French battleship Jean Bart (1940)
 The Jean Bart, photographed from a plane of the USS Ranger. Turret number two was not yet operational |
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| Career (France) |  |
|---|---|
| Namesake: | Jean Bart |
| Laid down: | December 1936 |
| Launched: | 6 March 1940 |
| Completed: | 1952 |
| Commissioned: | 16 January 1949 |
| Decommissioned: | 1961 |
| Reclassified: | 1961 Gunnery School Tender |
| Struck: | 1969 |
| Fate: | 24 June 1970 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Richelieu class battleship |
| Displacement: |
35,560 tonnes 48,950 t at full load |
| Length: | 248 m |
| Beam: | 35 m |
| Draught: | 9.60 m |
| Propulsion: | four Parsons geared turbines, 150,000 hp (112 MW) |
| Speed: | 32 knots (59 km/h) |
| Range: | 7671 nautical miles (14,207 km) at 20 knots (37 km/h); 3181 nautical miles (5,891 km) at 30 knots (56 km/h) |
| Complement: |
911 men in 1950 (incomplete) |
| Armament: |
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| Armour: |
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- For the first French battleship with this name, see French battleship Jean Bart (1911).
The Jean Bart was a French battleship of World War II named for the seventeenth-century seaman, privateer, and corsair Jean Bart.
Derived from the Dunkerque class, Jean Bart (and her sister ship Richelieu) were designed to counter the threat of the heavy ships of the Italian Navy. Their speed, shielding, armament, and overall technology were state of the art, but they had a rather unusual main battery armament arrangement, with two 4-gun turrets to the bow and none to the stern.
Jean Bart was laid down in December 1936, and she was launched on 6 March 1940. Barely 75% completed, her steam engines never having been worked before, she was taken out of St. Nazaire's dry dock by Captain Ronach and steamed to Casablanca, Morocco, in June 1940 in order to escape the advance of the German army in France. Only one of her two 380-millimetre (15 in) main turrets had been installed by then. The second turret, with only two of its four naval guns, was loaded onto a cargo ship. The cargo ship was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-Boat[1]. Her 152-millimetre (6.0 in) secondary battery was also non-installed, and it was replaced by anti-aircraft guns. Like other French naval and military forces in North Africa, the Jean Bart was under the control of the Vichy French government.
On 8 November 1942, during Operation Torch, the French fleet in Casablanca was attacked by American warships and warplanes from the aircraft carrier USS Ranger (CV-4). The Jean Bart engaged the battleship USS Massachusetts (BB-59) in a gun battle. The Jean Bart suffered hits from several aerial bombs and 16-inch (406 mm) shells. On the 10th, the Jean Bart opened fire again on the cruiser USS Augusta, much to the surprise of the American naval officers - who thought that the Jean Bart had been silenced as a result of heavy damage. This gunfire drew action from the warplanes of the USS Ranger, and the Jean Bart suffered two more hits by 500-pound (230 kg) bombs. These opened a leak in her hull, forcing her Captain to run her aground. Combat was over by that evening, and along with the rest of French forces in North Africa, she surrendered and then took sides with the Allies of the United States and the United Kingdom.
Soon, it was suggested that the Jean Bart be sent to the USA and completed there (her sister ship, Richelieu, had already undergone a refitting there), but that proved to be impossible. The notion of converting the Jean Bart into an aircraft carrier was studied, but was found to be impractical. For the next two years, the unfinished battleship remained stranded in Casablanca harbour.
The Jean Bart returned to France in 1945, and she was completed in 1952, under an updated design influenced by lessons from experience with battleships in the previous war. The Jean Bart took her part in the Suez Canal Crisis off Egypt in 1956, but engaged in no ship-to-ship combat. She was put into reserve in 1957, and then she was decommissioned in 1961. The hulk of the Jean Bart was scrapped in 1969.
Contents |
[edit] Pictures
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Battleship "Jean Bart" in 1968 in the harbour of Toulon
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Battleship "Jean Bart" in 1968
[edit] References
- ^ Jordan & Dumas 2009, p. 153
[edit] Bibliography
- John, Jordan; Robert, Dumas (2009). French battleships 1922-1956. Barnsley S.Yorkshire: Seaforth Punblishing. ISBN 978-1-84832-034-5.
[edit] External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: |
- Caractéristiques principales (in French) Schematics of a turret
- Galerie de photos (in French) Photographs
- Maritimequest Jean Bart Photo Gallery
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