Hi all,
I'd like to discuss my idea for a battleship for Poland (in semi-historical setting). I am aware that there was no way to fit a BB in Polish budget in thirties, but let's strech it a bit
Do you think a such a refit was feasible? What would you change?
Background: One of the Mackensen-class BCs, SMS Graf Spee was built in shipyard in Gdańsk (Danzig). When the Ist World War ended, the ship was supposedly 12 months from completion. It was scrapped during 1919-1920.
My idea for this drawing is that Polish diplomats managed to obtain the hull of this ship as part of split of HSF in Versailles treaty. Throughout 1920s it stayed either in Gdańsk or somewhere along the Polish coast (Hel?) as a naval hulk ORP Bałtyk (replacing real ORP Bałtyk - disarmed french cruiser D'Entrecasteaux bought by Polish Navy in 1927).
In 1935, after signing a deal with British yard J. Samuel White in Cowes for the construction of four large destroyers* (future OORP Grom, Błyskawica, Huragan and Orkan) Department of the Navy began lobbying for further increase in funding, pointing to the threat of Soviet battleships and cruisers to newly built coastal infrastructure. At some point an idea appeared to finish construction of Bałtyk as a cheapest method of obtaining a ship that could fit the role. Those ideas were undoubtedly influenced by reconstructions of WWI vintage battleships that began in both UK and Italy. At first, the idea was rejected, even though questions were sent to French and British yards for drafts and costs. Over the next months enough popular support for the idea of Polish Battleship was gathered (along with some funds) that finally in autumn Government decided to yield to those demands and funding was secured. A British yard was chosen, and construction started in January 1936.
Completely new propulsion plant was fitted – Admiralty three drum boilers and Parsons turbines allowing her to reach 30-31kts. Bow was lengthened by new 10m long part added on top of old bow to increase L/B ratio and cover torpedo tube port in the original bow. Other underwater torpedo tubes were also removed and plated over, their compartments subdivided to remove the risk they posed in case of damage.
Deck armour was strengthened from 80mm(3,1in) to 5in over the magazines and 3,5in over the machinery spaces.
As the barbettes were already in place, new gun turrets needed to fit those (Mackensens were supposed to use 35cm guns). Proper 14in guns were just picked as armament of new British battleships (future King George V class) so a deal was made to use adapted twin turret that was planned for those ships. 16 dual-purpose QF 4.5in Mark III guns in twin BD Mark II mountings were fitted as secondary armament and heavy AA battery.
Light AA was composed of 10 twin 40mm Bofors guns and some twin 13,2mm Hotchkiss AAMGs as those were standard AA guns used by Polish navy at the time.
The plane is PZL-46 Sum, a prototype dive bomber built for the Polish Army in 1938, IRL it was used for tests and scheduled for series construction when the war broke out. I would love to use it as spotter for my BC, as PZL-46/hydro, Only I need to fit a catapult somewhere - either rotating catapult and a crane aft or cross deck catapult between turret V and X. Or maybe you can propose some better position I had not spotted?
*In reality the two latter were planned for construction in Poland starting from 1939.
![[ img ]](https://i.imgur.com/GR808x6.png)
(probable french or british or US design)