Special 1: HMS Warspite
History of the Second World War
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The Dreadnought and the Battlecruiser
The dreadnought would remove much of the secondary armament to focus in more space and more weight on only the guns of the largest possible caliber. This gave the ship a much greater total hitting power when compared with any other ship afloat. Admiral Bacon's geared turbine engines, first to be mounted on a capital ship, also provided a much greater endurance at maximum power. With the old reciprocating engines, they were limited to being very short bursts of top speed, but the dreadnought could manage it for hours on end.
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