HMS Essex (1901)

HMS Essex was a Monmouth-class armoured cruiser of the Royal Navy which served in the First World War

Service history
HMS Essex was laid down at Pembroke Dock 2 January 1900, and launched there on 29 August 1901, when she was christened by Mrs. Barlow, wife of the Captain-Superintendent of the dockyard.

In the view of one man who served aboard Essex around 1911, she was an unhappy and unpleasant ship and well known as a hot bed of un-natural practices, as told in The Royal Navy, an Illustrated Social History 1870-1982. Men going ashore at Portsmouth wearing an HMS Essex cap would be mocked by local harlots as being unlikely to want their services.

On the 16th of June, 1917, HMS Essex departed from Kantara, Egypt and carried Australian troops (4th Light Horse AIF) back to Australia.

She served in the First World War with most of her sisters, and survived to be sold for scrap on 8 November 1921. Essex was eventually broken up in Germany.