Hermes was a promising launch platform, but completion remained distant and too few ships were being ordered. Her design ancestry reached back to 1912 and earlier semi-private projects. Naval officers and constructors could ask private naval architects to investigate future requirements while official staff concentrated on ships needed immediately. Existing construction business gave shipyards an incentive to undertake some design work without direct funding for that project. The Admiralty could not yet make a convincing case to the government because it lacked a sufficiently developed proposal. A carrier requirement needed to explain how the aircraft would operate and how many the ship should carry. Those answers required work before an attractive general idea could become a credible procurement request.
Notable Point · 18:31-22:38
Semi-private design work prepares a carrier procurement case
The design roots of Hermes show naval officers and private yards developing proposals before the Admiralty could explain what it wanted to buy.