French Battleship Charles Martel
The Charles Martel was a pre-dreadnought battleship of the French Navy built in the 1890s. She was laid down in April 1891, launched in August 1893, and completed in June 1897. She was a member of a group of five broadly similar battleships, along with Carnot, Jauréguiberry, Bouvet, 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 18 kn (33 km/h; 21 mph).
Charles Martel spent her active career in the Mediterranean Squadron of the French fleet, first in the active squadron, and later in the Reserve Squadron. She regularly participated in fleet maneuvers, and in the 1901 exercises, the submarine Gustave Zédé hit her with a dummy torpedo, which was widely hailed in the press. Charles Martel was out of service by the outbreak of World War I in 1914, and so she saw no action during the conflict. She was ultimately broken up for scrap in 1922.
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