HMS Royal Oak was one of seven pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy during the 1890s. Upon her completion in 1894, she was initially placed in reserve until mobilised in 1896 for service with the Flying Squadron. After returning briefly to reserve, the ship was assigned the following year to the Mediterranean Fleet. Royal Oak remained there until 1902 when she returned home; after a refit, the ship was assigned to the Home Fleet, where she served as the flagship of the fleet's second-in-command in 1904–05. Royal Oak was then reduced to reserve until she was taken out of service in 1911. The ship was sold for scrap in early 1914.
Design and description
The design of the Royal Sovereign-class ships was derived from that of the battleships, greatly enlarged to improve seakeeping and to provide space for a secondary armament as in the preceding battleships. The ships displaced at normal load and at deep load. They had a length between perpendiculars of and an overall length of , a beam of , and a draught of . Their crew consisted of 670 officers and ratings in 1903.
The Royal Sovereigns were powered by a pair of three-cylinder, vertical triple-expansion steam engines, each driving one shaft. Their engines were designed to produce a total of and a maximum speed of using steam provided by eight cylindrical boilers with forced draught. The ships carried a maximum of of coal, which gave them a range of at a speed of .
Their main armament consisted of four breech-loading (BL) guns mounted in two twin-gun barbettes, one each fore and aft of the superstructure. Each gun was provided with 80 rounds. Their secondary armament consisted of ten quick-firing (QF) guns. 200 rounds per gun were carried by the ships. Sixteen QF 6-pounder () guns of an unknown type and a dozen QF 3-pounder () Hotchkiss guns were fitted for defence against torpedo boats. The two 3-pounders in the upper fighting top were removed in 1899–1902 and all of the remaining light guns from the lower fighting tops and main deck followed in 1905–1909. The Royal Sovereign-class ships mounted seven 18-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes, although Royal Oak had four of hers removed in 1902.
The Royal Sovereigns' armour scheme was similar to that of the Trafalgars, as the waterline belt of compound armour only protected the area between the barbettes. The belt was long and had a total height of of which was below water. Transverse bulkheads thick closed off the ends of the belt. Above the belt was a strake of nickel-steel armour closed off by transverse bulkheads.
The barbettes were protected by compound armour, ranging in thickness from , and the casemates for the 6-inch guns were protected by armour equally thick. The thicknesses of the deck armour ranged from . The walls of the forward conning tower were thick and the aft conning tower was protected by 3-inch plates.
Construction and career
The Royal Sovereign class was ordered as part of the Naval Defence Act 1889 that was a supplement to the normal naval estimates. Royal Oak, named after the tree in which King Charles II hid after the Battle of Worcester, was the sixth ship of her name to serve in the Royal Navy. The ship was laid down by Laird Brothers at their shipyard in Birkenhead on 29 May 1890 and floated out of the drydock on 5 November 1892. She arrived at Portsmouth Dockyard on 29 October 1893 for fitting out, completed her sea trials in June 1894, and cost £977,996. Upon completion, Royal Oak was placed in reserve at Portsmouth. Almost two years later, she mobilised there on 14 January 1896 for service in the Particular Service Squadron – later renamed the Flying Squadron – which was formed in response to rising tensions in Europe following the Jameson Raid and Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II's telegram of support to the Boer government. When the squadron disbanded on 25 November, the ship returned to reserve at Portsmouth.