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DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060
Photo # NH 52526:  HMS Wivern off Plymouth, England, 1865

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- SHIPS of the BRITISH NAVY --

HMS Wivern (Turret Ship, 1865-1922).
Originally intended to be CSS Mississippi.
Also briefly known as Egyptian El Monassir.

HMS Wivern, a 2750-ton ironclad turret ship, was built at Birkenhead, England. Ordered by the Confederate government in 1862 as one of two sisters, her true ownership was kept secret under the "cover story" that she was to become an Egyptian warship named El Monassir. Upon delivery to the Confederacy, she was to be named Mississippi. Strong diplomatic pressure by the United States led the British government to seize the two ships in October 1863, while they was fitting out. This action undoubtedly prevented the Confederate Navy from posing an extremely dangerous threat to the Federal blockade, and to the Northern seaboard, as these two ironclads would have been more than a match for all but one of the United States Navy's seagoing warships.

Purchased for the Royal Navy in early 1864, the ship was renamed Wivern and completed in October 1865. She served with the Channel Fleet until 1868. Following a refit that eliminated her square sails in favor of a fore and aft rig, the turret ship served for several months in 1870 as coastguard ship at Hull but then spent nearly a decade in reserve. In 1880, Wivern was returned to active service and sent to Hong Kong as part of that colony's defenses. In 1904 she was reduced to harbor support service. HMS Wivern was sold for scrapping in June 1922.

This page features all our views of the British turret ship Wivern.

For views of Wivern's sister ship, see: HMS Scorpion.

If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

Photo #: NH 52526

HMS Wivern
(British Turret Ironclad, 1865-1922)

At anchor in the Hamoaze River, off Plymouth, England, in 1865.
The original print is mounted on a carte de visite.
Note the lowered bulwarks abreast her two turrets, hammocks stowed around the turret tops to form rifle pits, and her tripod fore and main masts. She was reportedly the first ship fitted with tripod masts, which eliminated standing rigging, thus increasing the arc of her turrets' gunfire.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 79KB; 740 x 455 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 71211

HMS Wivern
(British Turret Ironclad, 1865-1922)

Moored off Plymouth, England, during the later 1860s, with another ironclad in the left distance.
Wivern's bulwarks and smokestack are in the "up" position.

Copied from the photographic album "Types of Ships in the British Navy", prepared in 1877.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 53KB; 740 x 505 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 65901

HMS Wivern
(British Turret Ironclad, 1865-1922)

In harbor, circa the 1870s or 1880s. Her rig had been reduced, as seen here, in about 1868, and she was sent to Hong Kong in 1880 as a harbor defense ship.
Note the ship-of-the-line being repainted in the left background.

Collection of Rear Admiral Ammen C. Farenholt, USN(MC).

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 66KB; 740 x 505 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 61408

HMS Wivern
(British Turret Ironclad, 1865-1922)

Line engraving, published in "Harper's Weekly", 1866.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 122KB; 700 x 570 pixels

 
Photo #: NH 48145

"Rebel Ram constructed by the Lairds"


Nineteenth Century line engraving depicting the outboard profile and rig of the two turret ironclads laid down in 1862 by Laird Brothers for the Confederate States. Intended to become CSS Mississippi and CSS North Carolina, they were seized by the British government in 1863, purchased in 1864 and completed in October 1865 as HMS Wivern and HMS Scorpion.

U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

Online Image: 92KB; 740 x 490 pixels

 


If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


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Page made 24 July 2001