HMS ''Orion'' was a of the Victorian

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

. Originally constructed for the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

, and called ''Bourdjou-Zaffer'', she was purchased by the British Government before completion. She was designed by the Ottoman naval architect Ahmed Pasha and built by

Samuda Brothers Samuda Brothers was an engineering and ship building firm at Cubitt Town on the Isle of Dogs in London, founded by Jacob and Joseph d'Aguilar Samuda. The site is now occupied by Samuda Estate. Samuda Brothers initially leased a premises on ...

Cubitt Town Cubitt Town is a district on the eastern side of the Isle of Dogs in London, England. This part of the former Metropolitan Borough of Poplar was redeveloped as part of the Port of London in the 1840s and 1850s by William Cubitt, Lord Mayor of L ...

, London under contract for the Ottoman Empire. However, in 1878 she was purchased by the British Government whilst still under construction, in a reaction to the war between the Ottoman Empire and Russia. Her sister, , which was purchased at the same time in an essentially complete state, was modified so as to fit in, as far as possible, with contemporary design in the

. ''Orion'', being less advanced in construction at the time of her purchase, was ultimately completed along the same lines. Her original design called for four 10-inch

muzzle-loading rifle A muzzle-loading rifle is a Muzzleloader, muzzle-loaded Small arms and light weapons, small arm that has a rifled barrel rather than a smoothbore, and is loaded from the muzzle of the barrel rather than the breech. Historically they were developed ...

s in a centrally located

box battery The box battery is a disposition of the main armament in a battleship, commonly used in ships built in the latter half of the 19th century. A box battery consists of a thick armour surrounding a central battery to protect the guns. It was an int ...

, but this plan was upgraded to four guns during her building. She, and ''Belleisle'' were the only British ships ever to mount 12-inch calibre artillery deployed to fire only on the broadside. It was possible, because of the provision of appropriate embrasures in the battery, to bring at least one gun to bear at any angle; proponents of the turret system of armament pointed out that in the turret system two, or possibly four guns could be made to bear on the same target.

Service history

The Royal Navy purchased the ''Orion'' in February 1878; she was launched in January 1879. Her first commission started on 24 June 1882, and she was sent to reinforce the Mediterranean Fleet. But she arrived 14 days too late to take part in the

Bombardment of Alexandria The Bombardment of Alexandria in Egypt by the British Mediterranean Fleet took place on 11–13 July 1882. Admiral Beauchamp Seymour was in command of a fleet of fifteen Royal Navy ironclad ships which had previously sailed to the harbor of Al ...

on 11–13 June. Landing parties from the ''Orion'' occupied

Ismailia Ismailia ( ', ) is a city in north-eastern Egypt. Situated on the west bank of the Suez Canal, it is the capital of the Ismailia Governorate. The city had an estimated population of about 1,434,741 according to the statistics issued by the Cen ...

and formed part of the Naval Brigade at the

Battle of Tell El Kebir The Battle of Tel El Kebir (often spelled Tel-El-Kebir) was fought on 13 September 1882 at Tell El Kebir in Egypt, 110 km north-north-east of Cairo. An entrenched Egyptian force under the command of Ahmed ʻUrabi was defeated by a British ...

on 13 September. After paying off into the Reserve at Malta in May 1883, the ''Orion'' was recommissioned in April 1885. There was tension between Britain and Russia between 1885 and 1887 as a result of the

Panjdeh incident The Panjdeh incident (spelled Penjdeh in older accounts, and known in Russian historiography as the battle of the Kushka) was an armed engagement between the Emirate of Afghanistan and the Russian Empire in 1885 that led to a diplomatic crisi ...

. The ''Orion'' was ordered to shadow a Russian armoured cruiser that was going from the Mediterranean to the Far East. At Aden and Colombo, agents working for the Royal Navy purchased the entire stock of coal available, so that to recoal, the Russian cruiser had to buy its coal from them, and they were only willing to supply enough for the cruiser to steam at half speed. This enabled the ''Orion'' to overtake the Russian cruiser. The ''Orion'' crossed the Bay of Bengal in the favourable season; when the Russian cruiser reached Singapore, she found the ''Orion'' waiting for her. The Russian cruiser then went on to Vladivostok shadowed by the ''Audacious'' and the ''Shannon''. After the commission ended in 1888, the ''Orion'' remained at Singapore as guardship until 1890, when she returned to the Mediterranean Fleet. On 26 May 1890, whilst serving in the Mediterranean Fleet, the ''Orion'' accidentally collided with the ''Temeraire''. The fleet was in close formation at sea, with the ''Temeraire'' as the last ship in the starboard column and the ''Orion'' as the next-to-last ship in the port column, which, with two

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

s () between the columns, resulted in the ''Orion'' being four

points A point is a small dot or the sharp tip of something. Point or points may refer to: Mathematics * Point (geometry), an entity that has a location in space or on a plane, but has no extent; more generally, an element of some abstract topologica ...

(45°) on the port bow of the ''Temeraire''. *According to G.A. Ballard, the ''Temeraire'' and the ''Orion'' were ordered to change positions, and the ''Orion'' hit the ''Temeraire'' with her ram, as described below. *According to a contemporary newspaper, the ''Orion'' and the cruiser ''Phaeton'' were ordered to change positions, and the ''Orion'' hit the ''Temeraire'' with her propeller. Ballard wrote that according to the instructions of the signal book used at the time, such movements had to comply with the traffic rules by moving from port to port. But due to the prevailing situation, the ''Orion'''s engines had to be stopped when turning to starboard. When the flagship's signal made, the ''Orion'''s watch officer kept his engines running, leaving little room to avoid a collision at full speed. Fortunately, the officer on watch of the ''Temeraire'' had recognized the impending danger and immediately gave the order to head for ''Orion'' instead of turning away from it. When the ''Orion'''s ram struck the ''Temeraire'' next to the engine room and below the armour belt, ''Temeraire'''s stern was already swinging away from it, which tore through the ship's outer skin and flooded a wing compartment. Later in 1890, the ''Orion'' went into second class reserve. After repair and refit, she was paid off into Dockyard Reserve at Chatham in September 1893. The ''Orion'' was declared non-effective in November 1901. Three months later, in April 1902, she became a depot-ship at Malta for torpedo-boats, Captain Charles Madden in command. She served a brief commission in December 1906. In 1910 she was renamed ''Orontes'', and served as a store-ship at Devonport. She was sold in June 1913 for £13,275.

Citations

References

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Orion (1879) Belleisle-class ironclads Ships built in Cubitt Town 1879 ships Victorian-era battleships of the United Kingdom