The Geography of the European Dreadnought Race: 1884

ABSTRACT
The Geography of the
European Dreadnought Race:
1884-1919
William D. Walters, Jr.
Professor
The launching of HMS Dreadnought
in 1906 is sometimes regarded as the
start of the warship building race preceding World War One and is often seen
as one of the causes of that war. In fact,
the European battleship building race
goes back to the 1880s. Most of the
countries of Europe participated in some
way in this race, which involved significant transfer of technology from the
more developed to the less developed
countries of Europe. Spain, Italy and
Russia received significant aid from armaments firms in northern and western
Europe. During the period before the war,
battleships dominated naval thinking and
were the subject of intense popular interest. Three historical periods of battleship launchings between 1884 and 1919
show the changing relative importance
of European building locations. In addition to economics, shipbuilding locations were often influenced by strategic
factors and internal political considerations. British production shifted northward and the North Sea became increasingly
important
in
German
production.
KEW WORDS : economic geography, shipbuilding, technology transfer, naval armaments race, Europe.
Department of Geography-Geology
Illinois State University
Normal, IL 61761 -6901
The tens of thousands of people who
had assembled at Portsmouth Navy Yard
on Saturday, February 10, 1906, to watch
the launch of HMS Dreadnought expected English weather at its worst. On
the preceding night a rapidly moving Atlantic low pressure cell brought near-gale
force winds to the ancient seaport town .
Morning found the crowds braving driving rain and temperatures in the low 30s
as they made their way to the sight of
the launch . Fortunately, as noon approached, the rain ceased and sunshine
broke through scattered clouds above the
English Channel; the day remained raw
and blustery, but at least the spectators
would be dry. They fortified themselves
by singing as the band played Rule Britania and Swaunee River until the official ceremonies began and the KingEmperor ascended the high platform at
the bow of the ship to join a thousand
45
specially invited guests and launch what
would become perhaps the best known
warship in the world. It took Edward VII
two trys before he managed to break the
flower-covered bottle of colonial wine
over the stem of the revolutionary vessel. Everyone cheered as the battleship
slowly gathered speed and slid toward
the dark water. No one seemed to doubt
their presence at a history making event.
The launch of the HMS Dreadnought
is sometimes seen as the blow which set
in motion a worldwide naval arms race
which many see as a major contributary
cause to the First World War (Fig . 1). In
fact, the dreadnought phase was only the
last and most intensive manifestation of
a process which had been underway for
many years. As revolutionary as the new
battleship seemed at the time, its building was in many respects the inevitable
consequence of events which had their
beginning in the 1880s. Like other striking events in history, this naval arms race
can not be fully understood unless it is
seen in its proper geographical context.
This paper examines the geography of
European battleship construction between 1884 and 1919 and argues that this
geography is important in understanding the economic development at turnof-the-century Europe.
BATTLESHIPS AND THEIR BUILDERS
Never before or since has a single
class of warships dominated naval
thinking as battleships did in the years
before World War I and only rarely has
any single weapons system so captured
the popular imagination. Both layman
and expert regarded naval power as
countable and countable in terms of bat-
Figure 1. HMS Dreadnought, the warship which focused increased public attention
on the growing naval armaments race. (Courtesy of the United States Naval Institute).
46
tleships. Naval opinion held that naval
battles would be decided by the number
of first-class vessels which each side
could place in the line of battle. In Germany Alfred von Tirptz, the man who
more than any other responsible for the
development of the Kaiser's new navy,
revived the old term Linienschiffe, Shipof-the-Line, for a new generation of battleships. When the London Times of
January 22, 1907, quoted Lord George
Hamilton, " our supremacy at sea must
after all be measured by the number of
battleships we could put into the line,"
his was a general, if not quite universally held opinion (January 22, 1907, p.
8b). A quick comparison of the percentage of pages devoted to battleships in
any 1914 naval annual , such as Jane 's
Fighting Ships, with issues from 20, 40
or 60 years later, demonstrates the exceptional way in which battleships dominated pre-World War I navies.
Certainly the apparent countability of
naval strength was an important factor
in explaining popular willingness to expend staggering sums on battleship
construction. The press was filled with
seemingly endless debates about how
many battleships a potential enemy was
really constructing. Sinister tales of secret construction projects in shrouded
shipyards were standard fare in the prewar press of Europe ; tonnage, guns, armor, speed , and rate of construction of
enemy warships were all exaggerated in
the popular journals. Indeed, one of the
most intriguing and economically significant aspects of the great battleship race
is the extent to which the people were
willing to make staggering sacrifices for
major warship construction .
The term " social energy" is sometimes used to describe this kind of economic behavior. Former British Prime
M inister Arthur Balfour expressed his
enthusiasm for more battleships in this
way to cheering crowds on October 19,
1910, "I say no pedantries of finance
ought to allow us to stand in the way of
carrying out a policy on which the future
of our whole finance depends." (Times,
October 10, 1910, p. 7a.) The modern
British Death Dues, taxes on estates
which fell almost entirely on the very
wealthy and which were perhaps more
responsible than any other single cause
for reducing the power of the then ruling classes, were instituted in 1894
largely to pay for expanded battleship
construction . In Turkey, school children
took up contributions to pay for the purchase of a foreign built battleship. In 1908
the speaker of the Reichstag returned to
report that the enthusiasm for the arms
race could be felt even in the remotest
village in Thurengia . (Times, June 16,
1908, p. 8d.) A correspondant of the
London Times felt compelled to remind
readers that popular demands for new
battleship construction were just as
strong in Bavaria as they were in the
coastal cities of Germany (Times, Janu ary 23, 1908, p. 9f).
Although sometimes seen as primarily an Anglo-German arms race, the battleship mania was, in fact, worldwide. In
Europe, only the very smallest states
failed to join the race. Even Portugal had
plans for dreadnought construction. Figure 2 shows each of the participating
states. The economic impact of battleship construction was staggering , particularly so for countries like Italy, Spain,
Russia, and Austro-Hungary who were
in the take-off stage of economic
development.
Clive Trebilcock (1969) has made some
estimates of the importance of warship
expenditures on national economies
emphasing the total amount spent and
the importance "spin-off" in national
economic
development.
Trebilcock
stresses that arms expenditures at this
period were critical to the industrialization of many European countries. For
example, he points to a Spanish naval
contract first advertised in 1908. Foreign
firms were invited to Spain to develop
industries equal to the highest modern
standards. The British consortium which
ultimately won the contract did much to
develop Spanish naval, metallurgical, and
machine building industries, particularly
at EI Ferrol and Cartagena. The shipyard
developed with British assistance at EI
Ferrol built three Spanish dreadnoughts.
(Trebilcock, 1973.)
Trebilcock also provides some insight
into the huge sums of money involved.
47
•
~
Dome.tic Production
Dome.tic Production:
l.fm Some Aaalatance
nmm Dome. tic Production:
UillllJ Subs tantial AsslatsJlc<l
~ Ordered From Abroad
~
Projected
Figure 2. Battleship production and orders. Only the smaller European states were
not involved in the struggle to acquire battleships.
The Spanish 1906-1914 naval construction program amounted to staggering
two percent of the entire Spanish national income for 1906. For Italy similar
programs were 2.4 percent of the national income and for Russia 3.3 percent. While none of the figures for developing European countries come close
the Japanese battleship construction,
which Trebilcock estimates at a 10.3 percent of the 1903 national income, they
are incomparably greater than these
states had spent before the battleship
race and large enough to have a significant and lasting economic impact.
The skills learned in the great rush to
complete battleships were for the most
part transferable to other industries. This
is particularly true of precision metal
working (Trebilcock, 1969). Grand Adm iral Tirpitz (1919, I, 193) makes this
point when he writes of the engineering
skills developed in the navy which were
transfered to civilian occupations. It is
important to remember that turn-of-thecentury shipbuilding was an extremely
48
labor intensive activity. In 1914 the
Armstrong-Whitworth yards near Newcastle-on-Tyne, had 25,000 workers including those at associated steel works
and ordinance facilities. On the west
coast of England the Vickers works at
employed
some
Barrow-in-Furness
16,000 workers. (Jane's, 1914, 22.) The
major private German yards engaged in
battleship construction (as will be seen
later, government owned shipyards were
also producing battleships) had over
50,000 workers in 1914 (Jane's, 1914,
108-109). Of course, not all of these
workers were engaged in the construction of battleships, but the building of
large first-line warships occupied a very
substantial portion of their effort. Even
though guns and armor were usually
made in other locations, such facilities
were few in number and operated on a
very large scale. In turn-of-the-century
Europe great sums of money and vast
amounts of technical effort were being
funneled into a very limited number of
locations. This would have lasting geographical consequences.
MAPPING BATTLESHIP
CONSTRUCTION
Before examining the maps which
show the changing geography of European battleship construction something
must be said about the data which were
used and their limitations. The data used
reflect the 297 battleships launched for
the fleets of European countries between 1884 and 1921. Information on
their construction has been gathered
from a number of sources (Jane's, various dates; Gibbons, 1983; Parkes, 1966;
Preston, 1972; Silverstone, 1984; Tomitch, 1968; Weyer, 1905 and 1918). The
small number of battleships built in European yards and actually delivered to
non-European states have been excluded as have instances where such
ships were begun but never reached the
stage of launching . Some of the ships
launched were never completed. Some
ships, especially at the very end of the
period were launched simply to clear the
building ways with no intention of ever
finishing them. However, the fact that a
battleship reached the point where it
could be launched indicates that a substantial amount of work had been done
and therefore prevents a serious undercounting for countries where military or
political problems prevented a large
number of ships from ever entering service. To aid in comparisons all maps
show 1914 boundaries.
By 1884 the use of the term battleship had become fairly standardized. This
investigation generally follows the practice of the followed at the time. That is,
it includes both battleships and battlecrusiers-the later group being as large
and expensive as battleships with similar main armament but usually with
somewhat greater speed and thinner armor. Marginal cases have required individual decisions with which some may
disagree. For example, although the
Netherlands officially rated the Zeven
Provincien and the Heemskerck as "battleships" they were one third the size of
contemporary battleships, with proportionately slower speed and smaller ar-
mament and were of less fighting value
than many crusiers launched in the same
year. They have been excluded along
with similar coast defense "battleships"
built in Scandanavia. These exclusions
are in accord with practice in most referenced material.
While most of the work on the battleships was done at the building yard,
substantial parts were often manufactured at other locations. The most important of these were the complex main
armament turret mechanisms which
stretched deep into the hull of the ship
and which were, in fact, the whole reason for its existence. Construction of a
set of guns and gun turrets would generally take as long as the construction of
the hull and the engines of the ship; the
rate at which these guns and turrets
could be produced generally was the
most critical factor in determining the
speed of battleship construction. Frequently such mechanisms were produced at locations far removed from the
shipyards. The Germans centralized all
such work at the Krupp works at Essen
in the Rhur Valley. The Royal and Imperial Austro-Hungarian Navy was largely
supplied with guns from the Skoda works
in what is now Czechoslovakia . Engines
were often constructed by the builders,
but it was also quite common for a separate concern, usually another major
shipyard and sometimes one located in
a quite different part of the country, to
supply this part of the battleship's essential equipment. Other items, from armor plate to fuel oil lines to icemaking
machines, would be drawn from
hundreds of manufacturers which might
be widely scattered.
When looking at the maps it must always be remembered that the European
armaments industry of this period was
integrated in such a way that technology
flowed very quickly from one country to
another. British armaments were the
technical guarantors and sponsors of almost all Spanish and Italian warship
builders and were deeply involved in
Russian warship and armaments firms .
French firms were deeply involved in
Russian enterprises. The Krupp firm had
become a major stockholder in the Aus49
tro-Hungarian Skoda works . Patents and
technologies were quickly shared , even
among potential rivals. One of the major
technological
innovations
of
HMS
Dreadnought was her revolutionary
steam tubine propulsion : within a year
and a half of HMS Dreadnought's com missioning the British firm of Parsons
which had developed the turbines, had
sold licenses to produce such turbines
to the German Admiralty (June 17; 1908,
4) .
The battlesh ips included were either
constructed directly by governments or
by private shipyards. In the earlier years
government navy yards dominated battleship construction, but w ith the passage of time private yards became more
important. This transition would have
some importance in the location of battleship construction , but it is important
to remember that navy yards and private builders engaged in battleship construction were interrelated at several
levels. Warsh ip plans were almost al ways the responsibility of government
bod ies and government inspectors were
present at private yards . Encouragement, and frequently subsidation of privately owned shipbuilding firms was
common
policy
among
European
governments.
THE CHRONOLOGY OF
BATTLESHIP PRODUCTION
Figure 3 shows the number of battleships launched at two year intervals from
1884 to 1921 . While there are fluctuations, the overall trend is clear : from 1884
to 1914 the number of launchings rose
from about 12 every two years in the
1880s to over 30 just before the outbreak of World War I. Once the fighting
had started the number of launchings
dropped. This drop was due to several
factors . Foremost was the generally held
belief that the war would be so short that
sh ips under construction would play no
role . Resources were therefore diverted
to uses where they could more immediately influence the struggle. Second
was a much clearer definition of what the
alignments would be. For example, once
the French were certain that the Royal
Navy would be fighting at their side, they
50
brought a halt to virtually all heavy warship construction . Only later, after the
lessons of early fighting had been
learned, did the vulnerability of battleships to underwater attack by mines and
torpedos begin to impact on battleship
construction .
In examining Figure 3 it must be remembered that launchings reflect decisions made several years previously .
Contemporary legend has it that HMS
Dreadnought was ready in 366 days after construction was begun , but this is
an exaggeration . The British were often
able to build battleships is less than two
years. The Germans took a little longer,
and the French, Ital ians, Russians might
take up to five years. To this t ime must
be added the lag between the time of the
political decision to begin construction
and the time work actually began. Thus,
the chart reflects events two or more
years before the date of launching .
Figure 3 and the maps that follow
(Figures 4, 5, 6 and 7) are based on the
number of ships launched. An alternate
approach would be to use tons launched.
Such numbers would reflect the same
general pattern but would be more
heavily skewed toward the later years.
At the start of the period under consid eration the average battleship displacement was about 9,000 tons . However, by
1905 it had risen to 13,000 tons, and by
the middle of the war displacement was
over 32,000 tons. The size of ships reflected, in part, the geographical position of the country involved. The Italians
and Austro-Hungarians could build for
the milder weather conditions of the
Mediterranean. The German fleet was
primarily designed for Baltic or North Sea
operations where extended range was
not a primary consideration . On the other
hand, the Royal navy, which had to plan
for worldwide operations, placed more
emphasis on range and sea-keeping
qualities. Therefore, in any given year,
British ships were somewhat larger than
their contemporaries .
1884-1895: BRITAIN AND GERMANY
Figure 4 shows construction during the
early years of the battleship race . Overall British dominance is clear, but al -
EUROPEAN BATTLESHIPS LAUNCHED
1884 - 1921
~ .----------------------------------.
30
C/)
Il.
I
C/)
LL
o
25
20
II:
W
~ 15
::::>
z
10
5
85
87
89
91
93
95
97
99
1
5
9
13
17
21
3
7
11
15
19
YEAR
FIGURE 3. The number of battleships launched between 1884 and 1921 . The increase in the early years is even more dramatic when the steady growth in size and
cost are considered .
ready the Germans have become important players, and Russian production ,
especially in the St. Petersburg yards, is
significant. However, the British share of
battleship production would never come
close to its complete dominance of merchant ship production. In 1895 British
yards accounted for 78 percent of all the
world 's shipbuilding (Pollard and Robertson , 1979) but only were accounting
for only about half of the world's battleship launchings. Most of the yards which
eventually built battleships were already
showing some signs of activity, but as
will be seen, a number of the shipbuilding locations later dropped from
production .
The pattern of battleship building in
the British Isles was distinctive and
changed greatly in subsequent periods.
Figure 4 reveals that concentration in
1884-1895 was focused in southern England. At this time merchant ship production had shifted overwhelmingly to
northern yards, Tyneside and the Clyde
yards which were producing tramp
steamers and specialized merchant vessels at unprecedented rates. However,
warship production remained stubbornly in the south . This southern concentration reflected a high percentage of
all battleships built in navy yards . Historically Chatham on the Thames had
been the fitting out and repair yard for
battle damaged vessels from the English
Channel to Scotland while the Portsmouth or the Devonport yards handled
the same functions for the south coast.
(Pollard and Robertson, 1979). During this
period the southern navy yards Chatham ,
Portsmouth and Pembroke in south
Wales, dominated British battleship con struction. Earlier in the century const ruction in navy yards had been regarded as
inefficient and overly expensive, but by
this period costs were probably not much
different than in private yards (Pollard
and Robertson , 1979).
There was some construction of British battleships by private builders during the 1884-1895 period such as at the
Thames Iron Works. The various Clyde
51
1884-1895
Seale
1
•
2
•
3
•
4
•
5
•
6
•
7
••
8
g
RUSSI A
ATLAIfl'IC
OCEAN
••
10
e
_
11
12
13
Figure 4. Distribution and number of battleship constructed between 1884 and 1895.
Most locations later to be important have already entered the battleship business.
1896-1907
Seale
1
2
3
•
•
•
4
5
6
•
•
8.•
7
g
10
11
RUSSIA
ATLAIfl'IC
OCEAN
•
••
e
13 _
12
Figure 5. Distribution and number of battleship constructed between 1896 and 1907.
Some change in production are already evident such as a northward shift in Britain.
52
1908-1919
Scal.
1
2
3
•
•
4
•
5
•
6
•
7
•
8.9.
10.
11e
e
13_
12
FIGURE 6. Distribution and number of battleship constructed between 1908 and 1919.
A growing intensity of production and a change in locations from the 1884-1895
period are evident.
Total 1884-1919
Scal.
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
22
•
•
•
••
RUSSIA
••
•
•_
•
FIGURE 7. Summary of battleship production and distribution from 1884 to 1919.
The effort involved was immense in terms of volume and in geographical scope.
53
and Tyneside yards were expressing a
growing interest in warship production,
but several centers were notable for their
inactivity. The great shipbuilding town
of Belfast was already well established
wit h the firm of Harland and Wolff gaining fame as a producer of passenger liners, but the yards of Northern Ireland
while later producing some large warships, were destined never to be a majo r contributor to the great battleship
race. Also missing were the Irish Sea
yards at Birkenhead, across from Liverpool , and Barrow-i n-Furness; both would
later become battleship building centers.
Germany was in a very different position from England during this period.
There was no long standing tradition of
seafaring , ship construction, or naval
dominance. Therefore, the German industry was never supported by massive
mercantile construction . As late as 1905,
and inspite of extensive government
subsidies, German yards were producing only about five percent of the world's
ships (Times, January 15, 1906, p. 6). The
German navy yards at Kiel, on the east
side of the Schleswig Penninsula , and
Wilhelmshafen on the Jade estuary in the
western part of the country, were not
established until 1870 (Barker, 1906).
Moreover, while most of the British private yards were close to major steel
producing centers, German yards, both
private and naval, were far removed from
steel production. The distance from Essen in the Ruhr to Wilhelmshafen was
some 200 miles and the distance to
Hamburg, Bremen and Kiel even further.
The eastern Baltic shipbuilding centers of Stettin and Danzig were even
more poorly placed . An 1879 survey had
found that twenty to thirty percent of the
cost of iron products used in German
shipbuilding was accounted for by
transportation costs, compared to eight
to t en percent for comparable British
costs (Barker, 1906). Germany tried to
counter these costs by providing heavy
subsidies to railroads for transporting
steel, but the German industry was never
really competitive. This meant that
throughout the battleship race, warships
were always a much more important part
54
of the total shipbuilding program in Germany than in England .
The old Prussian navy had been centered in the Baltic Sea with its major yard
at Danzig (now Gdansk in Poland). But
the Danzig yard was long past its prime
and would later be described as the
" scrap yard of the navy" (Times, June
16, 1908, p. 7). Still a glance at Figure 4
shows the extent to which the Baltic Sea
dominated early German battleship production . At Bredow near Stettin (now
Szczecin in Poland) Franz Fruchtenicht
and Franz Wilhelm Brock had expanded
their Vulcan works from a builder of railroad engines to an important naval and
commercial shipyard. At Danzig the
Schichau works had launched their first
gunboat in 1879 and soon after moved
into the battleship business. But Kiel was,
and would remain the heavyweight of
Baltic shipbuilding. Here, in addition to
Germany's most productive naval shipyard, was the Germania works soon to
be purchased by the Krupp firm and developed into a massive naval construction facility. Kiel continued to be a key
shipbuilding location throughout the
battleship race.
In contrast to the Baltic, German North
Sea yards were as yet unimportant. The
Weser firm at Bremen launched two battleships before 1895 as did the navy yard
at Wilhelmshafen, but that was the extent of the activity. The firm of Blohm
and Voss across the Elbe River from
Hamburg had been established in 1877
but had not yet received battleship contracts from the German navy. In 1895 the
Imperial German Navy was infinitely
stronger than it had been 15 years before. Yet, it still was not in a position to
challenge Britain. Its production was
Baltic centered . However, roots had been
put down which would soon lead massive expansion: of the eight German
yards which would ultimately take part
in the dreadnought race, two naval and
six private yards had already begun producing battleships by 1895.
OTHER EUROPEAN NAVAL POWERS :
1884-1895
In the 1884-1895 period, four additional states were involved in European
battleship construction. They were
France, Russia, Italy, and AustriaHungary. None had the industrial resources of Great Britain or Germany, but
major warship production was to have
important political and economic consequences for them all. Each had its own
set of naval rivals and each had a distinctive geographical pattern of shipbuilding which was already well established by 1895.
The French had long been considered
the main rivals of British sea power and
at the start of this period had the second
largest European fleet. French naval
shipbuilding was concentrated in two
areas: the south side of the Brittany
Penninsula at Brest, Lorient, and St. Nazaire and on the Mediterranean Sea at
Toulon and La Seyne. Neither of these
concentrations was well located with respect to the steel producing centers of
northeastern France, but both offered
strategic advantages against the three
possible foes: Germany, Great Britain,
and Italy. Like the other major powers
the French built battleships in both privately owned yards and government facilities. Like the British, but unlike the
Germans, the French yards had considerable success in obtaining orders from
foreign navies at this period. All but one
of the French battleship builders, who
would later be important in the race, had
launched battleships before 1895. The
exception is Bordeaux which would later
play a fairly minor role in French
production.
Russia was in a unique position. In no
other country was battleship construction so heavily concentrated in a single
site. The St. Petersburg yards, both admiralty and private, dominated Russian
naval production at this period and would
continue to do so throughout the arms
race. Reval (now Tallinn in the Estonian
SSR) Riga, and Helsingfors (now Helsinki in Finland) on the Baltic produced
only minor warships. White Sea production would not assume importance until
after World War II and no major units
were constructed on the Pacific until the
1930s. Nowhere else in Europe did a
major political center also serve as a
country's dominant shipbuilding site.
Furthermore in no other country, except
Austria-Hungary, did the seacoast offer
such a limited selection of potential
shipbulding sites. In 1884-1895 Russian
naval construction relied heavily on foreign investment and technology. A British firm, John Brown, had control of the
New Admiralty Yard at Lenningrad and
one of the yards at Nikolaiev on the Black
Sea. Another British company, Vickers,
performed a similar function at the other
Nikolaiev shipyard (Polmer, 1986).
Russian Black Sea naval activities began in 1784 when a naval base and shipyard were established in the Crimea
(Palmer, 1986). By the late nineteenth
century most, but not all, major warship
construction had been shifted to the town
of Nikolaiev on the Bug River. Shipyards
here were extensively modernized with
French and British assistance and the
town has remained up to this day as a
major focus of Soviet naval construction. In the early years of the battleship
race activities on the Black Sea remained secondary to those on the Baltic
Sea, but as Turkish naval activity increased, the Russians would respond
with increased shipbuilding in their
southern ports.
Nowhere did internal political divisions more profoundly influence the location of battleship production as in the
duel monarchy of Austria-Hungary. In the
Stablemento Technico Triestino the
Austrians would soon have one of the
finest shipbuilding organizations in Europe; it was a firm whose products and
technical skill rivaled any yard in Britain,
France, or Germany. But Trieste was located on the Austrian section of the coast
and Hungarian representatives were reluctant to vote funds for warship construction unless some of the contracts
were let to companies located in Hungary. So a share of warship production
would eventually have to be diverted to
Fiume (today Rijeka in Yugoslavia) in
what was technically Hungarian territory
(Gebhard, 1968-1969). Allegations are
sometimes made that the work done in
the Hungarian yard was decidedly inferior to and slower than that done at Trieste (Gibbons, 1983).
Italy was the final European power
55
producing battleshilJs during the 18841895 period. Traditionally Italian warship construction had been in royal
dockyards, particularly Taranto and Venice. However, shipbuilding was shifting
to the east coast where modern shipyards associated with British firms were
under construction. Battleships were
launched from Venice in 1884 and again
in 1891, but the yard here was not capable of handling the construction of
large modern warships. Eventually the
focus was beginning to shift to the Naples or the Genoa area. West of Naples
the British armaments firm of Armstrong had established a modern facility
in 1886 for the construction of guns, gun
mountings, armor plate, turrets, torpedo
tubes and ammunition hoists (Van Langendonck, 1914); the Armstrong-Pozzuoli
firm worked in close conjunction with the
nearby Italian naval yard at Castlemare
to form a naval construction complex
with a potential equal to any in the world.
The Italian firm of Ansalado, established in 1853 as an engine works, was
also tooling up with British help to enter
the battleship business. In 1886 the firm
moved its chief works to La Spezia, south
of Genoa, where it had constructed five
modern slips. Like the Pozzoli works,
Ansalado had become part of the worldwide Armstrong armaments conglomerate. Eventually the works south of
Genoa would dominate the major Italian
warship building .
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENTS:
1896-1907
Figure 5 shows the location and distribution of battleship construction during the 1897-1907 period. When analyzing the map it is important to realize that
construction took place against a background of increasing international tension and increasing public interest in naval affairs. The size, gunpower, and cost
of battleships escalated dramatically. In
1896 average displacement was about
10,000 tons, roughly the size of a World
War II crusier ; by 1907, it had jumped to
16,000 tons. Admirals realized, with increasing alarm, that ships completed as
recently as 10 years before would no
longer be able to stand up in the line of
56
battle. Navy leagues continually pressured parliaments to vote larger sums
for construction. In France, Chamber of
Deputies proclaimed that if that country
did not immediately begin a new program of battleship construction, the Germans would be able to control Rotterdam, Antwerp, and Fiume on the Adriatic.
(Times, March 7,1906, p. 5). Fiction writers found a ready market for thrillers
featuring naval invasions (Marder, 1960).
The period came to a climax with the
launch of HMS Dreadnought in 1906.
Rather than the traditional four main
guns, this revolutionary British battleship seen in Figure 1 carried 10 and in
place of the usual reciprocating engines
were steam turbines which delivered
greater power, particularly at sustained
speeds. In retrospect, it is clear that many
changes embodied in HMS Dreadnought were the inevitable outcome of
developments which had been going on
for several years . The so-called "semidreadnoughts" which came before the
famous ship, were nearly as large and
powerful. However, the psychological and
political impact, when details of the new
British ship became known, are difficult
to underestimate. Older designs were
quickly abandoned. Within a few years
seven European countries, as well as the
United States and Japan, had laid down
dreadnought-type battleships. The public and politicians alike were infected with
dreadnought feve~
The location and distribution of battleship construction between 1896 and
1907 are illustrated in Figure 5. Most of
the sites producing battleships are the
same as those recorded on Figure 4.
However, some new locations and some
important shifts in relative importance
began to emerge. In the British Isles the
increased importance of northern yards,
all privately owned, was beginning to be
evident. The Clyde and Tyne yards began to increase their share of total production and a new Vickers-owned facil ity on the Irish Sea began to get a portion
of Admiralty contracts. Pembroke in
south Wales had ceased to produce battleships, but navy yards in southern En gland, such as Chatham, Portsmouth, and
Devonport, were still major builders and
some battleships were still being built at
Thames Iron Works, east of London .
In Germany, Kiel had increased its
relative dominance, while other Baltic
shipyards continued to be important.
Perhaps the most striking change was
an increase in number of ships launched
from the huge navy yard at Wilhelmshafen, a change which foreshadows the
rising importance of the North Sea in
German naval construction. Russia was
passing through the turmoil and naval
humiliation of its war with Japan and its
production remained overwhelmingly
concentrated in the various St. Petersburg yards. France and southern Europe
showed much the same pattern that they
did in the period 1884-1906. The only
new battlesh ip producing location was
at Bordeaux where the firm of Chantiers
de la Gironde had entered the French
battleship construction picture.
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENTS:
1908-1919
Figure 6 shows the European battleship race during the period 1908-1919.
The volume of construction is even more
impressive when it is remembered that
once the First World War actually began,
many countries immediately cut back on
major warship production. Fear increased and naval budgets soared . In
1908 the Russians spent 90 million rubies on their navy; by 1913 the amount
had risen to 228 million rubles (Greger,
1972). In 1910 Admiral Von Chiari of the
Austro-Hungarian Navy bluntly informed the public that unless his country approved massive new expenditures
the Royal and Imperial Navy would be
so inferior to the Italians that it would be
better off if it were entirely liquidated
(Times, October 25, 1910, p. 5). Von Chiari
and the other admirals got their way, but
only after the Magyar delegates were
promised that 36.4 percent of the money
would be spent in the Hungarian part of
the duel monarchy (Gebhard, 1968-69).
The French produced plans for a force
of 28 battleships (Wright, 1980). Above
all the Anglo-German rivalry generated
battleships in unprecedented numbers.
When Figure 6 (1908-1919) is compared with Figure 4 (1884-1895) changes
in the location of construction become
clear. In Britain production has now
shifted decisively to the northern yards.
On the Channel coast Portsmouth and
Devonport are still important, but high
labor costs have almost eliminated production in London. British battleship
production now more closely resembled
mercantile construction. German production was more heavily concentrated
in North Sea yards than ever before. In
Hamburg the firm of Blohm and Voss
which produced many of Germany's
battlecrusiers, has lead that city to the
front rank of battleship building locations. In the Baltic, Stettin dropped in
importance, but Danzig and Kiel remained major dreadnought building
centers.
In Russia, St. Petersburg still dominated, but fear of Turkish battleship purchases had lead to major Black Sea battleship production at Nikolaev. Italy,
France, and Austro-Hungary maintained
roughly the same geography but the total volume had increased at all sites. In
Spain, the British supported facilities at
EI Ferrol have, at last, begun launching
their first and only class of battleships.
Everywhere the dreadnought battleship
as both a weapon and a symbol had assumed striking importance.
CONCLUSIONS
The combined battleship production
throughout the 1884-1919 period is illustrated on Figure 7. The map reflects
two factors. The overall economic
strength of the various countries and the
relative importance which they attached
to naval strength. England dominates the
total picture and has devoted a far greater
percentage of her total armaments budget to her navy compared to other European powers. In this respect Britain
more closely resembled the United States
or Japan than the continental powers.
Still, the volume of battleship production throughout Europe was impressive.
Even countries like Russia and AustroHungary with limited sea coast's and no
overseas colonies devoted significant
funding to major warship construction .
In two respects the European battleship race had important lasting conse57
quences. The first was economic spin-off;
the skills developed by the intense national will to produce battleships could
often be transferred to other forms of industrial production. The second is the
remarkable continuity shown by the battleship producing locations. Battleships
constituted a far smaller percentage of
total naval construction in the 1920s,
1930s, and 1940s than they had in earlier years, but the same cities arid shipyards for the most part continued as
shipbuilding centers in later years. The
only locations producing battleships in
the years just before 1914 which are not
important before World War II, are Danzig, which was dumped into political
limbo by the Treaty of Versailles, and
Stettin, and Pola. Trieste was transferred
to Italy, but produced numerous major
warships for Mussolini in the 1930s. Even
today with naval budgets in most European countries greatly reduced and the
shipbuilding
environment
European
moribund, a substantial part of the remaining production comes from locations which were important in the years
of the great dreadnought race.
REFERENCES
Barker, J . E. 1906. Shipbuilding and Shipping
Industries of Germany. Contemporary,
89 :324-329.
Jane's Fighting Ships. Various dates. Sampson Low Marston, London.
Gebhard, L. A. 1968-1969. Austria-Hungary's
Dreadnought Squadron : the Naval Outlay
of 1911. Austrian History Yearbook, 4-5 :
245-258.
Gibbons, T. 1983. The Complete Encyclopedia of Battleships: A Technical Directory of
58
Capital Ships from 1860 to the Present Day.
Crescent, New York.
Greger, R. 1972. The Russian Fleet: 1914-1917.
Trans. Jill Gearing ; Ian Alan , London .
Marder, A. 1960. From Dreadnought to Scapa
Flow: The Royal Navy in the Fisher Era,
1904-1979. Vol. 1 The Road to War. Oxford
University Press, London .
Parkes, O. 1966. British Battleships : A History
of Design Construction and Armament. Revised ed.; Seeley Service & Co., London .
Pollard, S. and Robertson, P. 1979. The British Shipbuilding Industry: 1870-1914. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA and
London.
Pol mar, N. 1986. Guide to the Soviet Navy 4th
ed.; Naval Institute Press, Annapolis.
Preston, Anthony. 1972. Battleships of World
War I: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of the
Battleships of al/ Nations. Stackpole, Harrisburg, PA.
Silverstone, P. 1984. Directory of the World's
Capital Ships. Hippocrene, New York.
Times. Various Dates. London Times.
Tirpitz, A. 1919. My Memoirs. 2 vols ; Dodd,
Mead and Company, New York.
Tomitch, V. 1968. Warships of the Imperial
Russian Navy Vol. 1 Battleships B. T. Publishers, San Francisco.
Trebilcock, C. 1973. British Armaments and
European Industrialization, 1890-1914. Economic History Review, 26(1} :254-272.
Trebilcock, C. 1969. Spin-Off in British Economic History : Armaments and European
Industrialization, 1890-1914. Economic History Review, 22(3} :474- 490.
Van Langendonck, C. 1914. The Armstrong Pozzuoli Works (Italy) . Engineering Magazine, 47:849- 856.
Weyer, B. 1905 and 1918. Taschenbuch der
Kriegsflotten. Vols. 6 and 19; C. F. Lehmann's, Munich .
Wright, C. 1980. The French Naval Building
Program of 1915. Warship International,
17(1}:14-23.
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