Contemporary British material called the Hawkins class light cruisers despite their later importance to heavy-cruiser history. The 1922 treaty set a maximum of 8-inch guns and 10,000 tons for cruisers, using this recent British design as a practical reference point. The Royal Navy still had armoured cruisers and battlecruisers while it assessed the First World War, so it had not yet needed to build its proposed heavy-cruiser designs. That origin matters because the Royal Navy’s own idea of a true heavy cruiser was much larger than the treaty type that followed.
Chapter · 1:39-3:12
Hawkins class and the cruiser limits
The Hawkins class explains why the Washington Treaty’s cruiser ceiling followed a British wartime design even though the Royal Navy did not regard it as a true heavy cruiser.