HMS Warrior: The First Iron-Hulled Warship

1860

HMS Warrior, launched at Blackwall on the Thames in 1860, was the Royal Navy's first iron-hulled, armoured warship and represented a revolution in naval technology that rendered every other warship in the world obsolete overnight. The ship was built in response to the French ironclad La Gloire, launched the previous year, and was designed to outclass her in every respect. Warrior was 127 metres long, could make over 14 knots under steam and carried a formidable armament of 40 guns behind four and a half inches of wrought-iron armour backed by 18 inches of teak. She was so powerful that she never fired a shot in anger; her mere existence deterred any potential adversary. Despite her revolutionary design, Warrior's period of front-line service was remarkably brief. Within a decade, newer and more advanced ironclads had superseded her. She was reduced to reserve, then served as a floating workshop and eventually as an oil fuel hulk at Pembroke Dock in Wales. In 1979 she was towed to Hartlepool for a painstaking restoration that lasted eight years. In 1987 she arrived at Portsmouth and was moored at the Historic Dockyard, where she has since been open to the public. Warrior is a striking and beautifully restored vessel, and her presence at Portsea adds an important chapter to the story of naval evolution told within the dockyard.