I believe the (Federal) Government should be doing everything practically possible to ensure it is preserved for the future.
—Kevin Rudd, Prime Minister
Cerberus is clearly of tremendous historical importance not only to Australia but to Maritime history.
—Mike Weidenbach, USS Missouri
One of the most important naval vessels in existence is getting perilously close to being lost forever.
—Andrea Coote, Liberal State MP
It is tantamount to historical vandalism by omission.
—Andrea Coote, Liberal State MP
The Cerberus is a unique & significant historical treasure of almost iconic value...
— Prof. R.A. Gould, Anthropology Dept. Brown University
The RSL feels that this ship must be preserved as it is the only one of its type on earth...
— Bruce Ruxton
The unique character of this ship as the first warship built to mount turrets fore and aft...
— National Maritime Historical Soc. USA
...in Cerberus we have the germ idea of the principle upon which all battleships
...were based
— Oscar Parkes, British Battleships
In every way the Cerberus was a complete break from established tradition...
— Oscar Parkes, British Battleships
She is a particulary interesting vessel in herself, but she is also part of the state of Victoria's history.
— Prince Phillip
...Cerberus...
was the first of the newly designed fighting ships...
— P.A. Vicary,
Ships Monthly
Ships like Cerberus will strip naval warfare of its romance and panoply.
— The Age 10 April 1871
It will no longer be a matter of dash & galantry, but of science and calculation.
— The Age 10 April 1871
in some ways, Australia's most significant warship in that she represented a developmental shift away from sail power
— C. Jones, Aust Colonial Navies
Cerberus represented...
one of the most powerful vessels for harbour defence in the world
— Argus newspaper
The genesis of all battleship design in the period to 1905
— Spencer Tucker, Handbook of Naval Warfare
Indeed Devastation itself was an enlarged version of the coast defence Breastwork Monitor Cerberus
— John Beeler,
Birth of the Battleship
whose construction marked "the beginning of practical turret ship design
— John Beeler,
Birth of the Battleship
in ... gunpower & protection would have proved more than a match for the combined British Squadron then on the Australian Station
— John Bastock, Aust Ships of War
Between the harbour defence ship & the sea-going battleship was a matter of degree
— Oscar Parkes, British Battleships
the Devastation was to develop out of the Cerberus in due course.
— Oscar Parkes, British Battleships
no contemporary opponent of their own tonnage ... would have stood much chance against them.
— Admiral G. A. Ballard
They might be said to resemble full-armed knights riding on donkeys, easy to avoid but bad to close with.
— Admiral G. A. Ballard
Internationally
Significant
— Heritage Victoria
Pride of Victoria,
star of her navy,
Last iron-clad monitor left on the earth.
Now just a breakwater,
rusting & waiting;
Waiting and hoping to have a re-birth.
— Dacre Smyth
In the Cerberus is seen the genesis of the design to which all battleships were built from 1885 to 1905.
— Arthur Hawkey,
Black Night off Finisterre
Do your worst mates! I’m the bloody monitor!
— Ned Kelly as he confronted the police at Glenrowan.
The Naval Forces of Victoria
"a formidable flotilla"
— Brassey's Naval Annual, 1884.
She was the prototype of all modern battleships
— J.R. Hill, Oxford Illust. History of the Royal Navy
in 1867 he (Reed) produced a virtually silent revolution with the design of the coastal defence vessels Cerberus & Magdala
— Roger Chesneau, Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1860-1905
A crucial link between the period of timber line-of-battle ships and the more modern battleships
— Australian
Heritage
Commission
One of the most historically important naval vessels in existence.
— National Trust
(Victoria)
Of outstanding heritage significance to Australia.
— National Heritage List