HMS Ariel (1897)

HMS Ariel was a two funnel, 30 knot destroyer ordered by the Royal Navy under the 1895 – 1896 Naval Estimates. Named after Shakespeare's "airy spirit", or the biblical spirit of the same name, she was the ninth ship of the name to serve in the Royal Navy. She was launched in 1897, served at Chatham and Malta, and was wrecked in a storm in 1907.

Construction
The British Admiralty ordered two "thirty-knotter" torpedo boat destroyers from John I. Thornycroft & Company as part of the 1895–96 shipbuilding programme for the Royal Navy. The two ships, HMS Angler (1897) and Ariel were repeats of the four thirty-knotters ordered from Thornycroft under the previous year's programme (HMS Desperate (1896), HMS Fame (1896), HMS Foam (1896) and HMS Mallard (1896)) and as such shared the same design features.

Thornycroft's design had three water-tube boilers supplying steam at 220 psi to 2 four-cylinder triple-expansion steam engines, rated at 5700 ihp, and had two funnels. The ship was 210 ft long overall and 208 ft at the waterline, with a beam of 19 ft and a draught of 5 ft. Displacement was 272 LT light and 352 LT full load, while crew was 63 officers and men. The ships were required to reach a speed of 30 kn during sea trials and carry an armament of a single QF 12 pounder 12 cwt (3 in calibre) gun, backed up by five 6-pounder guns, and two 18-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes. An arched turtleback forecastle was to be fitted.

She was laid down as yard number 314 on 23 April 1896 at Thornycroft's shipyard at Chiswick on the River Thames and was launched on 5 March 1897. During sea trials, she reached 30.82 kn over the measured mile and 30.194 kn in the three-hour trial. Ariel was completed in October 1898.

Operational history
After commissioning Ariel was assigned to the Chatham Division of the Harwich Flotilla where she participated in the exercises with HMS Angler (1897) in 1899. The following year she was part of the Medway Instructional Flotilla. Lieutenant Henry Cyril Royds Brocklebank was appointed in command on 1 March 1900.

She was commissioned at Chatham on 22 August 1901 with a complement of 60 officers and men, to serve at the Mediterranean station. Upon arrival at Gibraltar she replaced HMS Hornet (1893) as tender to the receiving ship HMS Cormorant (1877). On 3 December 1901 she arrived in Malta from Gibraltar.

Loss
On 19 April 1907, Ariel was wrecked when she ran aground on a breakwater just outside Grand Harbour, Valletta, Malta, at night. All of her crew survived, and were rescued by the destroyer HMS Bruiser (1895).