Busting the Myth of the "glass cannons" (aka battlecruisers).

An interesting read, and it does make you make think, imo.

http://www.informationdissemination.net/2014/12/the-enduring-myth-of-fragile_16.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+InformationDissemination+%28Information+Dissemination%29

 

Well I'm not sure BCs were really cheaper than BBs. Compare the cost of Hood to the QE's and I suspect Hood was more expensive. BC's also exibited thier vulnerability on a number of other occasions Hiei being disabled by cruiser gunfire even after enough of an armor upgrade to change her rating to a BB is an example.

 

True, and packing the RN BCs at Jutland with 50% more ammunition than they were designed to carry certainly didn't help.

 

I think the results of the British BC's off Jutland did give the impression that BCs were much more vulnerable than they really were. They were more vulnerable than battleships but a number of factors came to play in that battle. Certainly the German BCs didn't leave the same impression.

 

Lion and Tiger at Jutland took about as many hits as Warspite, more than any other battleship on either side, and remained operational except for items like Lion's Q turret which were hit directly. They were basically survivable except for the ammunition issue (which I admit is a bit like asking "Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the theater?").

Sources vary a bit but give hits as follows:

Warspite 13-15, all or most 12"
Lion 12-14, all or most 12"
Tiger, 15-17, all or most 11", plus several 5.9"

On the other side, Derfflinger's armor, only slightly lighter than a battleship's, did not keep her C and D turrets from being penetrated and burned out, but her ammunition handling system prevented the fires reaching the magazines.

 

I think Canonade makes a great point. I have a diagram somewhere showing the British and German methods of protecting the magazines , flash proof doors, hoist, etc. and the German's had developed a more elaborate protective system against flash.

while discussing this does anyone remember the name of a novel that dealt with this issue , The Mystery of the Sands" or something like that ? Read it years ago and no combination of words I have tried have turned anything. ....Maybe the Frisian Islands were the setting.

 

A "battlecruiser" can be many different things:
- A "cruiser killer" with cruiser (6") armour and battleships guns (Invincible).
- A battleship sized ship that sacrifices gunpower for speed (Derflinger or Sharnhorst)
- A ship that's significantly larger than contemporary battleships in order to get more speed with similar armour and gun power (Hood or Iowa) .

The British "catastrophic losses" were possibly more due to bad ammo handling procedures than to belt penetration, but the first group is unlikely to do well when faced by big guns are they are very "unbalanced" designs, the second group is best used for "outrun what you can't outfight" and the third are hugely expensive ships and if fighting as part f a battleline their superior speed is wasted.

 

Thanks, gt. The British problem may have been their ammunition handling practices more than the basic design. Apparently they were removing or leaving open some of the flash-tight scuttles or hatches in order to increase rate of fire.

The novel is The Riddle of the Sands by Erskine Childers and it did take place in the Frisian Islands. Two young British officials masquerading as recreational sailors discover that the Germans are building a fleet of barges for an invasion of Britain. In the climactic scene they encounter no less than Kaiser Wilhelm himself.

Incidentally Childers later became a fervent Irish nationalist and was executed - by the Irish - in 1922 during the civil war.

 

Not necessarily. One of the concepts of the time was to have a fast wing i.e. ships that could maneuver faster than the normal battleships of the period. That allows some significant tactical possiblities. Of course you need more than one of them for it to work well.

 

Canonade, Many thanks, I have tried for years to remember that book which I read many decades ago. I wanted to read it again to see if my memory was remotely correct. First sign it was not ....the book was written in 1902, I thought it dealt with WW 1 !!! Still Kindle has it for 99 cents US so I will download it.

I am impressed that you knew of it so quickly. I had no knowledge about about Childers fate, interesting..

 

I first heard of it in Dreadnought - have you read that? - by Robert Massie, excellent history of Anglo-German relations in the years leading up to WWI. There was a whole genre of war/invasion books and plays, most involving some form of covert or surprise assault on Britain. So Riddle does kind of deal with WWI - and it's a good read.

 

I will definitely check out Dreadnought, will check Kindle as I can only read books in large print or on Kindle with it's adjustable print size.
I think Barbara Tuchman's Guns of August falls into that category of pre WW 1 books but is a true history book.

BTW, if anyone is interested I have a large print copy of Len Deighton's Bomber, a well researched historic novel base on a single day about a Lancaster and a German anti-aircraft group and a German town....great detail. Deighton also wrote "Fighter, a factual account of the BOB..

If anyone wants the large print Bomber I would be happy to post it to you anywhere on the globe, free and postage included in that.

Gaines

 

I second that! It was such an informative and enjoyable read. His Castles of Steel was also very good.

 

When comparing hits at Jutland ( and elsewhere ) it's worth keeping in mind the very significant differences between German and British ammunition.
Projectile weight of the British 15" Mk1 was 1,920lb ( and 1400lb for the 13.5" MkV/VI ). This compares to 893lb for the German 12" SKL/50 and 666lb for the 11" SKL 45/50.

Of course, many other factors are involved, and I'd recommend the late John Campbell's 'Jutland - An Analysis Of The Fighting' for this.

 

Online: http://webpages.charter.net/abacus/news/jutland/cont.htm

 

Tuchman also did one other Pre ww1 book, trying to remember the name, it actually discusses the society of Europe and how it contributed. I know someone disagreed, but I also liked the description of BC's Too slow to catch cruisers and too light to fight BB's.

 

Early British battlecruisers were faster (around 26 knots) than contemporary cruisers (that were usually designed for 24) as they used turbines while most cruisers still used triple expansion, but their 6" belt made them "cruiser killers", which worked very well at the Falklands, but unsuited to face similarly armed ships. The Germans response was a more balanced design that could go head to head with a similarly armed ship under favourable tactical conditions, that it's superior speed had a chance to bring about. The later British "cats" were more balanced with a 9" belt and Hood had similar armour to the Queen Elisabeth battleships at the cost of some additional 10.000t to get over 30 knots instead of 24.
IMO the big British mistake was lumping together pretty different ships under the "battlecruiser" denomination, the Germans made a similar mistake by assigning Blucher to Moltke's squadron and paid for it at Dogger Bank.

 

The book is The Proud Tower; haven't actually read it.

Have to agree with TOS; the battle cruisers were comparable or faster than almost all contemporary cruisers. You might argue that light cruisers of 1914 or 1916 were faster than the 1906 BCs, but they had little if any edge over ships like Tiger or Renown.