photo #1510301

The Revenge-class superdreadnoughts were a follow-up to the superlative Queen Elizabeth-class battleships and represented an attempt by the Admiralty to resolve some issues with that class.Slightly smaller and more compact, the Revenge (also erroneously called the "Royal Sovereign" or "R") class had greater armour protection in all areas (especially the deck and engineering spaces) and had better interior arrangements to counter damage and flooding below the waterline. Propulsion was originally going to be both fuel oil and coal power as the conservative element in the Admiralty was concerned about Britain's lack of a domestic oil industry, which might lead to shortages, and so wanted coal as a backup. When Admiral John "Jackie" Fisher, 1st Baron Fisher, was recalled back to his old post as First Sea Lord of the Admiralty shortly after the war began one of the first moves he made was to convert the Revenge-class to oil fired. This increased their speed & range by a significant amount, though they never reached their theoretical top speed of 23 knots.The main battery would remain the same as the Queen Elizabeth-class (the superb 15" Mk I guns), though they really wanted a 5th turret they just couldn't quite make it work within the self imposed displacement limit. The secondary 6" guns were mounted in casemates and positioned so they didn't ship as much water as the QE's. They also had four submerged torpedo tubes.The five ships of the class were named Revenge, Resolution, Royal Oak, Royal Sovereign and Ramillies. There were originally going to be eight but one was canceled and two were completely redesigned into the Renown-class battlecruisers.Pictured here is HMS Revenge followed by Royal Sovereign and Ramillies after exercises in the 1930's.