HMS Pegasus was a Doterel-class screw composite 6-gun sloop launched on 13 June 1878.

The Doterel class were a development of the Osprey-class sloops and were of composite construction, with wooden hulls over an iron frame.

The original 1874 design by the Chief Constructor, William Henry White was revised in 1877 by Sir Nathaniel Barnaby and nine were ordered.

[1] The primary purpose of ships of her class was to maintain British naval dominance through trade protection, anti-slavery, and long term surveying.

With a view to forestalling Russian intentions, on 16 April 1885 Pegasus, Agamemnon and Firebrand occupied Port Hamilton, a small group of islands in the Jeju Strait off the southern coast of the Korean Peninsula.