The three ''Ardent''-class torpedo boat destroyers ("Thornycroft ") were ordered by the
British Admiralty
The Admiralty was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for the command of the Royal Navy until 1964, historically under its titular head, the Lord High Admiral – one of the Great Officers of State. For much of it ...
on 12 October 1893 and served with the
Royal Navy. Built by
Thornycroft
Thornycroft was an English vehicle manufacturer which built coaches, buses, and trucks from 1896 until 1977.
History
In 1896, naval engineer John Isaac Thornycroft formed the Thornycroft Steam Carriage and Van Company which built its fir ...
for a contract price of £110,520 for all three vessels, they displaced 301 tons fully laden, and were long overall.
As part of the 1893–1894 Naval Estimates, the
British Admiralty
The Admiralty was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for the command of the Royal Navy until 1964, historically under its titular head, the Lord High Admiral – one of the Great Officers of State. For much of it ...
placed orders for 36
torpedo-boat destroyers, all to be capable of , the "27-Knotters", as a follow-on to the six prototype "26-knotters" ordered in the previous 1892–1893 Estimates. As was typical for torpedo craft at the time, the Admiralty left detailed design to the builders, laying down only broad requirements.
[Chesneau and Kolesnik 1979, p. 87.][Manning 1961, p. 39.]
The ''Ardent''-class were derived from the preceding
''Daring'' class, but were larger and more powerfully engined. It was originally intended that they would be armed with one 12-pounder quick-firing gun forward and three 6-pounder guns, mounted on the broadside and aft, and three 18-inch torpedo tubes, one fixed in a bow mount and two on a revolving mount abaft the two funnels; however the fixed bow tube fitted in the preceding '26-knotter' type had subsequently been found to throw up too much spray and was removed, and in October 1893 it was agreed that the bow tube should be omitted, giving "a clean sharp stem with no projections" and instead two extra 6-pounder guns were installed ''en echelon'' amidships. These three ships - and the similar three
''Charger'' Class destroyers (ordered from Yarrow in the same week) - were the first TBDs to omit this fixed bow tube. They carried a complement of 2 officers and 48 ratings (comprising 20 deck department and 28 engine room compartment).
[David Lyon, ''The First Destroyers'', p.206.]
These three ship met the speed requirement of 27 knots for which they were designed. Over the measured mile and in three-hour trials they averaged the following power (ihp) and speed:
At her second preliminary trial, ''Ardent'' reached 29 knots with 407 r.p.m., the engines developing 5,044 ihp. However, ''Boxer'' was the fastest British destroyer among all the 27-knotters, her best run over the measured mile being 30¾ knots.
In September 1913 the Admiralty re-classed all the remaining 27-knotter destroyers as
A Class; this applied to both ''Boxer'' and ''Bruiser'', although the ''Ardent'' herself had already been scrapped. ''Bruiser'' was sold for scrap eight months later, prior to the start of
WW1, while ''Boxer'' was the oldest destroyer in service in the Royal Navy during the First World War, although the oldest destroyer-type vessel was the large 'torpedo boat/torpedo boat chaser' TB.81 (ex-''Swift''), a destroyer precursor.
Vessels in class
Notes
Bibliography
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ardent class destroyer
Destroyer classes
Ship classes of the Royal Navy