French battleship Paris

Paris proceeding trials at full steam
History
France
Namesake:	Paris
Builder:	La Seyne, France
Laid down:	10 November 1911
Launched:	28 September 1912
Commissioned:	1 August 1914
Struck:	21 December 1955
Fate:	Scrapped beginning in June 1956
General characteristics
Class and type:	Courbet-class battleship
Displacement:	23,475 tonnes (23,104 long tons) (standard) 25,579 tonnes (25,175 long tons) (full load)
Length:	166 m (544 ft 7 in)
Beam:	27 m (88 ft 7 in)
Draught:	9.04 m (29 ft 8 in) at normal load
Installed power:	28,000 shp (21,000 kW)
Propulsion:	4 shafts Parsons steam turbines 24 boilers
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph) (trials)
Endurance:	4,200 nmi (7,800 km; 4,800 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph)
Complement:	1115–1187
Armament:	6 × 2 - 305 mm Mle 1910 guns 22 × 1 - 138 mm Mle 1910 guns 4 × 1 - 47 mm (1.9 in) guns 4 × 450 mm (17.7 in) torpedo tubes
Armour:	Waterline belt: 180–270 mm (7.1–10.6 in) Deck: 30–70 mm (1.2–2.8 in) Turrets: 290–250 mm (11.4–9.8 in) Barbettes: 280 mm (11 in) Conning tower: 300 mm (11.8 in)

Paris was the third ship of the Courbet-class battleships, the first dreadnoughts built for the French Navy. She was completed before World War I as part of the 1911 naval building programme. She spent the war in the Mediterranean, spending most of 1914 providing gunfire support for the Montenegrin Army until her sister ship Jean Bart was torpedoed by the submarine U-12 on 21 December. She spent the rest of the war providing cover for the Otranto Barrage that blockaded the Austro-Hungarian Navy in the Adriatic Sea.

Paris supported French and Spanish troops in 1925 during the Third Rif War before becoming a school ship in 1931. She was modernized in three separate refits between the wars even though she was not deemed to be a first-class battleship. She remained in that role until the Battle of France, which began on 10 May 1940, after which she was hastily rearmed. She supported Allied troops in the defence of Le Havre during June until she was damaged by a German bomb, but she took refuge later that month in England. As part of Operation Catapult, she was seized in Plymouth by British forces on 3 July. She was used as a depot ship and barracks ship there by the Royal and Polish Navies for the rest of the war. Returned to the French in July 1945 she was towed to Brest the following month and used as a depot ship until she was stricken on 21 December 1955.