French aviso Bougainville

For other ships with the same name, see French ship Bougainville.

Bougainville

Model of D'Entrecasteaux at Musée de la Marine de Paris
History
France
Name	Bougainville
Namesake	Admiral Louis Antoine de Bougainville
Laid down	25 November 1929
Launched	25 April 1931
Commissioned	15 February 1933
Fate	Sunk 9 November 1940
General characteristics
Type	Bougainville-class aviso
Displacement	1,969 t (1,938 long tons) (standard) 2,600 t (2,600 long tons) (full load)
Length	103.7 m (340 ft 3 in) (o/a)
Beam	12.7 m (41 ft 8 in)
Draught	4.15 m (13 ft 7 in)
Installed power	2,100 PS (1,500 kW; 2,100 bhp)
Propulsion	2 shafts; 2 diesel engines
Speed	15.5 knots (28.7 km/h; 17.8 mph)
Range	9,000 nmi (17,000 km; 10,000 mi) at 14 knots (26 km/h; 16 mph)
Complement	14 officers and 121 crewmen in peacetime; 166 or 183 men in wartime
Armament	3 × single 138.6 mm (5.5 in) guns 4 × single 37 mm (1.5 in) AA guns 3 × twin 13.2 mm (0.52 in) machine guns 50 × mines
Armour	Hull: 5–6 mm (0.20–0.24 in) Deck: 5–6 mm (0.20–0.24 in) Gun shields: 3 mm (0.1 in)
Aircraft carried	1 × Gourdou-Leseurre GL-832 HY floatplane

Bougainville was a Bougainville-class aviso of the French Navy launched on 25 April 1931 and commissioned on 15 February 1933. The ship was designed to operate from French colonies in Asia and Africa and initially stationed in the Indian Ocean. In 1935 it was transferred for service in the eastern and southern Mediterranean, and in early 1939 to Djibouti, returning to Toulon escorting a group of submarines after the outbreak of World War II.

It sided with Vichy France and was sunk by off Libreville by its sister ship Savorgnan de Brazza on 9 November 1940 in the Battle of Gabon. Although refloated in March 1941, Bougainville sank again and was finally broken up in 1952.

Bibliography

• Chesneau, Roger, ed. (1980). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922–1946. Greenwich, UK: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-146-7.
• Jordan, John (2016). "The Colonial Sloops of the Bougainville Class". Warship 2016. London: Conway. pp. 8–29. ISBN 978-1-84486-326-6.
• Le Masson, Henri (1969). The French Navy. Navies of the Second World War. Vol. 2. London: MacDonald & Co. ISBN 0-356-02385-0.
• Rohwer, Jürgen (2005). Chronology of the War at Sea 1939–1945: The Naval History of World War Two (Third Revised ed.). Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-59114-119-2.

Further reading

• Landais, Henri (2012). Les Avisos Coloniaux [The Colonial Avisos] (in French). Lela Presse. ISBN 978-2-914017-64-0.