The first HMS Wivern was an ironclad turret ship built at Birkenhead, England. She was one of two sister ships secretly ordered from the John Laird Sons & Company shipyard in 1862 by the Confederate States of America. In 1864 the Admiralty bought them and commissioned them into the Royal Navy: El Monassir as HMS Wivern and El Tousson as HMS Scorpion. Wivern had a long Royal Navy career, until she was scrapped in Hong Kong in 1922.