[3] On 8 January 1908, while navigating at South Shields, the ship collided with barquentine Emma Cook, anchored at Mill Dam and damaged her.

She was powered by two four-cylinder inverted vertical triple-expansion steam engines, which developed a total of 16,750 indicated horsepower (12,490 kW) and gave a maximum speed of 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph).

[1] Lord Nelson was first commissioned in reserve on 1 December 1908 at Chatham Dockyard, being attached to the Nore Division of the Home Fleet with a nucleus crew.

With other ships, she covered the safe transport of the British Expeditionary Force, under the command of Sir John French, to France.

[5] Lord Nelson relieved the battleship Queen Elizabeth as flagship of the British Dardanelles Squadron on 12 May, flying the flag of Vice-Admiral Rosslyn Erskine-Wemyss.

[8] According to naval historian Ian Buxton, the most important role of the Royal Navy was to blockade the Dardanelles and thus guard the Eastern Mediterranean against a breakout by Goeben.

[9] On 12 January 1918, Rear-Admiral Arthur Hayes-Sadler hoisted his flag aboard Lord Nelson at Mudros as the new commander of the Aegean Squadron.

Needing transportation to Salonika for a conference with the British Army commander there, and finding his personal yacht unavailable, Hayes-Sadler opted to have Lord Nelson take him there,[10] and thus she was not present when Goeben and Breslau finally made their breakout attempt on 20 January.

[8] Lord Nelson was part of the British squadron that went to Constantinople in November 1918 following the armistice with the Ottoman Empire,[8] after which she served as flagship in the Black Sea.