For a list of ships of the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, see List of Royal Navy ships.

Ships of the Royal Navy is a naval history reference work by J. J. Colledge

J. J. Colledge

James Joseph Colledge was a British naval historian, author of Ships of the Royal Navy, the standard work on the fighting ships of the British Royal Navy from the 15th century to the 20th century....

 (1908-1997); it provides brief entries on all recorded ships in commission in the British Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 from the 15th century, giving location of constructions, date of launch, tonnage, specification and fate.

It was published in two volumes by Greenhill Books. Volume 1, first published in 1969, covers major ships; Volume 2, first published in 1970, covers Navy-built trawler

Naval trawler

A naval trawler is a vessel built along the lines of a fishing trawler but fitted out for naval purposes. Naval trawlers were widely used during the First and Second world wars. Fishing trawlers were particularly suited for many naval requirements because they were robust boats designed to work...

s, drifters

Naval drifter

A naval drifter is a boat built along the lines of a commercial fishing drifter but fitted out for naval purposes. The use of naval drifters is paralleled by the use of naval trawlers....

, tug

Tugboat

A tugboat is a boat that maneuvers vessels by pushing or towing them. Tugs move vessels that either should not move themselves, such as ships in a crowded harbor or a narrow canal,or those that cannot move by themselves, such as barges, disabled ships, or oil platforms. Tugboats are powerful for...

s and requisitioned ships including Armed Merchant Cruisers.

The book is the standard reference work on ships of the Royal Navy, and Colledge's conventions and spellings of names are used by museums, libraries and archives.

A revised third version of the volume 1 work was published in 2003 which added the ships of the late 20th century. The revision was conducted by Ben Warlow. A fourth edition was published in 2006, reinstating some of the smaller vessels that the third edition had omitted. A further revised fourth edition was published in 2010 to include requisitioned ships e.g. Armed merchant cruisers, Merchant aircraft carrier

Merchant aircraft carrier

Merchant aircraft carriers were bulk cargo ships with minimal aircraft handling facilities, used during World War II by Britain and the Netherlands as an interim measure to supplement British and United States-built escort carriers in providing an anti-submarine function for convoys...

s as well as small craft e.g. landing craft

Landing craft

Landing craft are boats and seagoing vessels used to convey a landing force from the sea to the shore during an amphibious assault. Most renowned are those used to storm the beaches of Normandy, the Mediterranean, and many Pacific islands during WWII...

, Admiralty built trawlers.