HMS ''Miranda'' was a ''Doterel''-class

sloop A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...

of the Royal Navy, built at Devonport Dockyard and launched on 30 September 1879.Bastock, p.78.

Design

The ''Doterel'' class was designed by Nathaniel Barnaby as a development of William Henry White's 1874 . The graceful clipper bow of the ''Osprey''s was replaced by a vertical stem and the engines were more powerful. The hull was of composite construction, with wooden planks over an iron frame.

Propulsion

Power was provided by three cylindrical boilers, which supplied steam at to a two-cylinder horizontal compound-expansion steam engine driving a single screw. This arrangement produced and a top speed of .Winfield (2004) p.292

Armament

Ships of the class were armed with two 7-inch (90 cwt) muzzle-loading rifled guns on pivoting mounts, and four 64-pounder muzzle-loading rifled guns (two on pivoting mounts, and two broadside). Four machine guns and one light gun completed the weaponry.

Sail plan

All the ships of the class were provided with a barque rig, that is, square-rigged foremast and mainmast, and fore-and-aft sails only on the mizzen mast.

Crew

''Miranda'' would have had a normal complement of 140–150 men.

Construction

''Miranda'' was ordered from Devonport Dockyard and laid down on 8 July 1878. She was launched on 30 September 1879 and was commissioned on 22 July 1880.

Service

She commenced service on the Australia Station in September 1880. ''Miranda'' visited a number of the Ellice Islands (present-day Tuvalu) in 1886. She left the Australia Station in 1886 and returned to England. By 1891, because of her slow speed and obsolete armament, she had been relegated to the

Medway Medway is a unitary authority district and conurbation in Kent, South East England. It had a population of 278,016 in 2019. The unitary authority was formed in 1998 when Rochester-upon-Medway amalgamated with the Borough of Gillingham to for ...

Reserve. She was surveyed as a potential training ship in 1892, but found unfit.

Fate

She was sold to Reed of Portsmouth for breaking up on 24 September 1892.

References

*Bastock, John (1988), ''Ships on the Australia Station'', Child & Associates Publishing Pty Ltd; Frenchs Forest, Australia. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Miranda (1879) 1879 ships Doterel-class sloops Victorian-era sloops of the United Kingdom Ships built in Plymouth, Devon