HMS Achilles (1863)

Armoured frigate of the Royal Navy

HMS Achilles was an armoured frigate built for the Royal Navy in the 1860s. Upon her completion in 1864 she was assigned to the Channel Fleet. The ship was paid off in 1868 to refit and be re armed. When she recommissioned in 1869, she was assigned as the guard ship of the Fleet Reserve in the Portland District until 1874. Achilles was refitted and re armed again in 1874 and became the guard ship of the Liverpool District in 1875. Two years later, she was rejoined the Channel Fleet before going to the Mediterranean in 1878. The ship returned to the Channel Fleet in 1880 and served until she was paid off in 1885. Achilles was recommissioned in 1901 as a depot ship at Malta under a succession of different names. She was transferred to Chatham in 1914 and was again renamed multiple times before she was sold for scrap in 1923. Achilles had more changes of her rigging and armament than any other British warship, before or since. The ship was 380 feet (116 m) long between perpendiculars, had a beam of 58 feet (18 m) and a draft of 27 feet (8 m). She displaced and had a tonnage of 6,121 bm. Achilles was designed with a high centre of gravity and was very stiff. So much so that the ship only rolled 10 degrees during one storm that ripped the main and mizen topgallant masts off and split her topsails. Because of her great length she was not very manoeuvrable. Achilles had a crew of 709 officers and ratings.

The ship had a single two cylinder trunk steam engine made by John Penn and Sons driving a single 24 feet (7 m) propeller. Ten rectangular boilers provided steam to the engine at a working pressure of During her sea trials on 15 March 1865, Achilles had a maximum speed of from The ship carried of coal, enough to steam at They carried a total of of sail area, excluding the stunsails, the greatest area ever spread in a British warship.

The intended armament of Achilles changed no less than five times before it was finally mounted. She received four rifled 110 pounder breech loading guns mounted on the upper deck, two of which served as chase guns at the bow and stern, and 16 smoothbore, muzzle loading 100 pounder Somerset cannon, eight on each side on the main deck. The breech loading guns were a new design from Armstrong and much was hoped for them. Firing tests carried out in September 1861 against an armoured target, however, proved that the 110 pounder was inferior to the 68 pounder smoothbore gun in armour penetration and repeated incidents of breech explosions during the Battles for Shimonoseki and the Bombardment of Kagoshima in 1863–1864 caused the navy to withdraw the gun from service shortly afterwards. In 1865, six 68 pounder smoothbores were added, three on each side of the main deck, although she was not comprehensively rearmed until her 1868 refit. Detailed data for the Somerset cannon is not available, but the solid shot of the 68 pounder gun weighed approximately while the gun itself weighed The gun had a muzzle velocity of and had a range of at an elevation of 12°. The shell of the 110 pounder Armstrong breech loader weighed It had a muzzle velocity of and, at an elevation of 11.25°, a maximum range of The 110 pounder gun weighed All of the guns could fire both solid shot and explosive shells. Achilles was rearmed during her 1867–68 refit with 22 seven inch and eight rifled muzzle loading guns. The eight inch guns and 18 seven inch guns were mounted on the main deck and the remaining seven inch guns replaced the 110 pounders on the upper deck. The shell of the 15 calibre eight inch gun weighed while the gun itself weighed It had a muzzle velocity of and was credited with the ability to penetrate of wrought iron armour at the muzzle. The 16 calibre seven inch gun weighed and fired a shell. It was credited with the ability to penetrate armour. In 1874 the ship was rearmed with 16 nine inch rifled muzzle loaders replacing the 4 eight inch and 20 of the 22 seven inch guns. Fourteen of the guns were mounted on the main deck and the other two replaced the seven inch chase guns. The two remaining seven inch guns stayed in their position on the quarterdeck. As the nine inch guns were considerably bigger than their predecessors, the gun ports had to be widened to accommodate them. The shell of the 14 calibre nine inch gun weighed while the gun itself weighed It had a muzzle velocity of and was rated with the ability to penetrate a of wrought iron armour at the muzzle.

Achilles, named after the Greek mythological hero, was ordered on 10 April 1861 from the Chatham Dockyard. She was the first iron hulled warship to be built at a royal dockyard and her construction was delayed by the need to acquire the necessary machinery to handle iron and to train the workers to use it. The ship was laid down on 1 August 1861 in a drydock and was floated out rather than being launched on 23 December 1863. Achilles was completed on 26 November 1864 at the cost of £469,572. She served in the Channel Fleet until 1868. After a refit and her first major re armament, Achilles became the guardship at Portland until 1874 when she was again re armed. Upon its completion in 1875, the ship became guardship at Liverpool until 1877 when Captain William Hewett, VC, assumed command. In 1878 she was one of the ships in the Particular Service Squadron which Admiral Geoffrey Hornby took through the Dardanelles at the time of the Russian war scare in June–August 1878 during the Russo Turkish War. Achilles accidentally collided with the flagship of the Mediterranean Fleet, , on 4 October 1879, but was only lightly damaged by Alexandras propeller. The ship rejoined the Channel Fleet in 1880 and was paid off in 1885. She lay derelict in the Hamoaze until April 1901, when she was sent to Malta as a depot ship. To release her name for the new armoured cruiser, Achilles was renamed Hibernia in 1902. She was renamed Egmont in March 1904, and remained in Malta until 1914. Her role in Malta was assumed by the stone frigate Fort St Angelo. She was brought home to Chatham that year, and served there as a depot ship under the successive names of Egremont (19 June 1916) and Pembroke (6 June 1919).

Charles Dickens offered a short meditation on the construction of HMS Achilles following a visit to Chatham Dockyard in 1863, first published in the weekly magazine All the Year Round on 29 August 1863, and then included in his collection The Uncommercial Traveller. Dickens came away impressed by the experience, and the idea that such a large iron construction could float or move. "To think that this Achilles, monstrous compound of iron tank and oaken chest, can ever swim or roll! To think that any force of wind and wave could ever break her!"