In Britain’s last pre-dreadnought classes, the King Edward VIIs and the Lord Nelsons the secondary armament was increased to 9.2-inch guns. Main armament as four 12-inch guns, with some dozen 6-inch weapons as secondary armament, mounted in most cases in casemates.
Powered by triple expansion engines of 12 to 18,000 horsepower, top speeds were in the range of 17.5 to 20 knots. In the Royal Navy, pre-dreadnought designs had been all but standardised since the mid- 1890s – vessels of typically 15,000 tons and 400 to 450 feet in length. The launch of HMS Dreadnought in 1905 made all other battleships afloat into “Pre-Dreadnoughts” overnight, incapable of fighting in the battle line with the new “all big-gun” battleship and her successors. The Royal Navy’s Pre-Dreadnoughts’ Sacrifice
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