French battleship Bouvet
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| History | |
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 France
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| Name: | Bouvet |
| Namesake: | François Joseph Bouvet |
| Builder: | Lorient, France, Charles Ernest Huin |
| Laid down: | 16 January 1893 |
| Launched: | 27 April 1896 |
| Commissioned: | June 1898 |
| Homeport: | Toulon |
| Fate: | Sunk during operations off the Dardanelles on 18 March 1915 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Pre-dreadnought battleship |
| Displacement: | 12,007 t (11,817 long tons; 13,235 short tons) |
| Length: | 117.81 m (386.5 ft) |
| Beam: | 21.39 m (70.2 ft) |
| Draft: | 8.38 m (27.5 ft) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | 18 kn (33 km/h; 21 mph) |
| Complement: |
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| Armament: |
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| Armor: |
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Bouvet was a pre-dreadnought battleship of the French Navy. She was laid down in January 1891, launched in April 1896, and completed in June 1898. She was a member of a group of five broadly similar battleships, along with Charles Martel, Jauréguiberry, Carnot, and Masséna, which were ordered in response to the British Royal Sovereign class. Like her half-sisters, she was armed with a main battery of two 305 mm (12.0 in) guns and two 274 mm (10.8 in) guns in individual turrets. She had a top speed of 17.8 kn (33.0 km/h; 20.5 mph).
Bouvet spent the majority of her career alternating between the Northern and Mediterranean Squadrons. At the outbreak of World War I, she escorted troop convoys from North Africa to France. She then joined the naval operations off the Dardanelles, where she participated in a major attack on the Turkish fortresses in the straits on 18 March 1915. During the attack, she was hit approximately eight times by shellfire, though did not suffer fatal damage. She struck a mine at around 3:15, and sank within two minutes; only some 50 men were rescued from a complement of 710. Two British battleships were also sunk by mines that day, and the disaster convinced the Allies to abandon the naval campaign in favor of an amphibious assault on Gallipoli.
Bouvet was the last member of a group of five battleships built to a broadly similar design, but different enough to be considered unique vessels. The first ship was Charles Martel, which formed the basis for Bouvet and three other ships. Design specifications were identical for each of the ships, but different engineers designed each vessel. The ships were based on the previous battleship Brennus, but instead of mounting the main battery all on the centerline, the ships used the lozenge arrangement of the earlier vessel Magenta, which moved two of the main battery guns to single turrets on the wings. The five ships were built in response to the British Royal Sovereign-class battleships.
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Wikipedia