HMS Defender (1911)
1911 Acheron-class destroyer
HMS Defender was an Acheron-class destroyer which was built in 1911, served throughout World War I and was broken up in 1921. She was the fifth ship of the name to serve in the Royal Navy.
Construction
Defender was laid down at William Denny & Brothers in Dumbarton, Scotland on 7 November 1910, launched on 30 August 1911 and completed in January 1912. Her total cost was £83,000. Capable of 27 knots (50 km/h), she carried two 4-inch (102 mm) guns, other smaller guns and 21-inch (530 mm) torpedo tubes and had a complement of 70 men.
Operational history
Pre-World War One
Defender and her sisters formed the First Destroyer Flotilla and were attached to the Grand Fleet in 1914.
Battle of Heligoland Bight
On 28 August 1914 the Royal Navy and the Imperial German Navy met at the Battle of Heligoland Bight. When the German Destroyer SMS V187 was hit by eight British destroyers and sank with heavy loss of life, Defender stopped to pick up survivors. The reappearance of the German cruiser SMS Stettin caused two of her boats to be left behind. Their crews were lucky to be rescued by the British submarine E4.
“HMS Defender (1911)” enters the record as 1911 Acheron-class destroyer. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Defender, Acheron-class and destroyer can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“HMS Defender (1911)” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Defender, Acheron-class and destroyer provides the most credible route into that argument.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5632097. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1911, 1921, 1910 and 1912.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “HMS Defender (1911)”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow HMS Defender (1911) primary sources, HMS Defender (1911) archive and Defender research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “HMS Defender (1911)”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “HMS Defender (1911)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.