Lexington BC

The Martian invasion of 1901 (and its subsequent failure) resulted in a number of very significant scientific discoveries. The most important of these was the mineral cavorite, of course, which permitted vessels to shield themselves from the effects of gravity. The second was the alloy the Martian vessels' hulls were made from - the Germans were the first to duplicate this, naming it 'Wasserstahl'. Manned flight was suddenly no longer an impossibility, but swiftly becoming an everyday occurrence. The first voyager to orbit the Earth did so in 1905, and the space race was on.

The fleets of the great powers of Europe have, of course, been detailed elsewhere. The Lexington-class battlecruiser was the US Navy's first spacegoing capital ship. Armed with four ten-inch guns in twin forward turrets and a number of casemated six-inchers, this swift vessel packs a powerful punch. Like the Chesapeake class, the Lexingtons are deliberately built slightly larger than expected to provide for more supplies and crew comforts.