Name Mermaid class Built 1896–1898 Completed 2 | Operators Royal Navy In commission 1897–1919 Lost 1 | |
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Two Mermaid-class destroyers served with the Royal Navy during the First World War. They were three-funnelled turtle-backed destroyers with the usual Hawthorn funnel tops. Built in 1896–1898, Mermaid and Cheerful were launched by R. & W. Hawthorn, Leslie & Company from their Hebburn-on-Tyne shipyard.
Their Thornycroft boilers produced 6,100 hp to given them the required 30 knots (56 km/h) and they were armed with the standard 12-pounder gun and two torpedo tubes. They carried a complement of 63 officers and men. In 1913 the pair - like all other surviving three-funnelled destroyers of the "30-knotter" group - were reclassed as C-class destroyers. The almost identical Greyhound class ships built subsequently at the same yard differed only by having Yarrow boilers.