Cruizer class sloop
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Lark (ex-Cruizer), shown at Malta in 1894.
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| Class overview | |
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| Name: | Cruizer-class sloops |
| Builders: |
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| Operators: |
 Royal Navy
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| Cost: | £25,213 (Cruizer) - £36,743 (Alert) |
| Built: | 1852–1856 |
| In commission: | 1852–1912 |
| Completed: | 6 |
| Lost: | 0 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Wooden screw sloop |
| Displacement: | 1,045 tons (except Cruizer at 960 tons) |
| Tons burthen: | 747 51/94 bm |
| Length: |
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| Beam: | 31 ft 10 in (9.70 m) |
| Depth of hold: | 17 ft 6 in (5.33 m) |
| Installed power: |
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| Propulsion: |
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| Sail plan: | Barque-rigged |
| Speed: | 6.6 kn (12.2 km/h) - 8.8 kn (16.3 km/h) under power |
| Armament: |
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The Cruizer class was a class of 17-gun wooden screw sloops built for the Royal Navy between 1852 and 1856, comprising six vessels.
The wooden sloops of the Cruizer class were designed under the direction of Lord John Hay, and after his "Committee of Reference" was disbanded, their construction was supervised by the new Surveyor of the Navy, Sir Baldwin Walker. A pair of ships named Cracker and Hornet had been ordered from Deptford and Woolwich in April 1847 as "steam gun schooners", with the intention of ordering four more. They were suspended in August 1847, and the new ships Cruizer and Hornet were re-ordered on 1 November 1850. Harrier was ordered in 1851, Fawn in 1852, and both Falcon and Alert on 2 April 1853. Cruizer differed from the rest of the class in having a lower-rated geared engine and a displacement of 960 tons, compared to 1,045 tons for the rest of the class.
Their two-cylinder horizontal single-expansion steam engines generated an indicated horsepower of between 132 hp (98 kW) and 434 hp (324 kW); driving a single screw, this gave a maximum speed of between 6.6 knots (12.2 km/h) and 8.8 knots (16.3 km/h).
All ships of the class were built with a barque-rig sail plan.
All the ships of the class were provided with one 32-pounder (56cwt) long gun on a pivot mount and sixteen 32-pounder (32cwt) carriage guns in a broadside arrangement.Alert had her guns reduced to four Armstrong breech-loaders in 1874 as part of her conversion to an Arctic exploration vessel.
The Greyhound-class sloop of 1855 was essentially a Cruizer-class design adapted to carry a more powerful engine developing an indicated horsepower of up to 786 hp (586 kW), giving a top speed under steam of 10 knots (19 km/h). The second and last ship of the Greyhound class, Mutine, had originally been ordered as the seventh vessel of the Cruiser class.
From 1853 to 1856, Cruizer took part in the Baltic campaign of the Russian War. Renamed Cruiser in 1856, she served on the China station during the Second Opium War, including the taking of Canton and the attack on the Taku Forts on the Peiho river in 1859. Laid up in Portsmouth from 1861 to 1866, she recommissioned for the Mediterranean, where she served until 1870. She became part of the Steam Reserve in 1870, but in 1872 she recommissioned in Portsmouth for service as a sail training ship in the Mediterranean, for which role her engines were removed. In May 1893 she was renamed Lark and in 1912 she was sold at Malta.
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Wikipedia