Bretagne Class Battleship - Service History

Service History

All three ships of the class entered service with the French Navy in 1916. Bretagne and Lorraine were assigned to the 1st Division of the 1st Battle Squadron, while Provence served as the fleet flagship for the entirety of the First World War. They were deployed to guard the southern end of the Adriatic Sea, based in Argostoli and Corfu, to block a possible sortie by the Austro-Hungarian fleet. The three ships largely remained in port, though Provence was repeatedly used to intimidate the government of Greece, which favored Germany during the war. In January 1919, after the end of the war, Lorraine was sent to Cattaro to guard the Austro-Hungarian fleet. She joined her sisters in Toulon in June 1919; later that year the ships formed the Eastern Mediterranean Fleet until 1921.

Financial problems forced the French Navy to reduce its battleship force to four active vessels. Lorraine and Provence were reduced to reserve status in 1922, and the latter went into drydock for a major overhaul. Lorraine returned to service with the Mediterranean Squadron in 1923. Bretagne remained in service and conducted training cruises in the Mediterranean and along the coast of North Africa during the 1920s and 1930s. In 1934, Bretagne and Provence were assigned to the 2nd Squadron, based on France's Atlantic coast. In 1936, they joined the non-intervention patrols off Spain during the Spanish Civil War. At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, Bretagne and Provence were based in Toulon with the 2nd Squadron, while Lorraine was assigned to the Atlantic Squadron.

After undergoing a refit in the early months of the war, Provence conducted anti-raider patrols with Force Y, based in Casablanca. Bretagne was also overhauled early in the war; in March 1940 she escorted a convoy to Halifax and returned with another convoy loaded with aircraft for the French Air Force. She was then ordered to join Lorraine in Force X, to be based in Alexandria to operate in concert with the British Mediterranean Fleet. Two weeks later, Bretagne was instead ordered to steam at high speed to Bizerte, to join the Force de Raid with Provence. The ships put in at Mers-el-Kébir and remained there until after the fall of France in June 1940. To prevent the ships of the French Navy from falling into the hands of the occupying Germans, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered the neutralization of all French warships. Force H was to deliver an ultimatum to the ships based at Mers-el-Kébir; on 3 July, the British squadron arrived outside the harbor and demanded that the ships sail with them to Britain or they would be sunk.

The British and French negotiated for several hours, and culminated in the British opening fire on the French fleet. In the span of ten minutes, Bretagne was sunk and Provence was badly damaged. Bretagne was hit by at least four 15 in (380 mm) shells from HMS Hood, Resolution and Barham and exploded, killing the vast majority of her crew. Provence was set on fire and sank to the bottom of the harbor, though she was subsequently raised and transferred to Toulon, where she was later scuttled in 1942 to prevent her from being seized by the Germans. They nevertheless salvaged the ship starting in July 1943. Two of her main guns were emplaced as coastal batteries outside Toulon. Lorraine was disarmed in Alexandria until December 1942, when she joined the Free French Naval Forces. She served as a training ship for much of 1943 until a major refit at the end of the year to prepare her to participate in Operation Dragoon, the invasion of southern France. She provided gunfire support during the landings before steaming to Britain for a minor refit. She remained in Britain until March 1945, when she bombarded German-held fortresses in northern France.

After the end of the war, Lorraine served as a gunnery training ship in Toulon. She was then used as a barracks ship until February 1953, when she was stricken from the naval register and sold for scrapping at the end of the year. She was broken up for scrap outside Toulon the following year. Bretagne remained at the bottom of Mers-el-Kébir until she was raised for scrapping in 1952 and broken up. Provence was raised in April 1949 and scrapped.