Marine dreadnoughts. British battleship "dreadnought"

By the beginning of the 19th century, Great Britain had the most powerful battle fleet in history. Over the next century, the Industrial Revolution completely transformed the navy. From wood, canvas and primitive guns to armor, speed and firepower. In 1906, Great Britain disrupted the world order of forces by launching the most powerful battleship in the world, the Dreadnought.

What is a Dreadnought?

The appearance in 1906 of the English battleship Dreadnought changed the balance of power at sea. This ship alone was superior in power to a whole squadron of so-called "pre-dreadnoughts" (for example, battleships). It was equipped with ten 305 mm cannons for centralized fire, as well as several 76 mm anti-mine cannons. But large-caliber weapons were the main ones. Two things are innovative here: the main weapon is only a large caliber (the principle of “all big guns” has finally taken root), the fire was conducted centrally. The ships that preceded the Dreadnought had many guns of various calibers, and each gun fired independently.

Ancestor of the class of battleships. (wikipedia.org)

As epoch-making as its weaponry was the use of a steam turbine power plant on such a large ship, which for the first time in history allowed the Dreadnought to go at full speed for many hours on end. For ships with steam engines, 8 hours of constant full speed were considered the limit, and at the same time, their engine room “turned into a swamp” due to water sprayed for cooling and was filled with unbearable noise - for steam turbine ships, even at full speed, “the entire engine room was so clean and dry, as if the ship was at anchor, and not even a faint buzz was heard.

Each "Dreadnought" cost about twice as much as the squadron battleship of the type that preceded it, but at the same time it had a fundamental superiority over it in terms of tactical qualities - speed, protection, firing efficiency and the ability to concentrate artillery fire. In Russia, these new ships were called "battleships", since the only effective formation of the squadron when conducting volley fire was the formation of the line. Old squadron battleships were also included in this class, but after the advent of the Dreadnought, in any case, they could be considered no more than second-rate ships.

Orion in 1921 or 1922. (wikipedia.org)

Meanwhile, after five years, both the Dreadnought and its numerous followers turned out to be obsolete - they were replaced by the "superdreadnoughts" with their 13.5 ″ (343 mm) main caliber artillery, subsequently increased to 15 ″ (381 mm) and even 16″ (406 mm). The first superdreadnoughts are considered to be the British Orion-class battleships, which also had reinforced side armor. In the five years between Dreadnought and Orion, displacement increased by 25%, and the weight of a broadside doubled.

Battleship Iron Duke. (wikipedia.org)

Arms race

Such a familiar phrase in the context of relations between the United States and Russia can also be attributed to what happened in the fleets of Germany and England at the beginning of the 20th century. The appearance of the Dreadnought had to be answered. Following England, Germany hastily began to build dreadnoughts. Prior to this, the English fleet was twice as large as the German one in the number of ships of the line (39 versus 19).

Battleship Nassau. (wikipedia.org)

Now, Germany could compete with England in the pace of building a fleet on almost equal terms. After the adoption in 1900 by Germany of the “Law on the Navy”, England, which had previously adhered to the rule “to have a fleet equal to the sum of the fleets of the two following maritime powers”, and was extremely concerned about the growth of the German fleet, made a number of attempts to conclude an agreement with Germany that provided for the ratio of the English and German battle fleets would be within 3: 2. Negotiations between Britain and Germany on the weakening of the naval arms race, which dragged on for several years, ended in vain. Then England announced that she would respond to the laying of each new German battleship with the laying of two dreadnoughts. By the beginning of the First World War, the ratio of English and German dreadnoughts, as well as battlecruisers commissioned and under construction, was 42:26, that is, it was close to that which England sought during the negotiations.

Battleship "Rhineland" type "Nassau". (wikipedia.org)

The construction of the dreadnought fleet Germany began with the creation of a series of Nassau-class battleships, which consisted of four ships. They were launched in 1908. The next series of battleships of the Helgoland, Kaiser and König types also included four to five units (1909−1912).

Battleship Westfalen. (wikipedia.org)

The first series of German battleships was armed with traditional 280-mm main battery artillery and 150-mm rapid-fire cannons, which were also preserved on German battleships of subsequent series. On them, the caliber of the main artillery was increased to 305 mm. The rate of fire of the main caliber guns reached 1.2-1.5 rounds per minute. The preservation of the 280-mm caliber on the first four Nassau-type dreadnoughts was explained, on the one hand, by the good ballistic properties of these German guns with a barrel length of 40 and 45 calibers, and on the other hand, by the short range of visibility characteristic of the North Sea, which did not allow fighting on great distance.

Battleship Bayern. (wikipedia.org)

The English ships of the line were armed with guns of a larger caliber (305-343 versus 280-305 mm), but were inferior to the German ones in armor. Short and wide German dreadnoughts won in the mass of side armor, which made it possible to make the armor belt higher and thicker on them.

"Empress Maria" during the First World War. (wikipedia.org)

The differences between the German and English types of battleships were explained by the goals of their combat use. The German naval command assumed that the stronger English fleet would attack the German dreadnoughts directly off the coast of Germany. Therefore, such important tactical and technical characteristics as cruising range and speed were considered to some extent secondary, and armor was given paramount importance. In the English fleet, which sought to impose on the enemy the place, time and distance of the battle, on the contrary, they attached more importance to the cruising range, speed and caliber of the main artillery.

Battleship "Poltava" during the First World War. (wikipedia.org)

The rivalry between England and Germany in the naval arms race created favorable conditions for the political adventures of countries that were economically less developed. Having created a squadron of dreadnoughts and battlecruisers, they could count on strengthening their position on the world stage by joining their squadron to one or another of the warring parties. Tsarist Russia also adhered to this policy to some extent, having built four dreadnoughts and laid down the same number of dreadnought-type battlecruisers.

BB-35 "Texas". (wikipedia.org)

The fleets of other states participating in the First World War were many times inferior to England and Germany in the number of dreadnoughts. The countries that built the dreadnoughts, to one degree or another, repeated the features of the German or English battleships, depending on tactical considerations for their intended combat use. The exception, in a sense, is the US Navy's Texas-class battleships. They had both powerful armor and a large caliber of the main artillery (356 mm).

February 10th. /TASS/. Exactly 110 years ago, on February 10, 1906, the British warship Dreadnought was launched in Portsmouth. By the end of that year, she was completed and commissioned into the Royal Navy.

The Dreadnought, which combined a number of innovative solutions, became the ancestor of a new class of warships, to which he gave his name. This was the last step towards the creation of battleships - the largest and most powerful artillery ships ever put to sea.
At the same time, the Dreadnought was not unique - the revolutionary ship was the product of a long evolution of battleships. Its analogues were already going to be built in the USA and Japan; moreover, the Americans began to develop their own dreadnoughts even before the British. But Britain came first.

The hallmark of the "Dreadnought" is artillery, which consisted of ten guns of the main caliber (305 millimeters). They were supplemented by many small 76-mm guns, but the intermediate caliber was completely absent on the new ship.

Such armament strikingly distinguished the Dreadnought from all previous battleships. Those, as a rule, carried only four 305 mm guns, but were supplied with a solid battery of medium caliber - usually 152 mm.

The habit of supplying armadillos with many - up to 12 and even 16 - medium-caliber guns was explained simply: 305-millimeter guns were reloaded for quite some time, and at that time 152-millimeter guns had to shower the enemy with a hail of shells. This concept proved its worth during the war between the United States and Spain in 1898 - in the Battle of Santiago de Cuba, American ships achieved a depressingly small number of hits with their main caliber, but literally riddled the enemy with medium-caliber "quick guns".

However, the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 demonstrated something completely different. Russian battleships, which were much larger than the Spanish ships, withstood a lot of hits from 152-mm cannons - only the main caliber inflicted serious damage on them. In addition, Japanese sailors were simply more accurate than American ones.

12-inch guns on HMS Dreadnought
© Library of Congress Bain collection

Idea authorship

The Italian military engineer Vittorio Cuniberti is traditionally considered the author of the concept of a battleship equipped with exceptionally heavy artillery. He proposed to build for the Italian Navy an ironclad with 12,305 mm guns, a liquid fuel turbine power plant, and powerful armor. The Italian admirals refused to implement Cuniberti's idea, but allowed it to be published.

In the 1903 edition of Jane's Fighting Ships, there was a short - only three pages - article by Cuniberti "The Ideal Fighting Ship for the British Navy". In it, the Italian described a giant battleship with a displacement of 17,000 tons, equipped with 12 305-millimeter guns and unusually powerful armor, and even capable of speeds of 24 knots (which made it a third faster than any battleship).

Just six of these "ideal ships" would be enough to defeat any enemy, Cuniberti believed. Due to its firepower, his battleship had to sink an enemy battleship in one salvo, and due to its high speed, immediately move on to the next one.

The author considered rather an abstract concept, without doing exact calculations. In any case, it seems almost impossible to fit all Cuniberti's proposals into a ship with a displacement of 17 thousand tons. The total displacement of the real "Dreadnought" turned out to be much larger - about 21 thousand tons.

So, despite the similarity of Cuniberti's proposal with the Dreadnought, it is unlikely that the Italian had a great influence on the construction of the first ship of the new class. Cuniberti's article was published at a time when the "father" of the Dreadnought, Admiral John "Jackie" Fisher, had already reached similar conclusions, but in a very different way.

Cannons on the roof of the tower. HMS Dreadnought, 1906
© US Library of Congress Bain collection

"Father" of the Dreadnought

Admiral Fisher, pushing the Dreadnought project through the British Admiralty, was guided not by theoretical, but by practical considerations.

While commanding the British naval forces in the Mediterranean Sea, Fisher found by experience that firing from different-caliber guns made aiming extremely difficult. Artillerymen of that time, pointing the guns at the target, were guided by splashes from the fall of shells into the water. And at a long distance, bursts from 152 and 305 mm caliber shells are almost impossible to distinguish.

In addition, the rangefinders and fire control systems that existed then were extremely imperfect. They did not allow to realize all the capabilities of the guns - British battleships could shoot at 5.5 kilometers, but according to the results of real tests, the recommended range of aimed fire was only 2.7 kilometers.

Meanwhile, it was necessary to increase the effective distance of the battle: torpedoes became a serious enemy of the battleships, the range of which at that time reached about 2.5 kilometers. A logical conclusion was made: the best way to fight at long distances would be a ship with the maximum number of main battery guns.

Dreadnought cabin USS Texas, USA
© EPA/LARRY W. SMITH

At some point, as an alternative to the future Dreadnought, a ship equipped with many 234-mm guns, which were then already used by the British as medium artillery on battleships, was considered. Such a ship would combine a rapid rate of fire with massive firepower, but Fisher needed some truly "big guns."

Fisher also insisted on equipping the Dreadnought with the latest steam turbines, which allowed the ship to develop over 21 knots per hour, while 18 knots were considered sufficient for battleships. The admiral was well aware that the advantage in speed allows him to impose on the enemy a battle distance that is advantageous for himself. Given the Dreadnought's vast superiority in heavy artillery, this meant that a few of these ships were capable of destroying an enemy fleet while remaining virtually out of reach for most of its guns.

Without a single shot

The Dreadnought was built in record time. As a rule, they call an impressive year and one day: the ship was laid down on October 2, 1905, and on October 3, 1906, the battleship entered the first sea trials. This is not entirely correct - traditionally, the time of construction is counted from the laying to the inclusion in the combat composition of the fleet. "Dreadnought" went into operation on December 11, 1906, a year and two months after the start of construction.

The unprecedented speed of work had a downside. The photographs from Portsmouth show not always a high-quality assembly of the hull - other armor plates are crooked, and the bolts that fasten them are of different sizes. No wonder - 3 thousand workers literally "burned" at the shipyard for 11 and a half hours a day and 6 days a week.

A number of shortcomings are associated with the ship's design itself. The operation showed the insufficient effectiveness of the latest Dreadnought fire control systems and its rangefinders - the largest at that time. Rangefinder posts even had to be moved so that they would not be damaged by the shock wave of a gun salvo.

The most powerful ship of the era never once fired at the enemy from its main caliber. The Dreadnought was not present at the Battle of Jutland in 1916 - the largest clash of fleets consisting of dreadnoughts - it was under repair.

But even if the Dreadnought were in service, it would have to remain in the second line - in just a few years it was hopelessly outdated. It was replaced both in Britain and in Germany by larger, faster and more powerful battleships.

So, representatives of the Queen Elizabeth type, which entered service in 1914-1915, were already carrying guns of 381 mm caliber. The mass of a shell of this caliber was more than twice the weight of a Dreadnought shell, and these guns fired one and a half times as far.

Nevertheless, the Dreadnought was still able to achieve victory over the enemy ship, unlike many other representatives of its class. His victim was a German submarine. Ironically, the mighty dreadnought destroyed it not with artillery fire or even with a torpedo - it simply rammed the submarine, although the British shipbuilders did not begin to equip the Dreadnought with a special ram.

However, the submarine sunk by the Dreadnought was by no means ordinary, and its captain was a famous sea wolf. But this is completely different

Oldest surviving dreadnought, USS Texas (BB-35), launched in 1912

Exactly 110 years ago, on February 10, 1906, the British warship Dreadnought (English dreadnought - “fearless”) was launched in Portsmouth. By the end of that year, she was completed and commissioned into the Royal Navy.

At the same time, the Dreadnought was not unique - the revolutionary ship was the product of a long evolution of battleships. Its analogues were already going to be built in the USA and Japan; moreover, the Americans began to develop their own dreadnoughts even before the British.

But Britain came first.

The visiting card of the Dreadnought is artillery, which consisted of ten guns of the main caliber (305 millimeters). They were supplemented by many small 76-mm guns, but the intermediate caliber was completely absent on the new ship.

The habit of supplying armadillos with many - up to 12 and even 16 - medium-caliber guns was explained simply: 305-millimeter guns were reloaded for a rather long time, and at that time 152-millimeter guns had to shower the enemy with a hail of shells. This concept proved its worth during the war between the United States and Spain in 1898 - in the Battle of Santiago de Cuba, American ships achieved a depressingly small number of hits with their main caliber, but literally riddled the enemy with medium-caliber "quick guns".

12-inch guns on HMS Dreadnought © Library of Congress Bain collection

The 1903 edition of Jane's Fighting Ships featured a short - only three pages - article by Cuniberti "The Ideal Fighting Ship for the British Navy". In it, the Italian described a giant battleship with a displacement of 17,000 tons, equipped with 12 305-millimeter guns and unusually powerful armor, and even capable of speeds of 24 knots (which made it a third faster than any battleship).

The author considered rather an abstract concept, without doing exact calculations. In any case, it seems almost impossible to fit all Cuniberti's proposals into a ship with a displacement of 17 thousand tons. The total displacement of the real Dreadnought turned out to be much larger - about 21 thousand tons.

Cannons on the roof of the tower. HMS Dreadnought, 1906 © US Library of Congress Bain collection

"Father" of the Dreadnought

Admiral Fisher, pushing the Dreadnought project through the British Admiralty, was guided not by theoretical, but by practical considerations.

Dreadnought cabin USS Texas, USA, © EPA/LARRY W. SMITH

At some point, a ship equipped with many 234-mm guns, which were then already used by the British as medium artillery on battleships, was considered as an alternative to the future Dreadnought. Such a ship would have combined a rapid rate of fire with massive firepower, but Fisher needed some truly "big guns."

Fisher also insisted on equipping the Dreadnought with the latest steam turbines, which allowed the ship to develop over 21 knots, while 18 knots were considered sufficient for battleships. The admiral was well aware that the advantage in speed allows him to impose on the enemy a battle distance that is advantageous for himself. Given the Dreadnought's vast superiority in heavy artillery, this meant that a few of these ships were capable of destroying an enemy fleet while remaining virtually out of reach for most of its guns.

Without a single shot

The Dreadnought was built in record time. As a rule, they call an impressive year and one day: the ship was laid down on October 2, 1905, and on October 3, 1906, the battleship entered the first sea trials. This is not entirely correct - traditionally, the time of construction is counted from the laying to the inclusion in the combat composition of the fleet. The Dreadnought entered service on December 11, 1906, a year and two months after the start of construction.

The unprecedented speed of work had a downside. The photographs from Portsmouth do not always show the high-quality assembly of the hull - other armor plates are crooked, and the bolts that fasten them are of different sizes. No wonder - 3 thousand workers literally “burned” at the shipyard for 11 and a half hours a day and 6 days a week.

But even if the Dreadnought were in service, he would have to remain in the second line - in just a few years he was hopelessly outdated. It was replaced both in Britain and in Germany by larger, faster and more powerful battleships.

In early 1905, in the very days when the Russian fleet was hastening to the shores of Japan to meet its doom, the Committee, created by the First Sea Lord John Arbuthnot Fisher, had already developed a plan for the reconstruction of the British fleet "from keel to keel". The admiral himself declared: “I will change everything! And I do not advise you to interfere with me - I will destroy anyone who gets in my way. In a memorandum sent to members of the Admiralty, Fisher wrote: "The new fleet will consist of four classes of ships and will meet all the requirements of modern warfare." He listed these classes: battleships with a displacement of 15,900 tons, capable of speeds up to 21 knots; armored cruisers (15,900 tons, 25.5 knots), destroyers (900 tons, 36 knots) and submarines (350 tons, 13 knots).

The committee, which was to revive the British fleet in a new capacity, included experienced naval officers, prominent shipbuilders and large industrialists. Together, they knew almost everything about artillery, armor and driving performance of ships, fire control and torpedoes, communications and fuel. Among its civilians were British science stars such as Sir Philip Watts, a shipbuilder who left his private company to take over as director of the Royal Dockyards at Portsmouth, and Lord Kelvin, the famed Irish physicist and mathematician at the University of Glasgow, who invented the temperature scale and the submarine cable. who made the international telegraph a reality. The Committee also included Prince Louis of Battenberg, rear admiral, chief of naval intelligence and nephew (by wife) of King Edward VII, 46-year-old captain John R. Jellicoe, who, like Fisher himself, had extensive experience and versatile knowledge in maritime affairs and to the subtleties who knew artillery. His fame did not go beyond the narrow circle of naval officers, but it was he who, in the hour of severe trials, was destined to take command of the newborn fleet.

First of all, the Committee set about implementing Fisher's long-standing and reverent dream - the creation of a battleship. Conducting artillery exercises of a ship, squadron, fleet, he often used Napoleon’s favorite formula “Frappez vite et frappez fort” (“To beat often and hard”) and for a long time nurtured the image of such a ship that would swim faster and strike more crushingly than before. Five years before his “accession”, he persuaded his friend V. X. Gard, who then held the position of chief builder at the Royal Shipyards in Malta, to make sketches of drawings of such an ideal ship. Fisher gave the imaginary battleship the name Anteycable, and the project the Committee began working on in 1905 was given the same name. It is not known who and when the name "Dreadnought" ("Fearless") was chosen, which was destined to become a symbol of a new era in shipbuilding and naval art.

However, this name, which at different times was borne by seven ships of the British fleet (the first "Dreadnought" fought with the Invincible Armada in 1588), followed a long tradition of "animating" a new warship entering service, giving it the name of its predecessor, once instilled fear in the enemies.

But whatever the name of the ship being created, it marked a real breakthrough in navigation and - for all its novelty - was the brainchild of its time. Although later it was Fisher who was considered the creator of the Dreadnought, he did not at all belong to the defining and fundamentally new features of this battleship - high speed qualities combined with the fact that it was armed with exclusively long-range large-caliber artillery. The achievements of science in this area made it possible to increase the salvo distance more and more, and naval thought throughout the world gradually came to the conclusion that it was necessary to replace the "motley" naval artillery with heavy and homogeneous main-caliber guns.

In addition to the fact that this made it possible to conduct intense fire at a maximum distance, the unification of naval artillery greatly facilitated the search for a target and determining the distance to it. In the recent past, both were largely left to chance until, in 1912, Admiral Sir Percy Scott invented the electric PUAO (artillery fire control device). Until then, the guidance and target search systems remained at the same level as in Nelson's times. Officially, this was called "taking it into the fork", but it would be more appropriate to say "shoot as God puts on the soul."

An artillery spotter officer, being in the conning tower, ordered a series of volleys to be fired during the battle and, by bursts, "detected" the places where the shells fell. Then he made adjustments, using a speaking tube connected to the gun turrets to communicate with the gunners, and hoped for the best. Only after the target was taken into the "fork", that is, half of the shells went into short flight, and half - into flight, was the true range of the target determined, and then very arbitrarily and approximately, since the area of \u200b\u200bthe "fork" could be no less than an acre. Even the well-trained gunners of Admiral Togo in the Tsushima battle in half the cases "smeared": out of every 100 shells fired from a distance of 7000 yards, only 42 hit Russian ships, and 58 uselessly exploded in the sea.

Of course, while long-range artillery was "talking", small-caliber guns turned into ballast. But when the ships approached so close that all calibers could be brought into action, the rough approximation of the adjustment of the fire manifested itself especially brightly. It was often difficult for an officer to notice the bursts of small and medium-sized shells among the high columns of water thrown up by the main caliber shells. When he succeeded, the work for him was just beginning: 6-, 9-, and 12-inch projectiles going to the same target have different trajectories and, therefore, different elevation angles are required. Thus, the fire spotter in the pitch hell of battle had to shout out corrections for not one, but for all the calibers on board, into the speaking tube.

The first draft of a ship capable of carrying a large number of long-range guns was developed by a man endowed with outstanding talents, but who lived in a country whose fleet was weak and small. The Italian shipbuilder Vittorio Cuniberti had already given him the first gun platform and electrically powered projectile hoists. In 1902, he submitted to the government a design for a 17,000-ton battleship armed with a dozen 12-inch guns, 12-inch armor protecting the ship's vital centers. However, Italy did not have the money or “production capacity” to build it. The battleship remained in blue. Cuniberti shared his idea with the Englishman Fred T. Jane, publisher of the annual Warships, which included lists of ships that were part of the fleets of the whole world, and the opinions of leading scientists, often polar opposites. In 1903, Jane published Cuniberti's design and his own article entitled "The Ideal Battleship for the British Navy".

The "ideal battleship", in addition to large-caliber artillery, was supposed to have an unheard of speed of 24 knots, which was six knots higher than the average for that time. “The bull in the empty space of the circus arena consoles himself with the thought that since he surpasses the agile and agile bullfighter in strength, the battlefield will certainly remain with him,” Cuniberti declared with imagery worthy of the heir to the Romans, “but he is too slow to overtake an opponent, and he almost always manages to avoid the terrifying blow of the horns.

The appearance of an article in the yearbook caused the most controversial responses, which perfectly characterize the confusion in the minds that reigned at that time. Conservative-minded British experts reacted to her with a wide range of feelings - from indignation to polite bewilderment. Sir William White, formerly head of the shipbuilding department, found the proposal to remove auxiliary artillery from ships outrageous. The Engineer magazine was less categorical and expressed it evasively: "The day will come when such a ship will appear in our fleet, but, in our opinion, not soon." However, that day has come. The President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt, who loved the Navy very much, but poorly understood it, submitted a proposal to Congress to build for the American Navy Naval Forces battleship with homogeneous and heavy weapons. In early 1904, this bill was approved, and the Americans laid down two ironclads. Meanwhile, at the shipyards of Japan, work was already in full swing. And it took Jackie Fischer all his diabolical zeal and eloquence to convince his inert compatriots: it's time to catch up with the "breakaway" world.

For the members of the Committee created by Fischer, the issue of heavy and uniform weapons was obvious, but, without causing controversy, was for them on a different plane: how many large-caliber guns should be on the ship and where to place them. They finally settled on ten (the Cuniberti project provided for 12), since, according to the unanimous opinion of the members of the Committee, the displacement of the future battleship should not have exceeded 18,000 tons.

They decided to place them as follows: one pair - on the nose; two more pairs - in the middle part of the ship (middle) on the left and right sides; and two more - closer to the stern, but in the center, so that all four guns could fire simultaneously from the sides and from the stern. This timing was of particular importance: six guns fired from the bow or stern and eight from the side, while the best battleships of the previous era, armed with four 12-inch guns, fired from the bow (or stern) with two guns and from the side with four. Thus, the "Dreadnought" in terms of its firepower was two times superior to any battleship firing a broadside salvo, and three times superior to any battleship firing from bow guns. The latter circumstance especially pleased the assertive and aggressive Fisher, who was firmly convinced that the enemy would always run away from the Dreadnought pursuing him and then fall under the deadly bow gun fire, more powerful than side fire.

The project documentation was prepared by May 1905, and the blueprints were sent to the Royal Dockyards in Portsmouth, where the hull was laid down on October 2. From that day on, the building moved forward at breakneck speed. Fischer got into all the details so lively, so stubbornly hurried and urged on the engineers and workers, that his invariable phrase "Push - or fuck off!" became a proverb among the dockers.

However, he was far from being only customized - Fisher came up with and implemented many innovations that saved time at each stage of construction. One of these innovations was the standard, that is, interchangeable, parts of the structure. Just at the time when the Committee was developing the Dreadnought project, the battleship King Edward VII was being completed on the slipway, the massive hull of which was welded from several thousand steel plates of various configurations - they were cut from sheets brought from factories, and then for several months they were collected together and adjusted together - this work was reminiscent of compiling a “puzzle picture”. Fisher insisted that the Dreadnought's hull be mostly made of interchangeable standard rectangular steel sheets. They were brought from the factory, unloaded and put in the right place any of them, and all the delays - however, small ones - were associated with the expectation of sheets of a particularly complex configuration. This simple innovation saved almost a whole year of working time, and if on average the construction of a ship from laying to launching took 16 months, then the 527-foot Dreadnought hull literally took shape in just 18 weeks before the eyes of the astonished dockers - a negligible period. On February 10, 1906, the new battleship was prepared for launching.

Completion "at the wall" and the installation of weapons and equipment also took place with lightning speed. The capacity of the foundries in 1905 was such that it would have taken several years to make ten 12-inch guns. However, Fisher, who never reckoned with generally accepted norms and rules, achieved the immediate installation of eight guns intended for the battleships Agamemnon and Lord Nelson under construction. Thanks to this "interception", the work was again carried out well ahead of schedule.

October 3, 1906 "Dreadnought" has already entered sea trials. Instead of 3-3.5 years, during which ships of this class were usually built, the mighty armored battleship was born in one year and one day, that is, by the standards of that time, in the blink of an eye. Many rightly saw in this something providential. And although it was not Fisher who invented this hitherto unknown ship, no one disputed the decisive role of the admiral in the fantastic speed with which the Dreadnought was built, and in how wisely and resourcefully he led the creation of this Leviathan.

Sea trials "Dreadnought" became a real sensation. From Portsmouth, he went south to the Mediterranean Sea, and from there, across the Atlantic - to Trinidad, after which he returned to his native shores. Tests have shown that, at full load, the turbines are capable of providing the ship with a speed of 21 knots. Even more impressive was that the way to the West Indies and back (about 7,000 miles), the battleship passed at an average speed of 17.5 knots and without a single breakdown - a result unprecedented for ships equipped with piston engines.

The most crucial moment of the test was shooting. "Dreadnought" was to fire a volley with all sides - from eight 12-inch guns. Sir Philip Watts, director of the Portsmouth shipyards, where the new ship was born, was waiting for this moment with trepidation. “He was very gloomy and serious,” recalls one of the officers present at the firing, “as if he was afraid that at the first salvo the ship would fall apart. However, there was a rumble, muffled by the distance, and the Dreadnought shuddered slightly. Dozens of people crowding on the shore did not even know that eight 12-inch guns had been fired at once. And the ship “shuddered a little” because it sent shells with a total weight of 21,250 pounds to 8000 yards.

Tests of the Dreadnought revealed only one design flaw: when the ship turned, its stability decreased. Its first commander, Sir Reginald Bacon, recalled that “at speeds above 15 knots with more than 10 degrees of rudder shift, the power of the machine was not enough to level the ship, and she continued to circle in place until the speed dropped to 15 knots. ". There was one more trouble - on the way back from the Atlantic, the speed fell by one knot for no apparent reason, and two days later, for no apparent reason, it returned to its previous level. It turned out that the lagging sheet of sheathing served as a brake. These problems were fixed quite quickly - as soon as the Dreadnought returned from sea trials. In general, they were unusually successful, and in December 1906, Fisher enthusiastically wrote: "Dreadnought" should have been renamed "Cool Egg". Why? Because it can't be broken!"

Equipping one ship with ten heavy 12-inch guns was certainly a major achievement. But weapons are not everything. Other dizzying engineering ideas have found their embodiment in the Dreadnought.

The forecastle "Dreadnought" was distinguished by its extraordinary length, a 28-foot bulwark ran along the bow. Due to these design features, the deck was not flooded with water in stormy weather, which dramatically increased the accuracy of aiming the guns. The nose below the waterline had a bulbous protrusion - this improved the seaworthiness of the ship. In the middle part, the case was straightened, which made it look somewhat like a box. Such contours softened the rolling. Along the sides below the waterline were underwater keels, which had the shape of a triangle in cross section with the apex pointing downward at an angle. These keels dampened the vibrations caused by the vortex flows from the propellers.

The ship had anti-torpedo protection - booms installed from the hull, and steel nets for intercepting torpedoes. Another means of defense against torpedo attacks was anti-mine artillery - twenty-seven 12-pounder guns, guided by hand. They were dispersed throughout the ship and were installed on superstructures, including on top of the gun turrets.

Going against age-old tradition, the Dreadnought's mainmast was three-legged. This design gave maximum stability to the Mars, from which the shooting data was transmitted to the towers. The idea itself was great. But the designers did not take into account one essential detail - the mast was located between two chimneys. Not only did the smoke from the front pipe seriously impede visibility, it was hot, and in stormy weather, when the fireboxes were working with might and main, the tubular structure of the mast was so hot that it was simply impossible to move along the ladder inside it and leading from the hold to Mars .

In every respect, the Dreadnought was the most sophisticated technical device of its time. She was longer (527 feet), wider (82 feet), and had a deeper draft (26.5 feet) than any older ship of the line. Its displacement was 17900 tons, 750 tons more than the largest warship of that time.

Each Dreadnought turret weighed 500 tons, and the weight of one main battery gun exceeded the weight of all the guns of Victory, Horatio Nelson's flagship, combined. The turrets stood on fixed barbettes reinforced with vertical steel beams and covered with drums welded from 11-inch armor plates. To protect the magazines with ammunition and other compartments, the middle part of the ship along the waterline was covered with an 11-inch armor belt. Behind the armor were bunkers, which had the shape of a cut wedge in cross-section, in which there was a large part of the 2900-ton coal reserve. Bunkers were the second protective belt.

In addition, watertight bulkheads ran from the keel to 9 feet above the waterline, dividing the hold into 18 hermetic compartments. This ensured the ship's high survivability - the engineers believed that the Dreadnought could withstand two direct torpedo hits while remaining in service. (If necessary, the "Dreadnought" itself could carry out a torpedo attack - five torpedo tubes were installed on the ship).

The power plant, setting in motion all this colossus, was the last word in technology. The classic reciprocating steam engines with their roaring and rattling pistons were a thing of the past. The Dreadnought was the first heavy warship to be powered by steam turbines. It had eight turbines of the Parsons system. Steam was produced by eighteen boilers of the Babcock and Williams system. Developing a power of 23,000 liters. with., the machine rotated four propellers. The turbines made it possible to develop a cruising speed of 17.5 knots. The maximum speed of the Dreadnought reached 21 knots. The cruising range was 6620 miles.

The twin balancing rudders were controlled by means of a helm from the bridge or from any of the four spare steering posts dispersed throughout the ship. Two of them were at command posts located on the tops of both masts, it was possible to get there only through the ladders going inside the tubular structure, covered with armor (these cavities were also used as a voice pipe).

A team of 773 people was required to manage the floating fortress. Placing it in the living quarters was another breakthrough into the future. By tradition, the sailors huddled in the cramped quarters of the bow, and the officers were located in relatively spacious cabins in the stern. On the Dreadnought, everyone was turned upside down: the team was placed in the stern - closer to the car, and the officers were given the middle part - next to the bridge. Each of the five Dreadnought towers was manned by a crew of 35 men. The actions of the team were brought to automaticity: in some 10 minutes, a twin 12-inch artillery mount could fire 12 shots at a target located 20 miles away. 850-pound shells were stored in a shell magazine located in the hold. On a suspended monorail, the projectile was fed to the pocket of the intake - the first link in the ammunition lifting system. Then, moving up, the projectile entered the deck of the powder magazine, where four powder charges were loaded into the intake. Even higher, directly under the tower, there was a working compartment, where the shot was completed. Here, the projectile and the powder charge were placed in the feeder, which, moving along the rails, curved in the form of an arc, fired a shot at the bolt. The feed mechanism worked hydraulically. The shot was sent into the barrel chamber by a hydraulic rammer - first the projectile, and then the powder charges.

The shutter was locked, and the barrels of the guns rose to the desired elevation angle, turning on pins - massive bushings on each side of the barrel. They rested on support bearings built into the walls of the tower. So the vertical guidance was carried out. At the same time, the entire tower rotated on the axis by means of a gear mechanism - a toothed rim and pinion. Thus, the angle of deflection of the barrel was set, i.e., horizontal guidance was carried out. The aiming angles were set from the central post by the officer who controlled the fire.

The recoil force of the guns rolled back approximately 18 inches, and the hydraulic knurler brought them to their original position, after which the guns were reloaded. But first, a small but extremely important action was performed. To exclude the possibility that the hot gases remaining in the barrel from the previous volley would throw a new charge directly at the gunners, after each shot the barrel chamber was cooled by a stream of water and compressed air.

"Dreadnought", like any absolutely new phenomenon, was not welcomed by everyone. Sir George Clark, Secretary of the Imperial Defense Committee, argued that it was sheer recklessness to take such a technological risk, and assured that "our policy in the field of shipbuilding is not to get ahead of ourselves, but to improve on what others have already tried." Sir William White, who until the advent of Fisher and Philip Watts was Director of the Portsmouth Dockyards, and therefore had reason to say that "the grapes are green", considered it unacceptable "to put all your eggs in one or two huge, expensive, stately, but very vulnerable baskets" . And the caustic Admiral Charles Beresford, Fisher's colleague and rival, said: "This class of ships will not give us any advantages."

Beresford, who commanded the fleet, could not stand the First Sea Lord, who was his immediate superior, and apparently transferred his dislike to Fisher's favorite brainchild. However, there is some truth in Beresford's remark. Such a qualitative leap in the armament of the Dreadnought gave rise to well-known problems that were unexpected for its creators: next to it, all existing battleships seemed hopelessly outdated, and this made the so zealously guarded numerical superiority of the British fleet meaningless. A whole armada of slow-moving, lightly armed battleships, protected by thin armor, would not be able to cope with a squadron of new dreadnoughts. Germany, no doubt, had to jump on the idea of building such ships to close the gap, and Britain, if she wanted to maintain her priority and the title of "mistress of the seas", had to start a grueling naval arms race.

Not for his great accomplishments, he got into the history of the Dreadnought. There were no high-profile feats for him, his giant guns were silent throughout the war, and only once did the ship have a chance to participate in the battle. It happened in March 1915 on the North Sea: he met the U-29 submarine, rammed it and sank it. The Dreadnought is famous not for what it did, but for what it was. In 1906, when the ship entered service, it was so far ahead of the era that there was nothing fundamentally new in all the battleships launched after it - they were just the embodiment of the ideas embodied in its concept. The emblem of the Dreadnought was a golden key clutched in a knight's gauntlet, which, of course, should have symbolized the ambitious aspirations of the Admiralty, which saw in the new ship the key to the door leading to undivided domination of the sea.

battleship named " Dreadnought"(H.M.S. "Dreadnought") (eng. "fearless") was the only representative of British ships with the most successful design among the ironclad era. He differed from his brothers in enviable speed and had excellent seaworthiness.

« Dreadnought” became the first ship to be equipped with ten main guns and several smaller caliber guns, against four large guns of early buildings. Triple expansion steam piston engines, outdated and brought to the limit of perfection, replaced direct-drive steam turbines, which gave greater speed. Its only drawback was the weak protection against forward attacks, which was eliminated much later.

building « Dreadnought» began in October 1905, at the shipyard " HM Dockyard" in the city of Portsmouth, and entered service in December 1906. After four months of work on the slipway, the ship's hull was ready for launching. On a gray windy day in February 1906, tens of thousands of spectators gathered at Portsmouth Dockyard. Having broken a bottle of Austrian wine, King Edward gave the surface ship the name " Dreadnought". Over the next eight months, 3,000 workers turned the empty hull into a floating fortress. Only then did the incredible firepower become evident." Dreadnought". Its armament was 10 twelve-inch guns, two and a half times more than its predecessors. According to the inventor, such a battleship with large-caliber guns will become a real embodiment of firepower. Dreadnought showed itself well during sea trials, which were attended by the leaders of the state. He was thoroughly studied by the naval departments. And in 1907, it was decided to appoint her as the flagship of the Royal Navy. For several weeks the newspapers were filled with reports of the exclusivity, size, secrecy of the new ship and its unheard of firepower.

"Dreadnought" photo

"Dreadnought" during the tests

the British Navy admired the dreadnought

dreadnought stem

dreadnought

Battleship " Dreadnought”became the first ship of the British Navy, on which the placement of the crew was completely changed. The decision was prompted by concerns about whether the crew would be able to quickly take up their posts during the combat alert. That is, the placements of officers were brought as close as possible to their main combat posts, on bridges and central posts, and the sailors - to the engine and boiler rooms, where most of the personnel were involved.

battleship "Dreadnought" in combat campaign

Building idea dreadnought belonged to the first sea lord, Admiral John Fisher. The first ship was supposed to be the last incarnation of ideas in metallurgy and the design of power plants for weapons. " Armor is speed' Fisher said. It was the first battleship to feature the newly invented steam turbine. She allowed to reach speeds of up to 21 knots. Fisher wanted to build a surface ship with all medium caliber guns, this concept was called " all big gun". Moreover, it was possible to place them in such a way that the standard displacement generally accepted on ships with four heavy guns did not change. These guns became the best of their caliber in the history of the British Navy, since further increases did not give positive success.

bow 305 mm dreadnought turret in the position of the maximum angle of horizontal fire

In 1914, with the outbreak of the First World War dreadnought became the flagship of the fourth combat squadron in the North Sea. His only significant battle was the sinking of the German U-29 on 18 March 1915. Like most obsolete battleships, her condition fell into disrepair due to frequent patrols in the seas, and was soon put into reserve, and in February 1919 she was sold for scrap to the company " TW Ward & Company for £44,000.

the caliber of the main gun of the battleship "Dreadnought" was 305 mm

Battleship " Dreadnought”in all respects turned out to be an outstanding ship. It combined so many innovations that it made its design qualitatively new. All subsequent battleships, built in accordance with the idea of this ship, immediately began to be called dreadnoughts . And Britain with one " Dreadnought far outperformed its competitors. But its creation led to the fact that all previously created battleships became obsolete, including the British ones. And almost immediately, the Dreadnought sparked an arms race. A dangerous game played has led the world to an incredible catastrophe, the greatest confrontation at sea, which the world has not yet seen.