Two ships of the British Royal Navy have been named HMS Canopus : The first was an 80-gun third-rate French ship of the line launched in 1797, captured at the Battle of the Nile, and commissioned into the Royal Navy. She was scrapped in 1887. The second was a pre-dreadnought battleship launched in 1898 and finally broken up in 1920. She fought in the Battle of the Falkland Islands in 1914. HMS Canopus was also the name of a Royal Navy training base at Alexandria in World War II. References Royal Navy ship names