Boadicea-class cruiser

HMS Boadicea
Class overview
Operators	Royal Navy
Preceded by	Sentinel class
Succeeded by	Blonde class
Built	1907–10
In commission	1909–26
Completed	2
Scrapped	2
General characteristics (as built)
Type	Scout cruiser
Displacement	3,350 long tons (3,400 t) (normal)
Length	405 ft (123.4 m) (o/a)
Beam	41 ft 6 in (12.6 m)
Draught	14 ft (4.3 m)
Installed power	18,000 shp (13,000 kW) 12 × Yarrow boilers
Propulsion	4 × shafts 2 × Parsons steam turbine sets
Speed	25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph)
Complement	317
Armament	6 × single BL 4-inch (102 mm) guns 4 × single QF 3-pounder (47 mm (1.9 in)) guns 2 × single 18-inch (45 cm) torpedo tubes
Armour	Deck: .5–1 in (13–25 mm) Conning Tower: 4 in (102 mm)

The Boadicea-class cruiser was a pair of scout cruisers built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. They were the first class of the types to be fitted with steam turbine machinery.

Design

Like the earlier scout cruisers, the Boadicea class was designed to provide destroyer flotillas with a command ship, theoretically offering the ability to scout ahead of the group and locate targets for the smaller ships to attack. They were enlarged and more powerfully armed versions of the earlier ships, fitted with steam turbines. Curiously, they were no faster than the older ships and equally unsuccessful in their intended role as they lacked the speed of the destroyers they were supposed to escort.

The ships sported a four inch (102 mm) main armament, two guns in front of the bridge, two port and starboard just behind it and two more on the centre line towards the stern. HMS Boadicea was refitted during 1916 with four more 4-inch (102 mm) guns added to the waist of the ship and a three inch (76 mm) anti-aircraft gun to counter the new threats from the air. This was later replaced with a 4 inch A/A gun.

Career

HMS Bellona was attached to the 2nd Flotilla from 1909 to 1912 but her top speed of 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph) was sluggish compared to the 27 knots (50 km/h) of the Acorn class destroyers she was supposedly scouting for. HMS Boadicea lagged even further behind her Acheron class destroyers, capable of up to 32 knots (59 km/h).

Both ships served during the First World War, fighting in the Battle of Jutland. Both were later converted to minelayers. The class was followed by the two ships of the Blonde class of 1909 to 1911 - which proved to be even slower.

Ships

• Bellona - launched on 20 March 1909, converted to minelayer in June 1917 and sold on 9 May 1921.
• Boadicea - launched on 14 May 1908, converted to minelayer in December 1917, on harbour service from January 1921, and sold on 13 July 1926.

Bibliography

• Chesneau, Roger; Kolesnik, Eugene M., eds. (1979). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905. Greenwich: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-8317-0302-4. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |lastauthoramp= ignored (|name-list-style= suggested) (help)
• Corbett, Julian. Naval Operations to the Battle of the Falklands. History of the Great War: Based on Official Documents. Vol. I (2nd, reprint of the 1938 ed.). London and Nashville, Tennessee: Imperial War Museum and Battery Press. ISBN 0-89839-256-X.
• Friedman, Norman (2009). British Destroyers From Earliest Days to the Second World War. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-59114-081-8.
• Friedman, Norman (2011). Naval Weapons of World War One. Barnsley, South Yorkshire, UK: Seaforth. ISBN 978-1-84832-100-7.
• Gardiner, Robert; Gray, Randal, eds. (1984). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships: 1906–1921. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-85177-245-5. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |lastauthoramp= ignored (|name-list-style= suggested) (help)

External links

• Boadicea class in World War I
• History of the Boadicea class