Spanish warship Destructor (1886)

Destructor was a 19th-century Spanish warship. She was a fast ocean-going torpedo gunboat and a precursor of the destroyer type of vessel. Destructor was the first warship classified as a "destroyer" at the time of her commissioning. Her designer was a Spanish Navy officer, Fernando Villaamil, commissioned by the Minister of the Navy, Vice-Admiral Manuel Pezuela.

Genesis
During the 1860s, 70s and 80s the rapidly improving, fast and cheap torpedo boats were presenting an escalating threat to major warships. Escort vessels were already in use to provide protection for battleships but it was decided that what was needed was a new type of enlarged torpedo boat, capable of escorting larger ships on long voyages and also able to attack enemy battleships as part of a fleet action.

The Spanish Navy asked several British shipyards to submit proposals capable of fulfilling these specifications. In 1885 it chose the design submitted by the shipyard of James and George Thomson of Clydebank, near the Yarrow shipyards. She was laid down at the end of the year, launched in 1886, and commissioned in 1887.

Characteristics
She displaced 348 tons, and was equipped with triple-expansion engines generating 3784 HP, for a maximum speed of 22.6 kn, which made her one of the faster ships in the world by 1888. She was armed with one 90 mm Spanish-designed Hontoria breech-loading gun, four 57 mm (6-pdr) Nordenfeldt guns, two 37 mm (3-pdr) Hotchkiss cannons and two 15 in Schwartzkopff torpedo tubes. The ship carried three torpedoes per tube. She was manned by a crew of 60. On her maiden voyage, Destructor established a record after steaming from Falmouth to El Ferrol in 24 hours.

In terms of gunnery, speed and dimensions, the specialised design to chase torpedo boats and her high seas capabilities, Destructor is widely considered the first torpedo-boat destroyer ever built, and was described as such by British naval engineer Sir William Henry White. The Destructor is thought to have influenced the design and concept of later destroyers developed by the British Navy. Further developments followed the pattern of the Havock class, built in 1893. The aim of the new destroyer design was not only to neutralize the torpedo boat as an effective weapon, but also to replace it as a faster and more reliable torpedo-carrying warship.