HMS New Zealand was a King Edward VII-class battleship of the Royal Navy. Like all ships of the class (apart from HMS King Edward VII) she was named after an important part of the British Empire. The ship was built by Portsmouth Dockyard between 1903 and 1905. Armed with a battery of four and four guns, she and her sister ships marked a significant advance in offensive power compared to earlier British battleship designs that did not carry the 9.2 in guns.
After commissioning in July 1905, she served briefly with the Atlantic Fleet from October to March 1907 before transferring to the Channel Fleet. She then joined the Home Fleet in 1909. She was renamed HMS Zealandia in 1911. In 1912, she, along with her sister ships, was assigned to the 3rd Battle Squadron, part of the Home Fleet. That year, the squadron went to the Mediterranean Sea during the First Balkan War as part of an international blockade of Montenegro. In 1913, the ship returned to British waters.
When the First World War broke out, Zealandia was transferred back to the 3rd Battle Squadron, which was assigned to the Grand Fleet, the main British fleet during the war. Through 1914 and 1915, the ships frequently went to sea to search for German vessels, but Zealandia saw no action during this period. By the end of the year, the Grand Fleet stopped operating with the older 3rd Battle Squadron ships, and in November 1915, Zealandia was detached to serve in the Gallipoli Campaign. The campaign ended shortly thereafter, however, and so Zealandia returned to Britain in January 1916 and rejoined the 3rd Battle Squadron in March. Paid off in late 1917, the ship was converted into a gunnery training ship in early 1918, but she never served in that capacity. In 1919, she was used as a barracks ship before being sold in 1921 and broken up in 1923.
Design
Following the development of pre-dreadnought type battleships carrying heavy secondary guns of diameter in the Italian Regia Marina and the United States Navy, the Royal Navy decided to build similar ships. Initial proposals called for a battleship equipped with eight guns to support the main battery, though under the direction of William Henry White, the Director of Naval Construction, these were replaced with four guns. The new ships, though based on the general type that had formed the basis of the preceding four battleship designs, marked the first significant change in the series. Like all late pre-dreadnoughts that entered service in the mid-1900s, New Zealand was made almost instantaneously obsolescent by the commissioning of the all-big-gun in December 1906, armed with a battery of ten heavy guns compared to the typical four of most pre-dreadnoughts.
New Zealand was long overall, with a beam of and a draft of . The King Edward VII-class battleships displaced normally and up to fully loaded. Her crew numbered 777 officers and ratings. The King Edward VII-class ships were powered by a pair of 4-cylinder triple-expansion engines that drove two screws, with steam provided by sixteen water-tube boilers. The boilers were trunked into two funnels located amidships. The King Edward VII-class ships had a top speed of from .
New Zealand had a main battery of four 40-calibre guns mounted in twin-gun turrets fore and aft. These were supported by a heavy secondary battery of four guns in four single turrets, two on each broadside. The ships also mounted ten 45-calibre guns mounted in casemates, in addition to fourteen 12-pounder guns and fourteen 3-pounder guns for defence against torpedo boats. As was customary for battleships of the period, she was also equipped with five torpedo tubes submerged in the hull; two were on each broadside, with the fifth in the stern.
New Zealand had an armoured belt that was thick; the transverse bulkheads on the aft end of the belt was thick. The sides of her main battery turrets were also 8 to 12 in thick, atop 12 in barbettes, and the 9.2 turrets had sides. The casemate battery was protected with of armour plate. Her conning tower had 12-inch-thick sides. She was fitted with two armoured decks, thick, respectively.