Ezra Lebourgeois - Here is my list of the top ten most famous ships both military and civilian in history.

1. Top 10 Most Famous Ships in History

2. Though less than 70 feet
long and by all accounts a
slow and hideous vessel,
few can deny the fame the
tiny Spanish boat achieved
when she brought
Christopher Columbus to
the new world.
The Santa Maria

3. Finally ready for her first
combat test, on the evening
of February 17, 1864, the
Hunley, which never seemed
to run out of men eager to
serve on her despite the
generally suicidal nature of
doing so, snuck up on the
Union sloop Housatonic and
buried a spar torpedo in her
side.
C.S.S. Hunley

4. one of the most
important battles in
naval history in that it
was the first time two
ships made
predominantly of iron
rather than wood ever
engaged in battle. The
Union-built Monitor
U.S.S. Monitor and C.S.S. Virginia

5. U.S.S. Constitution
Known as “Old
Ironsides” due to her
sturdy construction,
the oldest still intact
ship in America serves
as a museum in
Boston, Massachusetts.

6. Battleship U.S.S. Missouri
she was reactivated
and sent to fight during
the Korean War, and
again in 1984, when
she became part of
Ronald Reagan’s 600-
ship fleet plan.

7. HMS Victory
One of the largest wooden
warships ever built, the ship
not only saw considerable
action in the last decades of
the eighteenth century
fighting both the French and
Spanish fleets, but she
became the stuff of legends at
the pivotal battle of Trafalgar
in 1805

8. Battleship U.S.S. Maine
the battleship Maine (a
tiny thing compared to
the later behemoths that
were to carry the title of
battleship) became a
rallying point for a nation
intent on war

9. German Battleship Bismarck
German dreadnought
Bismarck which, at 823
feet and with a top
speed of 30 knots, was
the largest and fastest
warship then afloat.

10. Battleship U.S.S. Arizona
Few ships illicit the sort
of emotion among
American veterans as
does the name Arizona.

11. British Luxury Liner RMS Titanic
The largest and fastest
passenger ship of its time,
the British White Star liner
left England on April 10,
1912 on its maiden
voyage to New York, only
to strike an iceberg five
days later and sink.