new construction to be stopped.Brown 2003, p. 165. She took part in the fleet review held at

Spithead Spithead is an area of the Solent and a roadstead off Gilkicker Point in Hampshire, England. It is protected from all winds except those from the southeast. It receives its name from the Spit, a sandbank stretching south from the Hampshire ...

on 16 August 1902 for the

coronation A coronation is the act of placement or bestowal of a coronation crown, crown upon a monarch's head. The term also generally refers not only to the physical crowning but to the whole ceremony wherein the act of crowning occurs, along with the ...

of King

Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria an ...

, and visited the

Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek language, Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish language, Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It ...

with other ships of the Channel squadron and

Mediterranean Fleet The British Mediterranean Fleet, also known as the Mediterranean Station, was a formation of the Royal Navy. The Fleet was one of the most prestigious commands in the navy for the majority of its history, defending the vital sea link between t ...

for combined manoeuvres in September and early October 1902, returning to Chatham on 20 October. Captain

Doveton Sturdee Admiral of the Fleet (Royal Navy), Admiral of the Fleet Sir Frederick Charles Doveton Sturdee, 1st Baronet (9 June 18597 May 1925) was a Royal Navy officer. After training as a torpedo officer, he commanded two different cruisers and then three d ...

was appointed in command on 17 October 1902. The ship was present at the relief operations in

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

after the great earthquake and tsunami in the Strait of Messina, 28 December 1908. The crew qualified for the ''Medal of Merit for Participation in the Relief of the Earthquake in Calabria and Sicily'', instituted by the King of Italy Vittorio Emanuele III. ''Minerva'' transferred from the Mediterranean to the United Kingdom in 1912, taking part in the rescue attempts when the submarine HMS B2 was sunk in a collision in October 1912.Gardiner and Gray 1985, p. 15.

First World War

Protected cruiser HMS Minerva - IWM Q 75387

On the outbreak of the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

in August 1914, ''Minerva'' was part of the 11th Cruiser Squadron based in Ireland, but was detached to join the 5th Cruiser Squadron in September, with the responsibility of intercepting enemy merchant shipping trying to return to Germany or Austria. During these operations it captured and scuttled the Austrian merchant ship ''Bathori'' off

Vigo Vigo ( , , , ) is a city and Municipalities in Spain, municipality in the province of Pontevedra, within the Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Galicia (Spain), Galicia, Spain. Located in the northwest of the Iberian Penins ...

, in North-West Spain on 3 September 1914.Rickard, J
"HMS Minerva"
''historyofwar.org''. 11 November 2007. Retrieved 28 April 2012. ''Minerva'' escorted a troop convoy from Britain to

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

in November 1914, and formed part of the Allied naval forces supporting the Gallipoli Campaign. When the Turkish

torpedo-boat A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs were steam-powered craft dedicated to ramming enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes. Later evolutions launched variants of se ...

''Demirhisar'' attempted to attack Allied troop ships near

Chios Chios (; el, Χίος, Chíos , traditionally known as Scio in English) is the fifth largest Greek island, situated in the northern Aegean Sea. The island is separated from Turkey by the Chios Strait. Chios is notable for its exports of mastic ...

on 16 April 1915, ''Minerva'', together with the destroyers ''Jed'', ''Kennet'' and ''Wear'', forced ''Demirhisar'' to run aground, where the Turkish torpedo boat was later destroyed.Gardiner and Gray 1985, p. 392. ''Minerva'' supported the

landing at Cape Helles The landing at Cape Helles ( tr, Seddülbahir Çıkarması) was part of the Gallipoli Campaign the amphibious landings on the Gallipoli peninsula by British and French forces on 25 April 1915 during the First World War. Helles, at the foot o ...

in April and at

Suvla Bay file:Suvla from Battleship Hill.jpg, View of Suvla from Battleship Hill Suvla () is a bay on the Aegean Sea, Aegean coast of the Gallipoli peninsula in European Turkey, south of the Gulf of Saros. On 6 August 1915, it was the site for the Landi ...

in August. ''Minerva'' was deployed to the China Station in 1916, and then to the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...

and

Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; T ...

in 1917, then remaining off East Africa until the end of the war. She returned to Queenstown, Ireland in 1920, and was sold for scrapping on 5 October 1920.Gardiner and Gray 1985, pp. 14–15.

Footnotes

References

* Brassey, T. A. ''The Naval Annual 1902''. Portsmouth, UK: J Griffin and Co, 1902. * Brown, D. K. ''Warrior to Dreadnought: Warship Development 1860–1905''. . London: Caxton Editions, 2003. . * Chesneau, Roger and Eugene M. Kolesnik. ''Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905''. London: Conway's Maritime Press, 1979. . * Gardiner, Robert and Randal Gray, (eds). ''Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships 1906–1921.'' London: Conway Maritime Press, 1985. . * Hythe, Viscount. ''The Naval Annual 1912''. Portsmouth, UK: J Griffin, 1912. * *Moore, John. ''Jane's Fighting Ships of World War I''. London:Studio, 1990. .

External links