Battleships
guns needed, since the same guns could cover both sides of the ship. The form of the ship's hull was slimmed and sharpened. This allowed the propulsion plant to move the ship with the least water resistance and the highest possible efficiency.
Although HMS Dreadnought was the first of the 'Dreadnoughts' (as battleships were called for quite some time), she was not the inspiration for similar ships. Navies around the world were moving in the same direction. The Japanese Navy launched INS Satsuma in 1906, a month before Dreadnought's launch, and except for the fact that there were not enough of the desired 12" guns available, the Satsuma class would have preceded the Dreadnought as the first 'all big gun ship'. All of the major powers built battleships, and many secondary powers also joined the race.
From this point, refinement set in. The essential form of the battleship was set, and would vary but little. In all navies, the form became a narrow nosed, but broad beamed hull, capable of carrying large quantities of fuel and ammunition, protected by thick armor and packing the punch of six to twelve heavy guns in three or four turrets.
Armor thickness varied, but not greatly. The thinnest side armor during WW I was about nine inches, but by the end of that war many ships carried a thickness of 13 or 14 inches. The United States 'Maryland' class of the 1920's had 16 inch armor, which was actually reduced during WW II to about 12 inches for each of the four battleship classes built during that war. Torpedo blisters along and below the waterline were fairly thin, but helped defend by exploding the warhead at a 'standoff distance' from the main hull. Main deck armor was much thicker, because engagements were expected to be at such ranges that 'plunging fire' would be the norm. Touring the USS Alabama, in Mobile, Alabama, allows you to see a number of deck hatches in the open position. These are approximately three feet thick.
Caliber of main guns also grew, but the more important improvement was in the design and construction of the shells and the guns. Power increased to the extent that attempting to fire a 12 inch shell from 1940 in one of the 12 inch guns from WW I would have resulted in the destruction of the gun and crew. By the end of WW II, most new
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