Amethyst-class corvette

The Amethyst-class corvettes were a class of the last wooden warships to be built for the British Royal Navy; each was built at a Royal Dockyard. Three were ordered under the 1871–72 Programme and two under the 1872–73 Programme. Built in the early and middle 1870s, they mostly served overseas and were retired early as they were regarded as hopelessly obsolete by the late 1880s. She served alongside HMS Shah in the action against the Peruvian warship Huascar on 29th May 1877.

HMS Diamond in Farm Cove, Sydney c. 1887
Class overview
Name	Amethyst class
Builders	Devonport Dockyard, Sheerness Dockyard
Operators	Royal Navy
Preceded by	Volage class
Succeeded by	HMS Rover
Built	1871–75
Completed	5
Scrapped	5
General characteristics (as built)
Type	Wooden screw corvette
Displacement	1,934 long tons (1,965 t)
Tons burthen	1,405 bm
Length	220 ft (67.1 m) (p/p)
Beam	37 ft (11.3 m)
Draught	18 ft (5.5 m)
Installed power	2,031–2,364 ihp (1,515–1,763 kW)
Propulsion	1 shaft 1 × 2-cylinder compound expansion steam engine 6 cylindrical boilers
Sail plan	Ship rig
Speed	12–13 knots (22–24 km/h; 14–15 mph)
Range	2,060–2,500 nmi (3,820–4,630 km; 2,370–2,880 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement	225
Armament	14 × 64-pounder 71-cwt or 64-cwt rifled muzzle-loading (RML) guns

Design

Unlike earlier wooden corvettes in the Navy, they had clipper bows (like the earlier Amazon Class sloops), while the last two had frigate sterns. All were initially ship-rigged (except for Encounter, which was barque-rigged), but after their first commission the Modeste, Diamond and Sapphire (but not Amethyst) were re-rigged as barques. They were completed with fourteen 64-pdr guns, of which twelve were truck-mounted on the broadsides and two were on rotating slides as bow and stern chasers. The guns were 64 cwt in the first three ships and 71 cwt in the last two.

Ships

Ship	Builder	Laid down	Launched	Completed	Fate	Cost
Encounter	Sheerness Dockyard[1]	19 June 1871[2]	1 January 1873[2]	July 1873[2]	Sold for scrap October 1888[2]	£63,098[3]
Amethyst	Devonport Dockyard[1]	28 July 1871[2]	19 April 1873[2]	July 1873[2]	Sold for scrap, November 1887[2]	N/A
Modeste	Devonport Dockyard[1]	27 November 1871[2]	23 May 1873[2]	January 1874[2]	Sold for scrap, 8 January 1888[2]	N/A
Diamond	Sheerness Dockyard[1]	1873[2]	26 August 1873[2]	July 1875[2]	Sold for scrap August 1889[2]	£76,796[2]
Sapphire	Devonport Dockyard[1]	17 June 1873[2]	24 September 1874[2]	August 1875[2]	Sold for scrap, 24 September 1892[2]	£78,297[2]

Footnotes

1. Chesneau & Kolesnik, p. 51
2. Lyon & Winfield, p. 288
3. Brassey 1888, p. 288.

Bibliography

• Ballard, G. A. (1937). "British Corvettes of 1875: The Last Wooden Class". Mariner's Mirror. 23 (October). Cambridge, UK: Society for Nautical Research: 435–45.
• Chesneau, Roger & Kolesnik, Eugene M., eds. (1979). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905. Greenwich, UK: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-8317-0302-4.
• Brassey, T. A. (1888). The Naval Annual 1887. London: J Griffin and Co.
• Winfield, R.; Lyon, D. (2004). The Sail and Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815–1889. London: Chatham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-86176-032-6. OCLC 52620555.