In 1839 four gunboats were built for the Honourable East India Company by The Birkenhead Iron Works ( Lairds ). They were the first iron vessels to carry armaments. The NEMESIS being 660 tonnes, a length of 184 feet and a beam of 29 feet had 2 pivot mounted 32 pounder and four 6 pounder guns and a rocket launcher. She was the first warship to have watertight bulkheads, she was powered by steam and sail and was built in 3 months.

The Nemesis first saw action in the first Anglo-Chinese war, known as the First Opium War...
Her captain was William Hutcheon Hall and she had a crew of 90, The Chinese referred to her as the Devil ship, being flat bottomed she could navigate the shallowest of rivers and mud flats and engage all targets.Later in her service she kept pirates at bay in the Philippines and Indonesia.

Bert, that pic is fantastic, is it the nemesis and who did it. Do you know what was the fate of this steamer. it chased pirates up the irriwadi and helped lord jim but then it disappears...

It is the Nemesis, taken from a Cammell Laird publication 'Our first 150 years'
The original painting might be in the Williamson art gallery someone might have info on that.
What happened to her? information seems thin on the ground there doesn't appear to be any newspaper reports that she was sank or anything drastic like that, perhaps she just peacefully went to scrap.

http://www.photoship.co.uk/JAlbum%20Ships/Old%20Ships%20N/index15.html


Also listed in the link below.

http://firedirectioncenter.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/battles-that-changed-history-second.html

thanks Fella's yeah Bert reckon your right. Last I can chase her is when she was helping lord Jim and chasing the Malay pirates.1852 seems to be when the story ends says she was sold and thats that.some ship,

http://www.merseysidermagazine.com/site/welcome/

Its not on line but the nemesis story is featured in the latest edition of the merseysider magazine, quite a few good interesting facts are mentioned however there is no mention of when she ended her days and where

The final fate of the Nemesis is still uncertain. She appears in the annual returns of vessels of the Indian Navy (formerly the Bengal Marine) for 1858 and 1860, but in the latter list appears to be no longer armed, suggesting that she had been reduced to the role of transporting troops and supplies. The latest reference to her I've been able to track down is in April 1863, when the General Abstract Account of Naval and Marine Charges of India includes £3,484 for "pay of the Commander and Crews of the steamer Nemesis in Burma".

There are numerous mentions of a steamer Nemesis up to 1894 in the papers I have available, is it the same one (previously a gunboat) or was there others.

The link is a 1901 wreck report, was it her end?

http://www.plimsoll.org/resources/SCCLibraries/WreckReports/18220.asp?view=text

There were a number of other steamers named Nemesis, most notably a passenger/cargo vessel owned by P&O which regularly voyaged to India in the late 1800s; she was built in 1857 and broken up in 1891. To add to the confusion there was also a small wooden Government steamer built in India in 1856 that crops up in local records. In the Indian Navy List references for 1858 and 1860, however, the listed tonnage and engine horsepower details seem to match those given in earlier records for the Laird's-built Nemesis, suggesting that they refer to the same vessel. The Nemesis in the 1901 wreck report (ON 82666) was a cargo steamer built in 1880 by Turnbulls of Whitby: she went missing in July 1904 whist on a voyage from Newcastle, New South Wales, to Melbourne.

Stop Press: I have been doing a little more research on the Nemesis and may have discovered a brief reference to her ultimate fate. The issue of Allen’s Indian Mail (a London-produced newspaper that was compiled from the official mails that arrived in this country from India and the Far East) dated 2nd April 1855 carries a small item noting that “The steamer Nemesis has been condemned, and her boilers and machinery are to be taken out and kept for some other vessel”. This would fit with the record of a new Government steamer being built in India in 1856 with the same name, possibly utilising the original Nemesis’s machinery which was presumably fairly new and therefore still serviceable.(Engines and boilers on these early steam vessels had to be regularly replaced because of corrosion, particularly if they operated in the Tropics.)

It was also fit in with what we know about the Nemesis’s much less famous near-sister ship the Phlegethon. She was launched at Laird’s on 30th May 1840 and followed the Nemesis out to China via the Cape (thereby presumably becoming the second iron vessel to sail south of the equator, the Nemesis being the first) to take part in the Anglo-Chinese War of 1841-1843. Like the Nemesis she was subsequently employed in anti-piracy operations in the Malay Straits and Borneo, before eventually being deployed in Burma in the early 1850s. According to Allen’s Indian Mail the Phlegethon was also condemned in 1855 and converted into a receiving vessel for the Bombay and Bengal Marine. So it would seem that these iron steamers had a useful life of about 15 years, at least in tropical waters, before they were no longer considered fit for active service.

Well done Marty,

Its hard to believe so little is known about a vessels demise, especially, considering her colourful early days.

The main problem is that the Nemesis and Phlegethon fell under the administration of the Bengal Marine and it appears that all of their records were kept in Calcutta. The only documents that regularly came over to this country were the Annual Returns of expenditure, etc, submitted to Parliament, which means that anyone wishing to research the vessels properly would probably have to visit India to see what if anything survives. Of course, much about her early career can now be read in several accounts available online on Google Books such as here or here, for which I suppose we should be grateful.

well done Marty and Bert history detectives par excellence.It would be wonderful to have a keepsake of some description of these grand old warhorses, looks like they were skinned and either rotted or rusted away. there's probably an old compass or some-such , somewhere,you never know something may turn up one of these days.by the way there is a model of the nemesis in the Hong Kong maritime museum but it doesn't look very detailed from what I can see.
what do you reckon about the coincidence of the giant Chinese supermarket being built on the exact site of the original Birkenhead iron works with the connivance of peel?Surely too much of a coincidence, them Chinese have long memories.

I agree ,well Done to Bert and Marty.Some great information you have shared with us.

Agreed,very informative.Could this Be Peel Holdings own Nemesis?

Nemesis, Capt. Wallage, May 1847 Action against pirates of Balanini or
Sooloo pirates in chase of a prahu, off Pilong Pilongan

Nemesis, Captain, I.N., Wallage, 28 May 1847 One of the results of
British action in Borneo was a treaty, whereby the Sultan ceded the
island of Labuan, of which Brooke was appointed the first governor

Nemesis, H.E.I. Co.'s steamer, 30 Jun - 1 Jul 1849 Actions against
Borneo pirates in the area of the Sarebas river

Nemesis, 1851-3, Involved in operations during the 2nd Burmah War Nov
51 - Jan 1853

and similarly for the Proserpine:

Proserpine, 1851-3, Involved in operations during the 2nd Burmah War
Nov 51 - Jan 1853
Proserpine, Commander, I.N. Brooking, 1851-3, 2nd Burmah War Nov 51 -
Jan 1853

http://www.pbenyon.plus.com/18-1900/N/03196.html
sent to Rangoon in '52

Entry of arrivals from the Bengal Directory 1844/45
Arrival Arrival
Month Dec
Year 1844
Name of Ship Nemesis
Captain R S Ross
Title or Rank Mrs
Passenger Surname Ross
Passenger Origin Bombay
Passenger destination Calcutta
Vessel Origin Bombay
Vessel Destination Calcutta
As above but Mrs T Wallage

Source Bengal Directory Edition 1845

thanks Dusty,
more clues from the trail, what a history this ship has..
I've got a brief mention of the Nemesis, probably circa 1845, at :

http://www.pbenyon.plus.com/Gazette/Campaigns_etc/Off_Coast_Of_Borneo.html

And again at :

http://www.pbenyon.plus.com/Gazette/RN_Vessels/Destruction_of_Pirates.html

from the Shipping Gazette & Sydney General Trade List for 20 Dec 1845.

The Phlegethon is another Indian Marine vessel that seems to receive
quite a few mentions around this period when operating with the RN.

Amongst other mentions of the Nemesis, W.L. Clowes, in his book "The
Royal Navy from Earliest Times to 1900" includes the following :

Nemesis, (H.E.I. Co.'s steamer), 1845, 18 - 19 Aug 1845 - In Malluda
Bay to attack pirate chief Seriff Osman

Nemesis, (H.E.I. Co.'s steamer), 1845, 6 - 17 Aug 1845 pirates of
the Eastern Archipelago under Panquera Usof were taught another severe
lesson

Nemesis, Capt. Wallage, May 1847 Action against pirates of Balanini or
Sooloo pirates in chase of a prahu, off Pilong Pilongan

Nemesis, Captain, I.N., Wallage, 28 May 1847 One of the results of
British action in Borneo was a treaty, whereby the Sultan ceded the
island of Labuan, of which Brooke was appointed the first governor

Nemesis, H.E.I. Co.'s steamer, 30 Jun - 1 Jul 1849 Actions against
Borneo pirates in the area of the Sarebas river

Nemesis, 1851-3, Involved in operations during the 2nd Burmah War Nov
51 - Jan 1853

http://bookish.asia/nemesis-first-iron-warship-world-%E2%80%A2-adrian-g-marshall/

This is a review of a book about the Nemesis, it says she ended her days as a rusting hulk on the Hoogly river in West Bengal,India, 15 years after her launch.