HMS Thunderbolt (1856)
Thunderbolt was one of three iron-hulled armoured floating batteries ordered during the Crimean War to follow the slightly earlier wooden-hulled Aetna Class Ironclad Floating Battery. See also HMS Terror (1856) and HMS Erebus (1856).
1856 'The Thunderbolt iron floating battery, built by Messrs. Samuda, of Millwall, Poplar, was launched on Tuesday. It is 186 feet long, 48½ broad, and 18½ deep ; 1,954 tons burden. Her engines are 200-horse power. She was to carry sixteen 68-pounders, each weighing 95 cwt. Over a casing of teak planks 6 inches thick, 4-inch iron plates are securely bolted ; and it is said that shot or shell fired at 400 yards would produce no effect on her. She was begun on the 8th January, and ready for launching on the 16th inst.'[1]
1863 'The floating batteries, Thunderbolt and Aetna, sixteen guns each, iron clads, built for the Russian war, which have been stationed in the Thames to protect the river during the dismantling of the batteries at Shornmead and Coalhouse point, have been removed to the Medway where tney will be stationed in future, to protect the entrance of the Thames and Medway. The reconstruction of the forts, on the Kent and Essex shores of the Thames, is to be proceeded with immediately.'[2]
1865 'Thunderbolt, 16, iron floating battery, attached to the steam reserve squadron in the Medway, has had her bottom coated over with the anti-fouling composition. She has all her guns and most of her stores on board, and will be ready for undocking at the approaching spring tides.' [3]
1874 'The Thunderbolt, 16, iron floating battery, armour-plated, has taken the place of the Thunder as a floating workshop in Chatham dockyard.'[4]
1878 'The Thunderbolt, iron floating battery, has been removed out of dock at Chatham on the completion of her repairs. She was built for operations in the Black Sea during the Russian war, since which time she has been employed on harbour service at Chatham.'[5]