Star Trek: 10 Things You Need To Know About The Lost Era
5. Uhurian Legend
What was a good year for bloodwine (according to Chief O'Brien) was a great year for CAPTAIN Uhura. In 2301, she and the crew of the USS Leondegrance, a Lancelot-class ship (naturally!), had set off on a five-year mission to explore the "Lesser Magellanic Cloud" — that according to the ship's commemorative plaque as seen at a distant blur in the Star Trek: Picard episode The Star Gazer, later tweeted (and deleted) in readable definition by Trek production designer Dave Blass.
If we assume they meant 'Small' not 'Lesser' Magellanic Cloud, that raises a few questions as to how Uhura and crew travelled such vast distances in such a short space of time. Traveling to the SMC in beta canon is almost common, however. Sulu and Excelsior already went in 2298, and later, in the Titan series novel The Red King, Riker and crew took a trip there via a similar spatial rift process in 2380. Perhaps the Leondegrance did the same?
The plaque from Picard further reads that the Leondegrance was in service from 2288-2336, although we know Uhura wasn't its Captain for all that time (she was still communications officer on the soon-to-be-decommissioned Enterprise-A in 2293). The plaque also goes on to state:
The Leondegrance became an Academy training vessel in 2317, with Capt. Uhura remaining in command until her retirement in 2333. Countless Academy cadets experienced faster-than-light travel for the first time aboard the Leondegrance, which is now on permanent display in the Fleet Museum.
That canon information now contradicts the sixth novel of the Lost Era series, Catalyst of Sorrows, in which Uhura was Admiral and chief of Starfleet Intelligence in 2360!