3-016-945 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Royal Sovereign turret-ship, 1864. 'The first turret-ship of the British Navy, the Royal Sovereign, which has been converted from an ordinary three-decker into her present form under the superintendence of Captain Cowper Coles...In her run down through Stoke's Bay she made twelve knots an hour, and could, if prepared for a trial of speed, have made thirteen knots, with her guns, shot, and coal on board, thus proving faster than she was as a three-decker...[The Engraving shows] this formidable warship as cleared for action, with the bulwarks lowered...[She is] a floating battery of superior speed...The tops of the turrets are covered with thin plating, supported on strong T-shaped bars, with the necessary man-holes for directing the turret (training its guns upon an object) and gaining access to the top. This latter is surrounded by a double row of fight iron railings, which enables it to be used as a look-out promenade at sea, or, by the addition of the men's hammocks round the railings, converted into an impregnable rifle-pit, when steaming up an enemy's river or close along his shores. The foremost turret, which will mount two 10-5-in. guns, has an internal diameter of 23 ft., and weighs 130 tons - that is, without guns'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.