HMS Boadicea served from destroyer flotillas to North Sea minelaying

Laid down on 1 June 1907, launched in May 1908, and completed in June 1909, Boadicea was the Royal Navy's first turbine cruiser. She began as a destroyer-flotilla leader before moving among larger fleet formations. In July 1914 she carried John Jellicoe from Wick to Scapa Flow so he could assume command of the Grand Fleet. During the response to the German bombardments of Scarborough, Hartlepool, and Whitby, severe weather in the Pentland Firth tore away her bridge and swept crewmen overboard, forcing her back for repairs. She took part in the Jutland operation without firing and sighted the German fleet later that night, but the report was withheld to avoid revealing the Grand Fleet's position. Converted to a minelayer late in the war, she laid mines at the Kattegat entrance in February 1918. The mine total remains unsettled because three historians give different figures, and resolving them would require checking the relevant archival record. After the war she entered reserve, served on harbour duties at Dartmouth, and was broken up in 1926.