Colchester was a fifth-rate warship of the Commonwealth of England's naval forces, one of six such ships built under the 1653 Programme. She was built by contract with Master Shipwright Henry Edgar at his yard at Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, and was launched on 23 February 1654 as a 24-gun fifth rate. She was named Colchester to commemorate the attack on that town by Parliamentary forces under Thomas Fairfax in 1648 during the Civil War.