Shipbucket

Atlantis.


Oh Atlantis, where did you go....

According to me, Atlantis went nowhere. It is still perched atop the mid-Atlantic ridge. Two major areas linked by a narrow neck of land. Four major cities with several largish towns and villages scattered around the rest of the land.

While not large, the land abounds in natural resources. Wood, Iron, Coal, Gold and Gems, all add to the legend of Atlantis being a rich land.

So, how do I wipe out the original occupants and then have the land being fought over and colonised by the major colonial powers till it can gain independence in the early 1800's?

The original Atlanteans were supposed to be an advanced peoples compared to the rest of the known world of the times. So smart people make mistakes when they try things just a little too advanced. My thought is that the Atlantean scientists are delving into all sorts of advanced 'technologies'. One of these was to improve agriculture production. Which went wrong. What they produced was a violent plague that wiped out all mamalian life on Atlantis. The plague was so virulent that it remained dormant/active for thousands of years. All visitors to Atlantis up to the early 1600's would catch the plague and die. The land had an evil reputation and was shunned.

The Dutch explorer Dirk Hartog, knowing of the evil reputation, landed three sheep (2 ewes and a ram) and a pair of goats on Atlantis, sailed to the Azores where he watered ship, then returned to Atlantis to see what had happened to the livestock landed. Sailing close inshore the sheep were spotted alive and seemingly healthy. Hartog left Atlantis and went out to Australia. A year or so later on his return trip to Holland, Hartog called int at Atlantis to see what had transpired, it was found that the three sheep had increased to eight, and the goats had also been populous. Armed with this knowledge, Hartog returned to Holland where an expedition was organised to fully explore Atlantis and claim it on behalf of the Dutch Crown. What the expedition found was a land lush in bird and insect life, trees and other flora bloomed. Mounds of decayed and rubble strewn towns and cities spoke of a once great nation. A few stone collumns hinted at once great buildings and palaces that were no more. Sifting through the rubble unearthed many fabulous items and the Dutch explorers went home very wealthy. A find like this was kept secret for about 10 minutes, and every brigand and freebooter headed for Atlantis hoping to make their fortune.

Thus starts the modern age of Atlantis. Glossing over the next 150 years, colonists from Holland, France, Spain and England all land and claim pieces of Atlantis. Wars are fought between colonists. One of the outcomes of the Battle of Trafalgar was to rid Atlantis of the French and Spanish presence, leaving the British in control. The British reigned over Atlantis for over a hundred years from 1710 until 1823 when an Atlantean Government was formed by disaffected colonists that take over with a popular revolt. The US was quick to recognise the new Government and other European powers followed suit, being happy to see Britain lose control of another piece of Empire.

As the industrial revolution kicks off , Atlantis is in a prime position to take advantage of the new technologies and keep to the Atlantean tradition of being leaders of technology. All of the requirements for being a rich land were in place. The Atlanteans knew that the only way to keep their sovereignty was to ensure that any attacker would take such losses as to make Atlantis not worth the huge expenditure that would be required to take it over. Backed with defense pacts with the US, France and eventually Britain, Atlantis was left alone to grow strong and populous.

Military spending was kept high through the late 1800's and early 1900's. Atlantis' involvement in WW1 was minimal, and was mainly in production support of the Allies. Atlantis declined to send troops to Europe. A token force of ships were sent to aid the Allies, these being split between the Channel, North Sea and Mediterrannean theaters. Atlantean strength was in its Navy (and later airforce) with the Army being enough to fight and defend the homeland.

Post-WW1, Atlantis was made a signatory to the Washington and future Naval Treaties. Like France and Italy there was some wiggle room in the Atlanteans tonnage allocations that would allow Atlantis to build new ships in the 1930's. Unlike a lot of countries Atlantis was not badly affected by the Great Depression. Atlantis had also remained relatively unscathed from the flu epidemic of the early 1920's. Atlantis had enforced a strict policy of quarantine which helped to stop the spread of the disease.

With the outbreak of War in 1939, Atlantis was in a prime position to guard the central Atlantic. Its patrol bombers and cruisers made life miserable for the Germans. Hunting groups were formed to search out and destroy the raiders. Atlantean escort groups made a huge difference to the Convoy system.

Hyperion was the shipbuilding and industrial centre of Atlantis. It eclipsed the Capital, Olympus, in size during the Industrial age. Olympus had always been the capital and the names of the largest cities were kept as per the original Atlantean names. The smaller towns and villages were named after original Atlantean places where these names could be found. Most smaller population centers had been put in place to guard the trade routes between cities and to guard the gem and gold mines.

The largest portion of the population of modern Atlantis were British, with good sized portions of Dutch, French and Spanish to make up a cosmopolitan society.

If any of the backstory sounds too much like bullshit. Too bad. It is what it is.

Yes the map comes from good old Civ 3. I still have fun playing that game.

On to the ships. The hulls are by Heuhen, with his kind permission. The artillery will be mainly French origin. The superstructure and radars will be a mixture.

Last shall be first.

Atlantis' last battleship was laid down in 1939, launched in 1942, and completed in late 1944. Christened 'Olympia', the ship was huge. 50,000 tons standard and 62,000 tons full load, 869x112 feet. Armed with 9x16" in three triple turrets, it could dish out punishment with the best of them. It could also take it, 16" of belt armour and 7" of deck armour gave a certain sense of security. The huge 180,000shp power plant drove the ship at 30 knots through four shafts. A large array of secondary and tertiary weapons gave the ship a huge anti-aircraft potential. The radar suite was comprehensive with surface and air radars for both search and targeting.




More info to come as I define the full array of Atlantean ships are drawn and what they will do in WW2. Whether they survive or sink.

Nice love the backstory

_________________
Hey, it's gotta be 5 o'clock somewhere...

Currently working on:
The October War, 27-10-1962 (apparently forever);
"Saxonverse" alt-UK;
Federation of the Channel Islands AU;
Republic of Yopur & Andaman;
some sort of overarching AU;
Regaining my sanity.

Nice start.
As for the Civ3 - I still have fun playing the original Civ1. (to me, actually the best part of the series, despite all the limitations)

AWS Artemis

First of Atlantis' modern warships. It had taken Atlantis 50 years to gain the experience necessary to start building large warships. The change from wooden to steel hulls helped as working with steel did not require the same experienced artisans that wood did. Several smaller ships were built while the Hyperion dockyards and shipbuilding industry were enlarged to be able to handle building bigger and yet bigger ships.

The Artemis was 348x68 feet and 9500 tons. The armament of 2x12" and 6x6.4" was a good first trial of the new gun foundries. Atlantis would learn many things in a short period of time to improve their ships to the stage where they were as good as any in the world.

Great job with the ships and also very interesting backstory.

_________________
kike-92

An interesting AU, it will be good to see what comes up here.

_________________
Hood's Worklist
English Electric Canberra FD
Interwar RN Capital Ships
Super-Darings
Never-Were British Aircraft

AWS Sapphire

The four Gem class protected cruisers were important ships to the future wealth of Atlantis. Their primary role was as trade protection cruisers, but twice a year two of the ships would be loaded with the gold and gem production that would be sent for sale to London and Holland. It would take a powerful force to intercept these 'wealth' runs.

The Gems were 365x58 feet and 5,500 tons displacement. 10,000hp triple expansion engines gave the ships a 20 knot maximum speed. Armour was limited to a 2" deck, while the magazines and other vitals also had 2" armour protection in a box system. The armament was strong with 6x6.4" in single turrets and 8x75mm guns. Four submerged 18" torpedo tubes were also fitted.



During WW1 the four Gems were mainly used as convoy escorts. Two were seconded to RN service and were used as escorts to the North Atlantic convoys. The other two initially spent time in the South Atlantic hunting German Merchant raiders. Once those were cleared, the two ships covered convoys from Atlantis to Gibraltar.

One ship of the class was lost, the Diamond, which was torpedoed by a U-boat 50 miles west of Gibraltar. The other three ships were scrapped in the early 1920's.

1898 and the Atlantean Government passes the Naval Acquisition Act. The Act was to have built, 4 Battleships, 2 Armoured cruisers, and 4 Scout Cruisers. Atlantis knew that they could not hope to keep up with the building power of the British, Germans and other Great powers. What they had to do was to build the best ships they could. The Atlanteans also had an edge in optical equipment. The crystal and glass that they produced was second to none. It was also during this time that their mechanical genius Alexander Vermuyden came to the fore.

Hyperion Class Battleships.

The Hyperion class ships were equivalent to the British King Edward VII class (what were to become known as semi-Dreadnoughts), but where the Hyperions differed is that the secondary armament used did not produce the problems with splash identification that the British and French had. They used 9.2" and 9.4" where the Atlanteans used a 7.5" gun. With 4x12" and 10x7.5" it was well armed. What also set these ships apart from their contemporaries was in the power plant (see below). The Atlanteans had stolen a march in the turbine stakes and fitted a 20,000shp plant that pushed the Hyperions through the water at a very respectable 20 knots. A good 2-3 knots faster than their peers.




Weapon Class Scout Cruisers.

The Weapon class cruisers introduced the 5.5" gun to the Atlantean Navy and this gun would arm all of its light cruisers till after WW1. Where the British and German cruisers of the time were armed with 4" and 4.1" guns. Fitted with the new turbine installations designed by Vermuyden, a 22,000shp unit pushed the ships along at 28 knots. The only armour, like other ships of the type, was a 1 1/2 inch deck. For the first time in ships of the AWS the torpedo armament received more than a token fitting with 4 twin trainable mountings.




Alexander Vermuyden 1868-1940

Joins Atlantean Navy as boy cadet at 12 years old. At age 15 Alex was put in charge of a motor pinnace as part of his cadetship. Alex rebuilt the motor to give it 25% more power and where he received a commendation in his service record from the Captain and Chief Engineer, the Boatswain tore a strip off him, telling Alex the next time he wanted to play with one of 'his' boats he better ask first. A salutary lesson at both ends of the scale. At age 17 he was made acting-Midshipman which was confirmed on his 18th birthday. Alex's bent for things engineering sent him off to the R&D Engineering section where he spent the next two years learning all he could and suggesting tweaks that improved various mechanical items. Now a sub-Lieutenant, Alex was sent to England to learn from the best. Seconded to Parsons, Alex learnt and then assisted Charles Parsons with the design and building of the first turbines. Now 1895 and the 27 year old Enineering Commander Alexander Vermuyden is recalled to Atlantis to design and build the Atlantean Navies first turbine engines to be mounted in the new ships ordered under the Naval Acquisition Act.

The Hyperion is an intermediate dreadnought worthy of the name!