There were no 1886 manoeuvres, but in 1887 they followed the Queen’s Jubilee Review off Spithead.17 The fleet was organized into three cruising squadrons (A, B, and C) and four coast defence flotillas. Squadron A was ten ironclads (including Imperieuse) and four cruisers (including Curlew); B was another ten ironclads and four cruisers, and C was six cruisers (including the slow Calypso). The coast defence units included both ironclads and first-class torpedo boats plus, in some cases, gunboats. The general idea was that British squadrons had lost touch with an enemy fleet which had put to sea to do maximum damage to English ports in the Channel and in the Thames and Medway while avoiding any engagement. The enemy was represented by the second divisions of A and B squadrons: five ironclads, Archer and Curlew (A) and five ironclads and the cruisers Amphion and Mohawk. The first division of A defended against the second division of A, the first division of B against the second division of B. C squadron was to try to pass through the North Channel without being discovered or, if so, attacked by the coast defence units. A second exercise had two cruisers entering the Irish Channel to attack commerce in the face of four British cruisers and the coast defence units. The defending element of B squadron spotted the attackers by their smoke and managed to use its cruisers to hold contact with them for 21 hours, so that it could bring the attackers to action. The A squadron defenders had no such luck (its enemy succeeded in attacking Falmouth, but failed to attack the Thames, where it would have been trapped). Torpedo boats proved effective in attacking the C cruisers during their first operation.18
The trade protection exercise must have been sobering. Calypso was soon captured by the faster cruiser Rover, but Volage was never captured (she narrowly avoided HMS Inconstant). She claimed 16 vessels off Liverpool, 5 off the entrance to the Clyde, and 36 in Kingstown harbour. Of the 57 in total, there were 14 steamers (but only 6 of any importance), 14 coasters, and 21 yachts. Most of the ships captured at Liverpool were lying off the bar waiting for the tide (capture required that the cruiser remain within a mile of the prize for half an hour, then stop for an hour, the latter representing the time to board a vessel, examine her papers, and put a prize crew aboard or sink the vessel). Umpires pointed out that Volage claimed 14 ships at the same time, which was unrealistic. Even simply sinking the ships would have taken longer. The umpires also doubted that Volage could have operated freely in the face of the coast defence flotillas envisaged in the other phases of the exercise. She had to get too close to them, and to fixed defences, to find her prey. Cruisers generally proved considerably slower than expected. Against trial (measured mile) speeds of 15.1kts and 16.2kts for Volage and Inconstant, actual speeds (when the ships were doing their best) were 12 and 11.8kts. However, Rover and Calypso attained 14¼kts and 13¼kts, respectively, which were much closer to trial speeds.
A, B, and C squadrons were attacked by torpedo boats. Anchored at Spithead, A squadron relied on nets, guns, and rifle fire, plus outlying small craft and torpedo boats. An attack by twenty-two torpedo boats led by the torpedo gunboat Rattlesnake failed. B and C were anchored at Portland, with a boom, wire hawsers, and mines laid across the mouth of the anchorage, plus fixed searchlight beams and small craft. Most of the torpedo boats managed to cut through the boom. However, they were considered put out of action either by the patrolling craft or by the guns of the outer line of ships. It seemed that the problems of torpedo defence raised by the 1885 manoeuvres had been solved.
HMS Avon was a Beacon class composite gun-vessel, the category below a sloop. These ships and the larger Plovers were conceived as replacements for decayed Crimean War gunboats, particularly for action in China. About thirty of these earlier ships were sent to China to fight in the wars of the 1850s and 1860s. They proved useful, although the ten which attacked the Peiho forts were beaten off with the loss of three of their number. Because the Crimean War gunboats were built of unseasoned timber, they had to be discarded within about a decade. Thus by 1863 work on a replacement was urgent; the Plovers were the first new cruising vessels laid down after the mass cancellations of large screw frigates. The engines were still good, and they featured in the Avon class replacement ships (four ships did get new engines). The main lesson of the Chinese operations was that the 32pdr armament of the Crimean War gunboats was inadequate. On the one hand something heavier was needed to deal with forts; on the other something firing faster was needed to deal with armed junks and with pirates. Draught had to be limited, so Robinson and Reed selected twin rather than single screws. The Plovers were of conventional wooden type, but for the smaller follow-on Avons Reed combined an iron frame with wooden planking – the first British composite hull. The hull was flat-bottomed and square-bilged for about three-quarters of her length; Admiral Ballard described her as almost on the lines of an elongated packing case. The result was a steady gun platform and a buoyant sea boat, and the flat bottom made it easier to deal with frequent grounding. On the other hand, the ships steered erratically in a following sea, and they could not avoid drifting sideways in a strong cross-wind. As the first ships below battleship size with iron frames, they were also the first such ships with watertight bulkheads. Planned armament was two 68pdr smooth-bore muzzle-loaders and two 20pdr breech-loaders at the ends, but ships had one 7in 6½-ton (between funnel and mainmast) and one 64pdr (between funnel and foremast: both muzzle-loading rifles) instead of the two 64pdrs (they retained the 20pdrs). The two different calibres of heavy guns were adopted because two 64pdrs would have been inadequate and two 6½-ton guns too heavy to carry; later the Admiralty planned to replace both with the new 7in 4½-ton (90cwt) gun, but that was done only for Rocket, Lynx, Hornet, Flirt, and Rifleman. Avon, Elk, and Frolic each had their 7in gun replaced by the lighter type. Although the ships were designed for river service, they first had to get to China (or other rivers: ships also served in West Africa and in South America) on their own bottoms, which meant sailing. These ships displaced 603 tons (they had been designed for 584); dimensions were 155ft × 25ft × 11ft. Eighteen were built under the 1867-68 program, and another four under the 1871-72 program. Avon was launched at Portsmouth on 2 October 1867, and discarded in 1890. She served in China, in West Africa, and in South America.
The first conclusion was that a squadron needed more than two scouts, to search a wider area, to allow for breakdowns, and to allow for ships absent while coaling. Ships needed better-trained and more numerous signal staff, with more practice in distant signalling by day and night. Local defensive squadrons would greatly assist in the protection not only of British ports but also of trade, which would inevitably concentrate off the ports. Rapid coaling was essential, and the battleships of a squadron should all have the same speed. Above all, manoeuvres should be conducted on an annual basis.
The 1888 manoeuvres were staged while the Naval Defence Act of 1889 was being framed. They were far more sophisticated than those of 1887. At the sudden outbreak of war, two enemy squadrons (fleet B) in ports some distance apart were preparing for action.19 The British (fleet A) established blockades of both bases, and the blockaded forces tried to emerge. Each fleet consisted of battleships, fast cruisers, and torpedo boats. The fleet A was numerically stronger than the enemy (B). A1 was based at Pembroke, A2 at Lamlash Bay; B1 was based at Berehaven and B2 at Lough Swilly. England and Scotland were friendly to A, Ireland to B. The object of the B fleet was (1) to attack commerce off the coast of Ireland, in the Irish and entrance to the Bristol Channels and in the English Channel, (2) to attack ports on the west and south coast of England, other than those counted as heavily fortified, and (3) to land troops on any unfortified position.
A1 consisted of seven ironclads and seven cruisers (including the torpedo cruiser Rattlesnake). A2 consisted of another five older ironclads, six cruisers (including the torpedo cruisers Tartar and Mohawk and the torpedo gunboat Grasshopper) and twelve first-class torpedo boats. In cruising order the A1 cruisers were dispersed ahead and astern of the two columns of ironclads. Those ahead were to stay ‘within signal distance’; the two ships astern were to stay within two miles. A collier trailed the ironclads. When A1 and A2 steamed together, a column of six cruisers steamed alongside the main body, other cruisers being dispersed before and abaft the main