Adequate Protection but Odd Layout

Before World War Two fully broke out, and all restrictions on battleship displacement and naval gun sizes were abandoned, two unique battleships were created:  the British HMS Nelson and the French Richelieu.

Both these ships featured non-standard arrangement of their primary naval guns:  they were all mounted forward of the main superstructure, with no ability to fire aft at all.  The key requirement here was to limit the amount of hull form that needed to be protected by armour, thereby limiting the overall displacement, whilst maximising protection.  Even so, both battleships were still formidable opponents:  as HMS Nelson featured nine 16 inch guns in three triple turrets; with Richelieu featuring eight 15 inch guns in two quadruple turrets.

I think that Richelieu was a much better looking/capable ship, as Nelson's aft-most turret was unable to fire directly forwards; where as the twin super-imposed turrets of Richelieu, did not encounter this problem.

Too Many Naval Guns

The race to build the most powerful battleship was often at "logger heads" with various international treaties/agreements, that aimed to restrain the overall displacement and maximum naval gun size that could be fitted to a battleship.  This helped to give rise to three battleships that were somewhat different to others:  HMS Agincourt, IJN Fuso and USS Wyoming.

As can be seen in the above photographs, each battleship aimed to meet one requirement:  the maximum amount of fire power on the smallest possible displacement.  Agincourt had fourteen 12 inch guns in seven twin turrets.  Fuso had twelve 14 inch guns in six twin turrets.  Wyoming had twelve 12 inch guns in six twin turrets.

Unfortunately, there was a problem with such arrangements; all three battleships had to be considerably long to fit the high number of turrets in, which meant that their armour plating was "too spread out", and were often simply regarded as "floating magazines", that could explode at any moment.  Despite this, there was an advantage to a high number of turrets.  Assuming you had adequate control of the gun crews, such a battleship could engage several targets at the same time.

Two 18 Inch Gun Battleships

The IJN Yamato was not the only battleship to have wielded 18 inch guns, nor was Japan the first nation to develop such a large navy gun.  The 18 inch "gun size" milestone really belongs to the Royal Navy, which in 1917 commissioned HMS Furious.

HMS Furious was originally designed to carry two eighteen inch guns: with one barrel in each turret.  Unfortunately, she was too "light" a vessel to cope with the stresses that were generated when the guns were fired, and as such, was soon converted into an aircraft carrier.

Twenty four years later, the Japanese were also to learn important lessons about the firing of 18 inch guns, when IJN Yamato was completed.  In this case, each turret featured three 18.1 inch gun barrels, and it was found that the "blast effects" were very extreme when they were fired.  Now, although Yamato was "heavy" enough to cope with these stresses, exposed personnel certainly were not!  This meant that deck-mounted anti-aircraft guns had to be shielded.

Battleship Armour Matches Guns

Generally speaking, a battleship was expected to have armour to match that of its guns:  if it fired 16 inch shells, it's armour should be able to defeat incoming 16 inch shells.

This was a much harder requirement to meet for battleships that had been left over from world war one, or had been built between the two world wars.

The British learnt this lesson the hard way, when for example, HMS Hood was lost to the German Bismarck.

Unlike the American South Dakota class, HMS Hood did not feature 6 inch deck armour, instead only having a maximum of 3 inch deck armour.

As world war two progressed, it was to be seen that even 9 inch deck armour (as found in the IJN Yamato), was to be proved in-sufficient.

Battleship Building Frenzy

The attack on Pearl Harbor, caused a battleship building frenzy within the US.  A direct result of this was the rapid completion of the four South Dakota class battleships.

Although featuring the same armament as the North Carolina's (nine 16 inch guns and twenty 5 inch guns), the South Dakota class was "on paper" an improvement over the North Carolina's, because they were designed to withstand hits from 16 inch shells (where as the North Carolina's protection was limited to 14 inch shells).  This resulted in a shortened hull form/superstructure area, most "visible" in the single funnel (where North Carolina had two).

In iron sight, it appears that the North Carolina's were better ships to have served on, as they were not "half as cramped".

WW2 Battleship Pacific Workhorse

For me, the USS North Carolina was the main "work horse" of world war two (in the Pacific).

There's a very good reason for this:  both her and her sister (USS Washington) were completed early in 1941, meaning they were available immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941).

They were also the first class to feature nine sixteen inch guns (in the standard two fwd one aft turret arrangement).  They were also the first battleships built by the US after the "Washing Treaty" building holiday expired, and were a vast improvement over earlier vessels.