Q&A ยท 2:30:35-2:32:48

Six Lion-class battleships would revive early dreadnought names

A six-ship Lion programme using Revenge-class turrets was technically imaginable, but the ships would not simply duplicate the eventual HMS Vanguard.

Question

Could Britain build six Lion-class battleships by reusing Revenge-class turrets, and what might they be called?

Short answer

The idea was viable as a counterfactual, but the ships would differ from Vanguard and would probably revive names from Britain's first dreadnought generation.

Notes

The turret-reuse proposal is viable enough for a counterfactual, although the resulting ships would differ from Vanguard's completed wartime design. Vanguard is not the automatic lead name because it belonged to the earlier St Vincent group of dreadnoughts. Likely revived names include St Vincent, Collingwood, Vanguard, Bellerophon, Temeraire, and Superb, with Dreadnought as another possibility. Turret reuse and Royal Navy naming practice would therefore produce something different from six identical copies of the later Vanguard.