Cruizer Class Sloop - Operational Histories - Alert

From 1857 to 1868 Alert served on the Pacific Station, with a refit in Plymouth in 1862. In 1874 she was converted for Arctic exploration; her engines were replaced with R & W Hawthorn compound-expansion engines, she was reboilered to 60 pounds per square inch (410 kPa), she was reduced to four guns and her hull was strengthened with felt-covered iron and teak sheathing. The modifications caused her displacement to increase to 1,240 tons. During the British Arctic Expedition of 1875-76 Alert reached a latitude of 82°N, and her second-in-command, Commander Albert Hastings Markham, took a sledge party as far as 83° 20' 26"N, a record at the time. She was used to survey the Strait of Magellan, as well as Canadian and Australian waters, and on 20 February 1884 was loaned to the US Navy to assist in the rescue of the expedition under Adolphus Greely. In 1885 she was transferred again to the Canadian Government for survey in the Hudson Bay area, on completion of which she was employed as a lighthouse supply vessel and buoy tender. She was laid up in November 1894 and sold, the bill of exchange being forwarded to the Admiralty, since she was still officially on loan. Alert, Nunavut, the northernmost permanently inhabited place on earth, is named after her.

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