HMS Indefatigable

Seven ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Indefatigable:

• HMS Indefatigable was a 64-gun third-rate ship of the line launched in 1784, razeed to a 38-gun frigate in 1795 and broken up in 1816. This was the ship popularised by C. S. Forester in the early volumes of his Hornblower series of novels.
• HMS Indefatigable was to have been a 50-gun fourth rate. She was ordered in 1832 but cancelled in 1834.
• HMS Indefatigable was a 50-gun fourth rate launched in 1848, loaned as a training ship after 1865, and sold in 1914.
• HMS Indefatigable was an Apollo-class second class cruiser launched in 1891, renamed HMS Melpomene in 1910, and sold in 1913.
• HMS Indefatigable was an Indefatigable-class battlecruiser launched in 1909 and sunk at the Battle of Jutland in 1916.
• HMS Indefatigable was a despatch vessel launched in 1883 as HMS Phaeton. She was sold as a training ship named Indefatigable in 1913, was repurchased in 1941 and renamed HMS Carrick II before being scrapped in 1947.
• HMS Indefatigable was an Implacable-class aircraft carrier launched in 1942 and scrapped in 1956.

Other vessels

• "His Majesty's armed defence ship Indefatigable", under the command of George Andrews, recaptured the Melcombe on 21 June 1804.^[1] This Indefatigable appears to have been an hired armed ship that served between 1804 and 1805, though one source has her having been purchased in 1804 and sold in 1805.^[2] A later source does not list her at all, neither as a purchase nor as a hired vessel.^[3]
• In fiction: The Indefatigable (aka "The Indie") was one of the key ships in the Horatio Hornblower series of novels by C. S. Forester.

See also

The Wiktionary entry for indefatigable

References

• Lyon, David (1993) Sailing Navy List: all the ships of the Royal Navy, built, purchased and captured, 1688-1860. (Conway Maritime Press). ISBN 9780851776170
• Winfield, Rif (2008). British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793–1817: Design, Construction, Careers and Fates. Seaforth. ISBN 1861762461.