Mermaid-class destroyer

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, HMS Mermaid (1898) and HMS Cheerful (1897) 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 kn 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 destroyer ships built subsequently at the same yard differed only by having Yarrow boilers.