The history of the design of the last (of the built) British battle cruiser Hood, according to F. Kofman's apt remark, “reminds the saga of how the Admiralty tried to create a very bad ship. But at the last moment this "idea" was either canceled altogether, or underwent such extensive changes that the final version had completely different qualities compared to the original one."
Recall that after the construction of five magnificent Queen Elizabeth-class battleships and then the same number of less fast and somewhat better protected Royal Sovereigns, the British were going to lay down another Queen Elizabeth and three Sovereigns in order to increase the number of “381-mm "fast battleships up to six, and ships of the line - up to eight. Such a development of the linear forces was more than reasonable, because it provided the line and the high-speed wing with the strongest and sufficiently protected ships. In Germany, the construction of "21-knot" battleships, armed with 380-mm cannons, began with a delay, so that by the time the first four Bayerns could be completed, the British would have had twice as many Royal Sovereigns. At the same time, the Germans did not build high-speed battleships at all, entrusting the task of the "high-speed wing" to battle cruisers, but with all the merits of the German ships of this class, they could not resist the ships of the Queen Elizabeth class.
Thus, the 1914 program providing for the construction of four "381-mm" battleships was both reasonable and logical. However, these plans were prevented by the war and the laying did not take place: it was assumed that the ships of this program would not have time to enter service before the end of hostilities. Then W. Churchill and his friend and teacher D. Fisher came to power, and from that moment on, English shipbuilding unexpectedly demonstrated a number of bizarre movements in the creation of battleships and battle cruisers.
First, the Ripals and Rhinaun, the world's first 381-mm battlecruisers, were very fast, but had extremely weak protection, on the slipway. After that, the "large light cruisers" "Koreyges", "Glories" and "Furies" were laid down, which historians later considered light linear - however, they could not resist the battle cruisers of Germany at all. All these ships were created on the initiative of D. Fischer, but in May 1915, the “Fisher Era” ended irrevocably: he left the post of First Sea Lord, and this time - forever. It could be assumed that with the departure of D. Fischer, the era of the design of large strange ships will end, but that was not the case! In 1915, the reasons that a year earlier forced to abandon the continuation of the construction of battleships lost their meaning - the war took on a protracted nature and the end was not visible to it.
So, it was decided to return to battleships, but … to which ones? The British considered their "Queen Elizabeth" and "Royal Soverins" quite successful, and were going to take one of these battleships as a basis, but build new ships according to an improved design. Of course, the admirals had to indicate the directions of modernization, especially since they had already managed to acquire some combat experience. The sailors demanded to increase the freeboard, raise the mine-action artillery battery by one interdeck space (that is, move the guns from the main deck to the forecastle deck) and - most original - reduce the draft to 4 meters!
It is possible, of course, to assume that D. Fischer's ideas were transmitted by airborne droplets and led to serious complications, but this is not so. The fact is that D. Fischer justified the shallow draft of his battle cruisers and "large light" cruisers by the need to operate in small areas of the Baltic, but in 1915 the British admirals had completely different reasons. They believed that such ships would be much better protected from torpedo weapons, while fighting for survivability on them would be much easier. In addition, a decrease in draft with increasing width would allow the placement of a constructive anti-torpedo protection.
The thing is that the battleships of the Royal Navy were in constant readiness for Armageddon - a general battle with the German high seas fleet. Accordingly, battleships and battle cruisers constantly had full supplies of fuel and ammunition, and in addition, military needs led to the appearance of various cargoes that were not provided for in the design, and all this led to overloading. The actual draft of the British battleships began to reach 9-10 meters, and this was unacceptable for a number of reasons. Firstly, damage to the hull from a mine or torpedo at such a depth led to the flow of water under very high pressure, which made it difficult to fight for survivability. Secondly, the large draft reduced the already not too high freeboard, which made the battleships very "wet". Accordingly, the anti-mine artillery, located in the casemates at the level of the main deck, were flooded with water in fresh weather and could not perform their function.
Of course, the designers did not at all support the idea of an ultra-low draft, explaining to the military the technical difficulties of creating such a "flat-bottomed" with a very long and wide hull, and eventually converged on a draft of 7.3 m, apparently increasing the latter to 8 m. It is very important to understand that when speaking of 8 m, we mean the draft in full load: for example, the battleships "Ramilles" and "Rivenge" had such in 9, 79 m and 10, 10 m, respectively. Thus, according to the plans of the shipbuilders, the draft of the projected battleships should have decreased by about 2 meters from that which the last British ships of this class actually had.
As a result, the battleship Queen Elizabeth was taken as a basis, but the new battleship (project A) turned out to be much longer and wider - the maximum length was supposed to be 247 m versus 196.8 m, and the width - 31.7 m versus 27.58 m at the prototype. At the same time, the draft in full load was supposed to be 8 m, the normal displacement was 31,000 tons. It was assumed that with such a hull, the new battleship, with the power of mechanisms equal to that of Queen Elizabeth (75,000 hp), would be able to develop a significantly higher speed - 26, 5-27 knots The armament was represented by eight 381-mm guns, the anti-mine caliber - a dozen of the newest, not yet adopted for service, 127-mm artillery systems. It was assumed that this caliber would be a good compromise in terms of ammunition power and rate of fire between 102-mm and 152-mm guns.
In principle, this project could be considered very successful, if not for one "but" - the thickness of its armor belt did not exceed 254 mm! Unfortunately, the author of this article could not figure out why this happened, since Russian-language sources contain almost no information about this project. If we reason logically, then we can assume that using in the new project the same guns and the same power plant that were used on the Queen Elizabeth, the British should have received a citadel of about the same length, but taking into account the increase in the length of the ship more than 50 m, the protection of its extremities should have become more extended and, accordingly, heavy. In addition, within the citadel, British battleships traditionally received protection from the entire side up to the upper deck, and it can be assumed that this time they did the same. Accordingly, due to the increase in the freeboard height, the British probably had to increase the height of the upper armored belt, and perhaps the main one (which is most likely, since the same F. Kofman indicates that the 254-mm armored belt had a greater height), which led to the need to "spread the butter thinner over the sandwich."
However, regardless of the reasons that caused such a weakening of armor protection, there is no doubt that this "innovation" killed the project in the bud. Ten inches of armor did not look absolutely sufficient even against 305-mm guns, and it was known that the newest Kaiser's ships would receive much more powerful artillery systems. At the same time, 254-mm armor could count on maximum retention of a high-explosive 380-mm projectile, and even then, probably, not at all combat distances. Quite recently (when designing battleships of the Queen Elizabeth type), sailors declared the protection of battle cruisers too weak and expressed their desire to get well-protected high-speed battleships - and suddenly this.
But this project also had one more drawback - the excessive width, which limited the number of docks into which the ship could be brought. Therefore, in the second version (project "B") the width of the ship was reduced to 27.4 m (by analogy with "Queen Elizabeth"). The power of the power plant was also reduced to 60,000 hp, with which the ship could develop no more than 25 knots. Armament and armor remained the same as that of the "A" project. The displacement decreased to 29,500 tons, but the draft increased by 60 cm, reaching 8, 6 m.
Project "B" also did not suit the British, but the Royal Soverin was taken for further work. British shipbuilders presented projects "S-1" and "S-2" on its basis: both battleships received eight 381-mm and ten 127-mm cannons, the speed was reduced to 22 knots, which made it possible to get by with a power plant with a nominal power of 40,000 h.p. The ships differed slightly in size, while the "S-1" had the entire same width of 31.7 m as the project "A". At the "S-2" it was slightly reduced, and amounted to 30, 5 m. "S-1" had a slightly larger displacement (27 600 tons against 26 250 tons) and a lower draft (8.1 m against 8, 7 m) … Alas, both ships carried the same, completely inadequate 254-mm armor.
Then the British tried to develop "Queen Elizabeth" but with a high side and a draft of 8 m (project "D"). Alas, here they were also disappointed - in comparison with projects "A" and "B" it was possible to reduce the maximum length (to 231 m), the width remained the same as that of project "A" (31, 7 m), which imposed certain restrictions on docking battleship. The draft exceeded the planned and amounted to 8.1 m. It was assumed that with a power plant with a capacity of 60,000 hp. the ship will be able to develop 25, 5 knots. The main caliber was represented by the same eight 381 mm guns in four turrets, and the mine countermeasure was represented by a dozen 140 mm guns. At the same time, the displacement was 29,850 tons, and the vertical protection of the hull was limited to 254-mm armor plates.
In general, it can be stated that in all the projects presented, the wishes of the sailors regarding high-grade and lower draft were fulfilled to one degree or another, while the British battleships finally received constructive anti-torpedo protection (it is indicated that it was rather primitive, but that at least). However, the price for this was a critical weakening of booking, so none of the five projects discussed above can be considered successful. All five projects were submitted for consideration to the commander of the Grand Fleet D. Jellicoe, and the admiral, quite predictably, “hacked” them all. At the same time, he generally informed the Admiralty that the Royal Navy did not need new battleships at all. This was motivated by the fact that the Grand Fleet already has a tangible superiority in numbers over the hochseeflotte (which was absolutely true even taking into account the completion of the Bayern-class battleships), at the same time, the quality of the British battleships turned out to be quite satisfactory, “there are no big complaints about the existing battleships.
Oddly enough, but D. Jellicoe did not see the point of further construction of an "intermediate" type of battleship with a speed of 25-27 knots. In his reply to the Admiralty, the commander of the Grand Fleet stated that ships of two types should be built: "21-knot" battleships and "30-knot" high-speed battle cruisers. It is interesting that domestic sources have significant disagreements on this issue: for example, the above speeds are given by A. A. Mikhailov, while F. Kofman claims that it was about "22-knot" battleships and "32-knot" cruisers. Thus, D. Jellicoe essentially took a "step back" on the road to a high-speed battleship - instead of combining the battleship and battlecruisers classes into one (at least to perform the functions of a high-speed wing), he again proclaimed the division “low-speed battleship - high-speed battle cruiser” … What made D. Jellicoe take such a step?
On the one hand, the accusation of retrograde seems to suggest itself, but if you think about it, this is not so. Apparently, the problem was that D. Jellicoe greatly overestimated the capabilities of the German battle cruisers.
The fact is that, according to available data, the British assumed that the last German ships of this class (of the Derflinger class) developed at least 30 knots. This well explains D. Fischer's desire to give the Ripals and Rhinaun a 32-knot speed: The First Sea Lord directly said that the Royal Navy, apart from the Tiger, did not have ships as fast as the Germans would receive. Perhaps, of course, it was just a maneuver in order to build battle cruisers so dear to D. Fischer's heart, but it is possible that the old sailor really believed what he said. And if this is really so, then the situation from the bridge of the flagship battleship Grand Fleet could look very different than from our comfortable chairs.
You and I, dear readers, know that the Germans were able to commission only three Derflinger-class battlecruisers armed with 305-mm cannons, while their speed, apparently, did not exceed 27, maximum - 28 knots. But "three is not a bunch", these ships could not form an independent connection, especially since by the time the third of them ("Hindenburg") entered service, the second ("Luttsov") had already died. In any case, the Derflingers could operate only in one formation together with the Moltke and Von der Tann, which were nevertheless somewhat less fast in everyday operation.
British high-speed battleships were designed for a speed of 25 knots, but in fact they did not reach it (on tests it averaged between 24, 5 and 25 knots) and the difference in speed between the Queen Elizabeth squadron and the detachment of German battle cruisers was relatively small. In fact, in the Battle of Jutland, Evan-Thomas's Queens caught up with the battle cruisers of Hipper's 1st Reconnaissance Group, despite the fact that they were formally inferior to them in speed. Therefore, the somewhat better speed qualities of the Hochseeflotte battlecruisers in a squadron battle did not give them a great tactical advantage over the British fast battleships, and they could not fight on equal terms with the Queens.
Subsequent series of German battlecruisers - "Mackensen" and "Erzatz York" - received more powerful artillery, while maintaining approximately the same level of protection. Accordingly, one could not expect a leap in speed from them, and there was none - ships of this type were calculated to reach 27-28 knots. It is interesting that a reasonable improvement of the British type "Queen Elizabeth" could give a ship, in terms of its tactical and technical characteristics, very close to the "Erzats York" - that is, eight 381-mm cannons, normal displacement increased to 32,000 - 33,000 tons, booking at the level of the same "Rivendzha" and speed within 26, 5-27 knots (Erzats York - 27, 25 knots). Such a British ship would be the best fit for confronting the newest German battlecruisers. It did not have any fundamental advantage over its German counterpart, but this is not surprising: for its size, the Erzats York could be considered an almost perfectly balanced high-speed battleship. Within the limits of its displacement, an equivalent ship could be built, but a superior one is not.
Thus, from the point of view of confronting the hochseeflotte, the optimal development for the Royal Navy would be the development of battleships of the Queen Elizabeth class, but … we know that. And John Jellicoe believed that the German battle cruisers, having received new 350-380-mm guns, would have a speed of at least 30 knots. Together with the already built ships of the "Derflinger" class, they could form a "30-knot" high-speed wing - while D. Jellicoe saw that the "Queen Elizabeth" still did not reach the design speed, albeit slightly. But he obviously did not want to build 26, 5-27-knot ships, get 26-26, 5-knot ships in fact, and then puzzle over how to counter the German 30-knot cruisers on them.
Thus, D. Jellicoe's position was absolutely logical and justified, but it was only based on an incorrect postulate - the allegedly existing 30-knot speed of the German battle cruisers. But if we take this postulate for granted, it will be easy for us to understand the concerns of the British commander. Formally, in 1915, he had 10 battle cruisers against 5 German ones, but of them only four ships of the Lion and Tiger types in their capabilities more or less corresponded to the newest Derflinger-class battle cruisers, and six of the older 305-mm The cruisers could not even catch up with them. At the same time, the British expected that after Lyuttsov at least three ships of a similar type, but with heavier artillery (350-380-mm), would enter service, which the British ships lost even in their traditionally strongest line - the power of artillery. At the same time, D. Jellicoe justly did not consider the "Repals" and "Rhinaun" (and even more so - "Koreyjessy") capable of withstanding the German ships of the same class. These considerations dictated his views on the further construction of heavy ships for the Royal Navy: refusing battleships, D. Jellicoe demanded modern and high-speed battle cruisers. The requirements for them from the commander of the Grand Fleet were as follows:
1. Ships must carry eight main battery guns - a smaller number of them not only reduces the weight of the onboard salvo, but also makes it difficult to zero in;
2. At the same time, 381-mm cannons should be considered as the minimum acceptable, if it is possible to install heavier guns, then this should be done;
3. Anti-mine guns must be at least 120-mm, while their number must not be less than a dozen;
4. You do not need to get carried away with torpedo tubes, it is enough to have two onboard ones, but the ammunition load of torpedoes should be increased;
5. The middle armor belt must be at least 180 mm, the upper one - at least 100 mm, and due to the increase in the distance of the artillery battle, the lower armored deck must be at least 60 mm thick. It is interesting that D. Jellicoe said absolutely nothing about the main belt;
6. With regard to speed, in the opinion of the author of this article, those who claim that D. Jellicoe demanded 30 knots are right.
In addition, the commander of the Grand Fleet expressed other, less significant wishes, sometimes of rather strange properties, for example, the presence of one mast (according to D. Jellicoe, two masts allowed the enemy to better determine the speed and course of the ship). He considered it possible to increase the draft up to 9 m.
I must say that the Admiralty fully supported the requirements of D. Jellicoe and the work began to boil - two groups of designers were working on the design of the newest battle cruiser. The general management was carried out by the head of the Department of Shipbuilding Tennyson d'Einkourt.
The design method was interesting. First, the shipbuilders determined the maximum size of the ship that they can afford (taking into account the possibilities of docking). It turned out that the battle cruiser should have a maximum length of 270 m, 31.7 m wide, and the draft, as mentioned earlier, should have been no more than 9 m. These measurements made it possible to create a high-speed and high-board ship within 39,000 - 40 000 tons, and then the elimination method began. Armament was identified in 8 * 381-mm in four two-gun turrets, and a dozen 140-mm. The power of the machines, which would provide a speed of 30 knots, had to be at least 120,000 hp. Also, the ship had to receive sufficient fuel reserves in order to provide a cruising range corresponding to that which the British expected from this class (unfortunately, there is no exact data for the first project, but for further options the normal fuel supply was 1200 tons, and the full - 4,000 t).
And when the characteristics of weapons and equipment were determined, which it was impossible to sacrifice, then further design went "from the opposite". In other words, having calculated the weight of everything necessary - weapons, hull, vehicles and fuel and having subtracted it from the maximum possible displacement, the British designers received the supply that they could spend on other needs, including booking. Alas, as it turned out, the newest battle cruiser could receive a maximum of 203 mm side armor, and, apparently, this option seemed unacceptable to the designers. Therefore, the Directorate of Shipbuilding proposed for consideration not one, but two projects of battle cruisers.
The key difference between the two was that the second project used a power plant using so-called thin-tube boilers, so named because the hot water pipes installed in them had a relatively small diameter. The efficiency of such boilers significantly exceeded the traditional ones, which used wide tubes, but the Admiralty did not agree to use the new product for a long time, believing that the old boilers are more reliable and easier to maintain. Nevertheless, it was impossible to ignore the progress, and thin-tube boilers began to be installed on ships of the Royal Navy - first on destroyers, then on light cruisers. Practice has shown that the fears of the Admiralty, in general, are in vain, nevertheless, it continued to oppose the installation of such boilers on large ships. Thin-tube boilers were offered for installation at Tiger
and on battleships of the Queen Elizabeth class, while it was expected that with the same weight of the power plant, the ships would be able to reach 32 and 27 knots, but the admirals rejected these proposals. They did not want to see thin-tube boilers in the new project, but then Tennyson d'Einkourt managed to make an offer that could not be refused.
The second project of the battle cruiser had only one fundamental difference - thin-tube boilers of the same power of 120,000 hp. But by saving the mass of the power plant, the battle cruiser turned out to be faster by 0.5 knots, its onboard booking was increased to 254 mm, and with all this, it turned out to be 3,500 tons lighter! The hull has decreased in length by 14 m, the draft by 30 cm.
The Admiralty could not refuse such an abundance of benefits, after considering the projects, it approved the second option (with thin-tube boilers) and further design continued on its basis. In total, four projects were prepared (nos. 3-6), and three of them (nos. 4-6) were supposed to be armed with 4, 6 and 8 457-mm guns, respectively, with a displacement of 32,500; 35,500 and 39,500 t. The speed remained at the level of 30 knots (for the project with 6 * 457 mm - 30.5 knots), and the armor belt was again reduced to 203 mm.
Surprisingly, the fact is that the admirals did not "value" the ship's booking at all. We have already said that even 254 mm for a battle cruiser looked too weak protection, but the attempt of the Shipbuilding Directorate to return at least to such armor did not meet with the support of sailors. In variants No. 4-6, the booking became a victim of monstrous 457-mm cannons, but in variant No. 3, in which the main caliber consisted of 8 * 381-mm and which eventually became the main one, the admirals preferred to reduce the armor from 254 mm to 203 mm in order to bring the speed from 30 to 32 knots. It was assumed that for this the cruiser would need to be equipped with a power plant with a capacity of 160,000 hp, the normal displacement in this case was supposed to be 36,500 tons.
Subsequently, this version, of course, was refined. The power of the machines was reduced to 144,000 hp, having found reserves of weights (including by saving on the power plant) and by reducing the displacement and reduced draft, while maintaining the speed of 32 knots. The ship received a very high side (stem 9, 7 m high, forecastle in the lowest part - 7, 16 m, stern - 5.8 m).
As for the reservation, unfortunately, the author did not find its schemes, but from the descriptions it looks like this. The battle cruiser received an extended belt of 203 mm of armor, and apparently he (like the armored belts of the Invincible and Rhinauna) covered both the engine and boiler rooms and the areas of the artillery cellars of the main caliber towers. Further, in the bow and stern, the belt thinned to 127 and 102 mm, the citadel was closed by traverses with a thickness of 76 to 127 mm, presumably there were several of them in the bow and stern. There were two more armored belts above 203 mm, at first - 127 mm, above - 76 mm. The armored deck within the citadel was 38 mm thick, both in the horizontal part and on the bevels. Outside the citadel, it most likely passed below the waterline and had 51 mm in the bow and 63 mm in the stern. Above the armored deck outside the citadel there was also an intermediate deck (25-51 mm in the bow and 25-63 mm in the stern). In addition, there was a thick forecastle deck, which had a variable thickness from 25 to 38 mm, and in the stern, where the forecastle ended, the main deck had 25 mm. The thickness of the conning tower armor was 254 mm, the stern (for controlling torpedo firing) received 152 mm.
The turret armor was superior to that of the Rhinaun (229 mm) and had a 280 mm forehead, 254 mm side walls and a 108 mm roof. But alas - the barbets were exactly the same (178 mm), that is, in this respect, the new project was inferior even to the Tiger. The head of the Shipbuilding Directorate himself assessed the protection of the new battlecruisers "at the Tiger level," and, probably, it was so - of course, the 203 mm main armor belt, covering the machines, boilers and main artillery, was better than the 229 mm Tiger armor belt, which protects only machines and boilers - the side opposite the artillery of the main battery was covered with only 127 mm plates. But the barbets, alas, were weaker protected.
As for the armament, two options were proposed. Both of them included 8 * 381-mm in four two-gun turrets, but option "A" assumed the placement of 12 * 140-mm gun mounts and four torpedo tubes, in option "B" it was proposed to increase the number of 140-mm guns to 16, and torpedo tubes reduced to two, and option "B" was 50 tons heavier. Accordingly, the displacement of the battle cruiser was 36,250 tons in version "A" and 36,300 tons in version "B"
It took the Admiralty ten days to review the projects, and on April 7, 1916, it approved option "B".
If we compare this ship with the German "Erzats York", then we will see an obvious and, literally, overwhelming superiority in booking the latter. So, for example, in order to pass into the cellar of a German battlecruiser through the main armor belt, the English projectile had to first overcome 300 mm, and then 50-60 mm of vertical armor (anti-torpedo armor bulkhead), while the German one - 203 mm and 38 mm bevel (the only advantage of which was its inclined position). To penetrate the horizontal part of the deck through the side, the German projectile had enough to break through the 127 mm middle or 76 mm upper armor belt and pierce 38 mm of the horizontal armor, the British one - at least 200-270 mm of the side armor and 30 mm of the horizontal deck armor. If we consider only horizontal booking (for example, when a shell hits the deck along the axis of the ship), then the protection of the British and German battlecruisers is approximately equivalent.
The medium artillery of the Ersatz York was housed in casemates and had much better protection. On the other hand, the 140-mm guns of the British ship that stood openly were located much higher above sea level and were not flooded with water - in various combat situations one or another option could be preferable, so here we can talk about approximate equality. The main caliber of battle cruisers, despite the difference in the concepts of its creation ("heavy projectile - low muzzle velocity" for the British and "light projectile - high muzzle velocity" for the Germans), should probably be considered equivalent in terms of their combat capabilities. As for speed, here the obvious advantage was for the British battle cruiser, which was supposed to develop 32 knots. against 27, 25 ties of "Erzats York". Without a doubt, the English ship could catch up with the German one, or run away from it, and, in principle, the newest 381-mm armor-piercing shells "Greenboy", with luck, could well overcome the German defense. However, for the Ersatz York's cannons, the British battle cruiser, with its armor roughly equivalent to the Tiger, was literally "crystal" - its defense made its way to any point at almost every conceivable battle distance. In this respect, the Project B battle cruiser was not much different from the Rhinaun (a sharply sharpened table knife is indifferent to the thickness of the apple peel).
The Admiralty placed an order for three B-class battlecruisers on 19 April 1916, and on 10 July they were named Hood, Hove and Rodney. Three days later, another ship of this type, Anson, was ordered. The shipyards began preparations for the construction and collection of materials for the first three battlecruisers at the beginning of May, and less than a month later, on May 31, 1916, the laying of the lead ship of the series, the Huda, took place.
But - an amazing coincidence! It was on this day that a grandiose battle of the two strongest fleets in the world took place - the Battle of Jutland.
