Ten aviso planned, 9 completed 1931-39: Bougainville, Amiral Charner, Dumont d’Urville, D’Entrecasteaux, La Grandière, D’Iberville, Rigault de Genouilly, Savorgnan de Brazza, Beautemps-Beaupré, La Pérouse* The Bougainville class were considered as “colonial aviso” (or sloopin some sources), designed as substitutes to cruisers, to operate and police waters in distant colonial outposts of the French Empire, aside … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 2500 tonnes. 6 built 1930-1934, in service until 1942: Le Fantasque, L’Audacieux, Le Malin, Le Terrible, Le Triomphant, Le Fier*. The Le Fantasque-class were a group of six large, very fast destroyers (officially classified as “contre-torpilleurs”) built for the French Navy (Marine Nationale) in the 1930s. These ships were among … Read more
France (1916-1953): Bretagne, Provence, Lorraine Choices made in 1905 meant France only ever had two classes of Dreadnoughts ever: The Courbet and Bretagne, a total of seven ships, all sharing the same hull essentially, and only differing by the artillery type and arrangement. The three Bretagne (4 planned initially, the extra one for Greece) were … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 2500 tonnes. 6 built 1930-1934, in service until 1942: Vauquelin, Kersaint, Cassard, Tartu, Maillé Brézé, Chevalier Paul. The Vauquelin-class destroyers were a group of six large destroyers (contre-torpilleurs) built for the French Navy in the early 1930s. They were an improvement over the previous Aigle class and were intended to … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 2400 tonnes. 6 built 1927-1930, in service until 1942: . The Aigle-class destroyers (“contre-torpilleurs”) were built for the French navy in 1931-34. Very similar to the previous Guepard class, they still had an improved machinery with higher pressure boilers for an extra 0.5 knots (0.93 km/h; 0.58 mph) in top … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 2400 tonnes. 6 built 1927-1930, in service until 1942: Guepard, Valmy, Verdun, Bison, Lion, Vauban. The Guepard class destroyers were a follow-up of the Jaguar class built in 1922-25. They were retrospectively called the “2400 tonnes” by contrast to the previous “2100” tonnes and officially were called “contre-torpilleurs”, since the … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 2100 tonnes. 6 built 1922-1925, in service until 1943: Jaguar, Lynx, Tigre, Chacal, Leopard, Panthere With the Chacal, we start a new development tree, the very unique “big cats” of the French Navy, the “contr-torpilleurs”. In the interwar the French Navy decided to start on a blank page towards destroyer … Read more
France (1911) – Courbet, Paris, France, Jean Bart (ex-Ocean) France’s first dreadnoughts The Four Courbet class were the first French “monocaliber” or “dreadnought” battleships to enter service. They were started late, pending the scheduled completion of six Danton, decided at the time to not disrupt battleships production, added to the fact they were already “semi-dreadnoughts” … Read more
French Navy – Standard 1500t destroyers, 14 built 1925-1931, in service until 1952: L’Adroit, Basque, Bordelais, Boulonnais, Brestois, Forbin, Frondeur, L’Alcyon, La Palme, La Railleuse, Le Fortuné, Le Mars, Foudroyant, Fougueux After a pause of many years complicated by the 1929 financial crash, the French admiralty obtained the construction of new “torpilleurs d’escadre”. They were … Read more
French Navy – Contre-Torpilleurs de 3000 tonnes. 2 built 1934-1939, in service until 1942: Mogador, Volta. The Mogador-class destroyers were a pair of large French destroyers (also called “contre-torpilleurs”) built for the French Navy before World War II. They were designed in the 1930s as powerful warships with size and armament comparable to light cruisers. … Read more
