HMS Howe (1860)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Howe.

The former HMS Howe as the school ship HMS Impregnable in the 1890s
History
Royal Navy United Kingdom
Name	Howe
Ordered	3 April 1854
Builder	HM Dockyard, Pembroke
Laid down	10 March 1856
Launched	7 March 1860
Renamed	Bulwark, 3 December 1885 Impregnable, 27 September 1886 Bulwark, — December 1919
Fate	Sold for scrap, 18 February 1921
General characteristics
Class & type	Victoria-class ship of the line
Displacement	6,959 tons
Tons burthen	424571⁄94 bm
Length	260 ft (79.2 m)
Beam	61 ft 1 in (18.6 m)
Draught	20 ft 9 in (6.3 m)
Depth of hold	26 ft 10 in (8.2 m)
Installed power	8 boilers, 4,564  ihp (3,403  kW; 4,627  PS)
Propulsion	1 propeller shaft; 1 steam engine
Sail plan	Full-rigged ship
Speed	13.6 knots (25.2 km/h; 15.7 mph)
Complement	1,000 officers and ratings
Armament	Lower gun deck: 32 × 8 in (203 mm) shell guns Middle gun deck: 30 × 8 in guns Upper gun deck: 32 × 32 pdr guns Quarter deck: 26 × 32 pdr guns, 1 × 68 pdr gun

HMS Howe was built as a 121-gun screw first-rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy. She and her sister HMS Victoria were the first and only British three-decker ships of the line to be designed from the start for screw propulsion, but the Howe was never completed for sea service (and never served under her original name). During the 1860s, the first ironclad battleships gradually made unarmoured two- and three-deckers obsolete.

The highest number of guns she ever actually carried was 12, when she finally entered service as the training ship Bulwark in 1885.

Howe was named after Admiral Richard Howe. She was renamed a second time to Impregnable on 27 September 1886, but reverted to Bulwark in 1919 shortly before being sold for breaking up in 1921.

Description

Howe measured 260 feet (79.2 m) on the gundeck and 219 feet 10 inches (67.0 m) on the keel. She had a beam of 61 feet 1 inch (18.6 m), a maximum draught of 21 feet 2 inches (6.5 m), and a depth of hold of 26 feet 10 inches (8.2 m). The ship had a tonnage of 4,245 31⁄94 tons burthen. ^[1] The armament of the Victoria class consisted of thirty-two 8 in (203 mm) shell guns on her lower gun deck, thirty 8-inch shell guns on the middle gun deck and thirty-two 32-pounder (56 cwt) guns ^{[Note 1]} on her upper gun deck. Between their forecastle and quarterdeck, they carried twenty-six 32-pounder (42 cwt) guns and a single 68-pounder (95 cwt) on a pivot mount. Their crew numbered 1000 officers and ratings. ^[1]

Howe's figurehead in Hunt's Green, Buckinghamshire)

Howe was powered by a two-cylinder horizontal trunk steam engine that was rated at 1000 nominal horsepower; it used steam from eight fire-tube boilers to drive the single propeller shaft. ^[1] The ship's engine was built by John Penn and Sons and it produced 4,564 indicated horsepower (3,403  kW ; 4,627  PS ) during her sea trials on 1 June 1860 which gave her a maximum speed of 13.6 knots (25.2 km/h; 15.7 mph), albeit without masts or supplies. The Victoria-class ships were unique in the RN as the only steam battleships with boiler rooms fore and aft of the engine room. ^[2]

Notes

1. "Cwt" is the abbreviation for hundredweight, 56 cwt referring to the weight of the gun.

Footnotes

1. Winfield 2014, p. 22
2. Lambert, p. 122

Bibliography

• Lambert, Andrew D. (1984). Battleships in Transition: The Creation of the Steam Battlefleet 1815-1860. Conway Maritime Press. ISBN   0-85177-315-X.
• Winfield, Rif (2014). British Warships in the Age of Sail, 1817–1863: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth Publishing. ISBN   978-1-84832-169-4.