HMS Wivern (1863)
The first HMS Wivern was an ironclad turret ship built at Birkenhead, England. She was one of two sister ships secretly ordered from the John Laird Sons & Company shipyard in 1862 by the Confederate States of America.
| History | |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | |
| Name | HMS Wivern |
| Namesake | Variant spelling of wyvern |
| Ordered | 1862 |
| Builder | John Laird Sons & Company, Birkenhead |
| Laid down | April 1862 |
| Launched | 29 August 1863 |
| Completed | 10 October 1865 |
| Fate | Sold for scrap, 1922 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type | Ironclad turret ship |
| Displacement | 2,751 long tons (2,795 t) |
| Length | 224 ft 6 in (68.4 m) (p/p) |
| Beam | 42 ft 4 in (12.9 m) |
| Draught | 17 ft (5.2 m) (deep load) |
| Installed power | |
| Propulsion | 2 shaft, 2 horizontal direct-acting steam engines |
| Sail plan | Barque-rigged |
| Speed | 10.5 knots (19.4 km/h; 12.1 mph) |
| Range | 1,210 nmi (2,240 km; 1,390 mi) at 10 kn (19 km/h; 12 mph) |
| Complement | 153 |
| Armament | 2 × twin 9-inch (229 mm) muzzle-loading rifles |
| Armour |
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Her true ownership was concealed by the fiction that she was being built as the Egyptian warship El Monassir. She was to have been named CSS Mississippi upon delivery to the Confederacy. Her sister was built under the false name El Tousson and was to have been renamed CSS North Carolina. In October 1863, a few months after their launch and before they could be completed, the UK Government seized the two ironclads.
In 1864, the Admiralty bought them and commissioned them into the Royal Navy: El Monassir as HMS Wivern and El Tousson as HMS Scorpion. Wivern had a long Royal Navy career, until she was scrapped in Hong Kong in 1922.