HMS Kestrel was a Clydebank-built three funnelled 30-knot destroyer ordered by the Royal Navy under the 1895 – 1896 Naval Estimates.

[2][3] The four destroyers ordered from Thomsons under the 1895–1896 programme had problems reaching the contract speed of 30 knots (56 km/h; 35 mph), and Kestrel was built to a revised design with a longer hull.

[6] In 1899 during the construction of these ships, steelmaker John Brown and Company of Sheffield bought J & G Thomson's Clydebank yard.

[10] In November 1910 she was ordered to Gibraltar for a refit, leaving Devonport at the end of the month in the company of the battleship Swiftsure.

On reaching Gibraltar, her crew transferred to the destroyer Mermaid, which had just completed a refit, for the voyage back to home waters.

[16] In February 1913 Kestrel was based at Sheerness as a tender to the "Stone frigate" (or shore establishment) HMS Actaeon, which acted as a torpedo training school.