Career
Ordered:
Laid down:	29 August 1873 at Pembroke Dockyard
Launched:	11 November 1875
Completed:	17 September 1877
Commissioned:	1877
Decommissioned:
Fate:	Sold for scrapping 12 December 1899
Struck:
General Characteristics
Displacement:	5670 tons
Length:	260 ft
Beam:	54 ft
Draught:	22 ft 3 in
Propulsion:	Sail. As built, with 24000 sq. ft. of sail, reduced shortly afterwards to 21500 sq. ft. Coal fired Laird compound horizontal steam engine, 8 x cylindrical boilers, single screw, 3,370 indicated horsepower
Speed:	12.25 knots maximum
Range:	Bunker capacity originally 280 tons coal, later increased to 560 tons, although sails allowed range only limited by food and water capacity.
Complement:	452
Armament:	2 x 10 in muzzle loading rifled guns, 7 x 9 in muzzle loading rifled guns 6 x 20 pounder breech loading guns added in 1881 4 x torpedo tubes added in 1881 This image is a temporary placeholder for articles(mostly those utilizing the table from Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/Tables) which still need a picture to illustrate them. ... The source for an SVG image of the White Ensign can be found at User:David Newton/SVG Graphics/White Ensign. ... August 29 is the 241st day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (242nd in leap years), with 124 days remaining. ... 1873 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... November 11 is the 315th day of the year (316th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 50 days remaining. ... 1875 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... September 17 is the 260th day of the year (261st in leap years). ... 1877 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... 1877 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... December 12 is the 346th day (347th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1899 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... A steam engine, once known as a fire and air engine, is a heat engine that makes use of the thermal energy that exists in steam, converting it to mechanical work. ... The horsepower (hp) is the name of several non-metric units of power. ... 1881 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ...
Armour:	Belt: 6-9 in on 10-13 in teak Deck: 1.5-3 in Bulkheads: 8-9 in Conning tower: 9 in A conning tower was an armoured observation post on a warship from where the vessel was controlled during a battle. ...

The eighth HMS Shannon was the first British armoured cruiser. She was the last Royal Navy ironclad to be built which had a propeller that could be hoisted out of the water to reduce drag when she was under sail, and the first to have an armoured deck. The armored cruiser was a naval cruiser protected by armor on its sides as well as on the decks and gun positions. ... The Royal Navy of the United Kingdom is the senior service of the armed services, being the oldest of its three branches. ... Ironclad warships, frequently shortened to just ironclads, were ships sheathed with thick iron plates for protection. ... A propeller can be seen as a rotating fin in water or a wing in air. ... For a solid object moving through a fluid or gas, drag is the sum of all the aerodynamic or hydrodynamic forces in the direction of the external fluid flow. ... Deck may mean: deck (ship), a floor or level of a ship a floor or level of other types of vehicles, most commonly seen in combination: double decker flight deck (aircraft) deck (building), an outdoor floor attached to a building deck (cards), a collection of cards, such playing cards or...

When she was built, she was considered to be a long-range cruising ironclad frigate, the term cruiser being invented and applied later. To allow her to operate for long periods far from British ports and coaling stations she was equipped with sails and a copper and wood sheathing on her hull. Ironclad warships, frequently shortened to just ironclads, were ships sheathed with thick iron plates for protection. ... Frigate is a name which has been used for several distinct types of warships at different times. ... USS Port Royal, a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser, launched in 1994. ... General Name, Symbol, Number copper, Cu, 29 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 11, 4, d Appearance copper, metallic Atomic mass 63. ... WOOD is a pair of radio stations in Grand Rapids, Michigan owned by Clear Channel on the frequencies of 1300 AM and 105. ...

She was designed as a counter to the perceived threat from second class ironclad anti-commerce raiders such as the Russian General Admiral and her sister Gerzog Edinburgski. These ships were fast and lightly armed, and Shannon was to be better armed and armoured than them and with sufficient range and speed to catch them. In practice although she could outgun these ships, her design top speed of 13 knots, and actual speed of 12.25 knots meant that she would have been too slow to get within range of many of them.

She also became obselete very quickly since she lacked the armour of a battleship and the speed of later cruisers. In particular her low speed meant that of her 22 years in service, only three were actually spent in foreign waters - a year in the China station followed by two in the Pacific station. Her ammunition supply in the Pacific was also a problem as she was the only British ship there with 10 inch guns, although had her speed been sufficient she could have had her armament altered. HMS Victory in 1884 In naval history, battleships were the most heavily armed and armored warships afloat. ... For other meanings of Pacific, see Pacific (disambiguation). ... Boxes of ammunition clog a warehouse in Baghdad Ammunition is a generic military term meaning (the assembly of) a projectile and its propellant. ...

She was relegated to coastguard duty in 1883 and placed in the reserve fleet in 1893 before being sold for scrapping in 1899. A coast guard is an organization devoted to saving the lives of shipwrecked mariners or people in danger at sea. ... 1883 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... 1893 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... 1899 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ...

See HMS Shannon for other ships of this name. Nine ships of the British Royal Navy have been named HMS Shannon, after the River Shannon in Ireland, longest river of the British Isles. ...

References

• John Beeler, Birth of the Battleship - British capital ship design 1870-1881, Chatham Publishing, 2001 ISBN 1861761678
• David Lyon, The Ship - Steam, steel and torpedoes, National Maritime Museum, 1980, ISBN 0112903185
• J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy, Greenhill Books, 1987.
• Battleships-cruisers.co.uk
• Warships on the Web