HMS Abyssinia was a breastwork monitor

Breastwork monitor

A breastwork monitor was one of a number of ships designed by Sir Edward Reed, the Chief Constructor of the Royal Navy between 1863 and 1870....

 ordered, designed and built by J & W Dudgeon

J & W Dudgeon

J & W Dudgeon was a Victorian shipbuilding and engineering company based in Cubitt Town, London, founded by John and William Dudgeon.John and William Dudgeon had established the Sun Iron Works in Millwall in the 1850s, and had a reputation for advanced marine engines. In 1862 they set up as...

 specifically for the Bombay Marine for the defence of the harbour at Bombay.

She was designed by Sir Edward Reed

Edward James Reed

Sir Edward James Reed , KCB, FRS, was a British naval architect, author, politician, and railroad magnate. He was the Chief Constructor of the Royal Navy from 1863 until 1870...

, and was a smaller version of, and hence a half-sister to, the s and . It was intended that Abyssinia and Magdala would serve in mutual support on the same station. Given that the stipulated naval requirement was for two ships for the coastal defence of the Bombay area, the India Office were pressed by the Board of Admiralty and the Chief Constructor

Director of Naval Construction

The Director of Naval Construction was a senior British civil servant post in the Admiralty, that part of the British Civil Service that oversaw the Royal Navy. The post existed from 1860 to 1966....

to order two ships of the Cerberus class. After the placing of the order for Magdala, budgetary limitations meant that a smaller, cheaper vessel had to be acquired.

Abyssinia, while being similar in layout to Magdala, was smaller and cost £20,000 less. She had slightly less freeboard, a shorter breastwork, could carry less coal and had about one knot less speed.

The ferry trip out to her base in Bombay was made under her own power, without the use of any sail whatsoever. Unlike her half-sisters, the hull was not built up for the trip, which she made in a faster time than they did.

Service history

Abyssinia remained at anchor in Bombay harbour, other than for occasional brief trips for firing practice, for the whole of her service career. When the Indian Harbour Defence Service was discontinued in 1903, she was sold locally and broken up.