HMS Calliope (1884)
HMS Calliope
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| History | |
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 United Kingdom
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| Name: | HMS Calliope |
| Builder: | HM Dockyard Portsmouth |
| Cost: | Hull: £82,000; machinery: £38,000 |
| Laid down: | 1 October 1881 |
| Launched: | 24 June 1884 |
| Sponsored by: | Lady Phipps Hornby |
| Completed: | 25 January 1887 |
| Commissioned: | 25 January 1887 |
| Maiden voyage: | 1 March 1887 |
| Renamed: |
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| Nickname(s): | "Hurricane Jumper" |
| Fate: | Sold for breaking 1951 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Calypso-class corvette |
| Displacement: | 2,770 long tons |
| Length: | 235 ft (71.6 m) pp |
| Beam: | 44 ft 6 in (13.6 m) |
| Draught: | 19 ft 11 in (6.1 m) |
| Installed power: |
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| Propulsion: | 4-cylinder compound-expansion J. and G. Rennie steam engine, driving a single screw |
| Sail plan: | Barque rig |
| Speed: | 13.75 kn (25.5 km/h) powered; 14.75 kn (27.3 km/h) forced draught |
| Range: | 4,000 nmi (7,400 km) @ 10-knot (19 km/h) |
| Complement: | 293 (later 317) |
| Armament: |
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| Armour: | Deck: 1.5 in (38 mm) over engines |
HMS Calliope was a Calypso-class corvette (later classified as a third-class cruiser) of the Royal Navy which served from 1887 until 1951. Exemplifying the transitional nature of the late Victorian navy, Calliope was a sailing corvette – last such ship built for the Royal Navy – but supplemented the full sail rig with a powerful engine. Steel was used for the hull, and like the earlier iron-hulled corvettes, Calliope was cased with timber and coppered below the waterline, in the same manner as wooden ships.
Calliope was known for "one of the most famous episodes of seamanship in the 19th century", when the vessel was the only one present to avoid being sunk or stranded in the tropical cyclone that struck Apia, Samoa in 1889. After retirement from active service, Calliope served as a training ship until 1951, when the old corvette was sold for breaking.
Calliope and sister ship Calypso comprised the Calypso class of corvettes designed by Nathaniel Barnaby. Part of a long line of cruiser classes built for protecting trade routes and colonial police work, they were the last two sailing corvettes built for the Royal Navy. Corvettes had been built of iron since the Volage class of 1867, but the Calypsos and the preceding Comus class were instead built of steel. Corvettes were designed to operate across the vast distances of Britain's maritime empire, and could not rely on dry docks for maintenance. Since iron (and steel) hulls were subject to biofouling, and they could not easily be cleaned, the established practice of copper sheathing was extended to protect them; the metal plating of the hull was timber-cased and coppered below the waterline. The only armour was a 1.5-inch (38-mm) armoured deck covering the machinery spaces, but coal bunkers along the sides gave some protection to the machinery spaces.
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Wikipedia