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HMS ''Albion'' was a British ''Canopus''-class predreadnought battleship. Commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1901, she served on the China Station until 1905. She was then employed as part of the Channel Fleet until 1907, at which time she began service with the Atlantic Fleet. Following the outbreak of World War I, she saw action in operations against German Southwest Africa in 1914 and also served in the Dardanelles campaign against the Turks, supporting the landings at Gallipoli. She remained in the Mediterranean until 1916, and then returned to the United Kingdom for service as a guard ship for the remainder of the war. She was scrapped in 1920. ==Technical Description== HMS ''Albion'' was laid down by Thames Iron Works at Leamouth, London on 3 December 1896. Tragedy struck when she was launched on 21 June 1898;〔Burt, p. 141〕 after the Duchess of York christened her, a wave created by ''Albion''s entry into the water caused a stage from which 200 people were watching to collapse into a side creek, and 34 people, mostly women and children, drowned.〔Burt, p. 159〕 This was probably one of the first ever ship launchings to be filmed.〔http://homecinema.thedigitalfix.co.uk/content/id/73551/tales-from-the-shipyard.html Tales from the Shipyard〕 ''Albion''s completion then was delayed by late delivery of her machinery. She finally began trials late in 1900, during which she was further delayed by machinery and gun defects, and she was not finally completed until June 1901.〔Burt, p. 141, 159〕 ''Albion'' was designed for service in the Far East, and to be able to transit the Suez Canal. She was designed to be smaller (by about 2,000 tons), lighter, and faster than her predecessors, the ''Majestic''-class battleships, although she was slightly longer at 430 feet (131 meters). In order to save weight, she carried less armour than the ''Majestic''s, although the change from Harvey armour in the ''Majestic''s to Krupp armour in ''Albion'' meant that the loss in protection was not as great as it might have been, Krupp armour having greater protective value at a given weight than its Harvey equivalent. Still, her armour was light enough to make her almost a second-class battleship. Part of her armour scheme included the use of a special 1-inch (2.54 mm) armoured deck over the belt to defend against plunging fire by howitzers that France reportedly planned to install on its ships, although this report proved to be false.〔 ''Albion'' had four 12-inch (305-mm) 35-calibre guns mounted in twin turrets fore and aft, mounted in circular barbettes that allowed all-around loading, although at a fixed elevation. She also mounted twelve 6-inch (152-mm) 40-calibre guns (sponson mounting allowing some of them to fire fore and aft) in addition to smaller guns, and four 18-inch (457-mm) submerged torpedo tubes.〔''Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905'', p. 35, 36; Gibbons, p. 145〕 The ''Canopus''-class ships were the first British battleships with water-tube boilers, which generated more power at less expense in weight compared with the cylindrical boilers used in previous ships. The new boilers led to the adoption of fore-and-aft funnels, rather than the side-by-side funnel arrangement used in may previous British battleships. The ''Canopus''-class ships proved to be good steamers, consuming 10 tons of coal per hour at full speed,〔Gibbons, p. 145〕 with a high speed for battleships of their time, a full two knots faster than the ''Majestic''s.〔''Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905'', p. 35; Gibbons, p. 145〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「HMS Albion (1898)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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