Kléber was one of three Dupleix-classarmored cruisers built for the French Navy (Marine Nationale) in the first decade of the 20th century. Designed for overseas service and armed with eight 164.7-millimeter (6.5 in) guns, the ships were smaller and less powerfully armed than their predecessors. Completed in 1904, Kléber was initially assigned to the Mediterranean Squadron (Escadre de la Méditerranée) before she was transferred to the Atlantic Division (Division de l'Atlantique) three years later, where she often served as a flagship. The ship was reduced to reserve in 1909–1910 before she was sent to the Far East in 1911. Kléber returned to France two years later and was again placed in reserve.
As tensions rose shortly before the beginning of World War I in August 1914, the ship was reactivated. When the war began she was assigned to defend Allied shipping in the English Channel and intercept German ships attempting to pass through. Transferred back to the Mediterranean in 1915, Kléber played a minor role on the periphery of the Gallipoli Campaign until a resurgence in German commerce raiding caused the Allies to transfer more cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping in mid-1916. The ship was deemed surplus to requirements the following year; on her way back to France to decommission, Kléber struck a naval mine on 27 June and sank with the loss of 38 crewmen.
The Dupleix-class ships were much smaller and more lightly armed than the preceding Jeanne d'Arc. They measured 132.1 meters (433 ft 5 in) long overall[1] with a beam of 17.8 meters (58 ft 5 in) and had a maximum draft of 7.46 meters (24 ft 6 in). The cruisers displaced 7,700 metric tons (7,578 long tons) as designed. They normally had a crew of 19 officers and 550 enlisted men, but accommodated 24 officers and 583 enlisted men when serving as a flagship.[2]
The sister ships' propulsion machinery consisted of three vertical triple-expansion steam engines, each driving a single propeller shaft, using steam provided by water-tube boilers, but the types of machinery differed between them. Kléber had three-cylinder engines that used 20 Niclausse boilers at a working pressure 18 kg/cm2 (1,765 kPa; 256 psi). The engines of all three ships were designed to produce a total of 17,100 metric horsepower (12,600 kW) that was intended to give them a maximum speed of 21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph). Only Kléber exceeded their designed speed during her sea trials on 14 October 1903, attaining 21.5 knots (39.8 km/h; 24.7 mph) from 17,177 metric horsepower (12,634 kW). The sisters carried up to 1,200 metric tons (1,200 long tons; 1,300 short tons) of coal and could steam for 6,450 nautical miles (11,950 km; 7,420 mi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph).[3]
The nickel steelarmor belt of the Dupleix-class cruisers covered the entire waterline length of the ship except for 18.9 meters (62 ft)[4] of the stern. The belt armor was 102 millimeters (4 in) thick, although it reduced to 84 millimeters (3.3 in) in front of the forward turret. The curved protective deck had a total thickness of 42 millimeters (1.7 in) on the flat and 70 millimeters (2.8 in) on the upper part of the curved portion where it met the bottom edge of the belt armor. The face and sides of the gun turrets were protected by 110-millimeter (4.3 in) Harvey face-hardened armor plates. The armor protection of the gun barbettes was 120 millimeters (4.7 in) thick. The sides of the elliptical conning tower were 100 to 120 millimeters thick.[6]
Named after the French Revolutionary-era General Jean-Baptiste Kléber,[7] the ship was ordered from Forges et Chantiers de la Gironde on 28 December 1897. Construction was considerably delayed when the armament configuration was revised after the ship had already been laid down; the contract for Kléber was revised to account for the changes on 22 August 1899. Kléber was laid down at their shipyard in Bordeaux in early 1899[8] and launched on 20 September 1902.[9] When the ship was launched she struck the river bottom because the height of the tide had been misjudged. Despite the damage, the ship began her formal sea trials on 26 September. Repairs and trials took two years and she was finally commissioned on 4 July 1904. The ship cost 19,258,000 francs.[10]Kléber was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet's Light Squadron (Escadre légère) upon completion, together with her sister Desaix. The latter ship was transferred away in September 1905, but rejoined the squadron in November 1906, replacing Kléber which was transferred to the Atlantic where she became the flagship of the Antilles Division (Division des Antilles).[11] During a visit to the United States, the ship accidentally rammed an American cargo ship, the 2,183-gross register ton (GRT) iron-hulledscrew steamerHugoma, on the Mississippi River off New Orleans, Louisiana, on 20 February 1907. Hugoma subsequently sank in 100 feet (30 m) of water. There were 25 people on board the freighter, and sources disagree as to whether all of them survived or seven crewmen died.[12][13] By 20 May Kléber was visiting New York City, together with the armored cruiser Victor Hugo and the protected cruiserChasseloup-Laubat. The trio sailed to Jamestown, Virginia, on 31 May where they participated in the Jamestown Exposition and in the naval review presided over by PresidentTheodore Roosevelt on 10 June.[14]
In January 1908 Kléber became flagship of the Moroccan Division (Division du Maroc) and was placed in reserve the following year. In 1911 the ship was assigned to the Far East Naval Division (Division navale de l'Extrême-Orient), joining her sister Dupleix. Kléber struck an uncharted reef on 12 July 1912 and received temporary repairs at Kobe, Japan, before returning to Lorient, France, in January 1913 where she returned to reserve.[15]
World War IEdit
As tensions rose during the July Crisis of 1914, Kléber, Desaix and the other cruisers in reserve were reactivated. The sisters were assigned to the 3rd Light Division (3e Division légère (DL)) of the 2nd Light Squadron (Escadre 2e légère) which was tasked to defend the English Channel in conjunction with the British. The 3rd DL was on station in the western end of the Channel by 4 August, where their mission was to intercept German shipping and provide distant cover for the smaller ships escorting the transports conveying the British Expeditionary Force to France. In early September, Kléber and the armored cruisers Gloire and Gueydon established a new patrol line further south off the southern coast of Brittany.[16]
Kléber's damaged bow after the collision
Improved defenses in the Channel and the stabilization of the front in early 1915 allowed the cruisers to be released from their tasks, so Kléber was transferred to the Dardanelles to support Allied forces in the Gallipoli Campaign in May. She was assigned to the Dardanelles Squadron (Escadre des Dardanelles) when that unit was formed on 16 May. The ship briefly ran aground off Scala Nuova Bay and was engaged by coastal artillery without effect before she could free herself. Kléber, Dupleix, and the armored cruisers Bruix and Latouche-Tréville were now assigned to blockade the coast of Asia Minor, based out of Lesbos.[17]Kléber collided with the Royal Australian NavytroopshipHMT Boorara in the Aegean Sea on 17 July 1915, forcing Boorara to beach herself on Mudros and damaging the cruiser's bow.[18][19]
After the Kingdom of Bulgaria joined the Central Powers in mid-October, Kléber, the Russian protected cruiser Askold and four destroyers was tasked to raid the Aegean coast of Bulgaria between Dedeagatch and Porto Lago while other forces bombarded the former town and its nearby railroad junction on 21 October. The successes of merchant raiders like Möwe in 1916 caused the Allies to transfer cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping. Kléber became the flagship of a new 6th DL, which consisted of all three sisters, in July 1916, based in Dakar, French West Africa.[20]
To release manpower for higher-priority patrol boats, the 6th DL was reduced to two ships and renamed the Coast of Africa Division (Division navale de la côte d'Afrique) on 18 May 1917; Contre-amiral (Rear Admiral) Louis Jaurès transferred his flag to Dupleix. En route to Brest, France, Kléber struck a mine at 06:00 on 27 June that the German U-boatUC-61 had laid off the Iroise entrance to Brest. The mine exploded abreast the forward boiler rooms, knocking them and the forward auxiliary machine room offline. The aft boilers were only operable for 20 more minutes before bulkheads began to give way at 06:30 and abandon ship was ordered. Nearby fishing trawlers, a French torpedo boat and a British steamship were able to rescue all but 38 of her crew.[21]
^U.S. Department of Commerce and Labor Bureau of Navigation (1907). Thirty-Ninth Annual List of Merchant Vessels of the United States for the Year Ending June 30, 1907. 1936/37-1939/41: Report series, no.[1], 4, 8, 11. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. p. 379.
^"Hugoma (+1907)". Wrecksite. Retrieved 26 September 2019.
Chesneau, Roger & Kolesnik, Eugene M., eds. (1979). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1860–1905. Greenwich, UK: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN0-8317-0302-4.
Corbett, Julian (1997) [1940]. Naval Operations. History of the Great War: Based on Official Documents. Vol. III (2nd ed.). London; Nashville, Tennessee: Imperial War Museum in association with the Battery Press. ISBN1-870423-50-X.
Jordan, John & Caresse, Philippe (2019). French Armoured Cruisers 1887–1932. Barnsley, UK: Seaforth Publishing. ISBN978-1-5267-4118-9.
Sieche, Erwin F. (1990). "Austria-Hungary's Last Visit to the USA". Warship International. XXVII (2): 142–164. ISSN 0043-0374.
french, cruiser, kléber, kléber, three, dupleix, class, armored, cruisers, built, french, navy, marine, nationale, first, decade, 20th, century, designed, overseas, service, armed, with, eight, millimeter, guns, ships, were, smaller, less, powerfully, armed, t. Kleber was one of three Dupleix class armored cruisers built for the French Navy Marine Nationale in the first decade of the 20th century Designed for overseas service and armed with eight 164 7 millimeter 6 5 in guns the ships were smaller and less powerfully armed than their predecessors Completed in 1904 Kleber was initially assigned to the Mediterranean Squadron Escadre de la Mediterranee before she was transferred to the Atlantic Division Division de l Atlantique three years later where she often served as a flagship The ship was reduced to reserve in 1909 1910 before she was sent to the Far East in 1911 Kleber returned to France two years later and was again placed in reserve Kleber at anchor at the Jamestown Exposition June 1907HistoryFranceNameKleberNamesakeGeneral Jean Baptiste KleberOrdered28 December 1897BuilderForges et Chantiers de la Gironde BordeauxLaid downEarly 1899Launched20 September 1902Commissioned4 July 1904FateSunk 27 June 1917General characteristicsClass and typeDupleix class armored cruiserDisplacement7 700 t 7 578 long tons Length132 1 m 433 ft 5 in o a Beam17 8 m 58 ft 5 in Draft7 46 m 24 ft 6 in Installed power20 Niclausse boilers 17 100 PS 12 600 kW Propulsion3 shafts 3 triple expansion steam enginesSpeed21 knots 39 km h 24 mph Range6 450 nmi 11 950 km 7 420 mi at 10 knots 19 km h 12 mph Complement569 607 as flagshipArmament4 twin 164 7 mm 6 5 in guns 4 single 100 mm 3 9 in guns 10 single 47 mm 1 9 in guns 4 single 37 mm 1 5 in guns 2 450 mm 17 7 in torpedo tubesArmorWaterline belt 84 102 mm 3 3 4 0 in Deck 42 70 mm 1 7 2 8 in Gun turrets 110 mm 4 3 in Barbettes 120 mm 4 7 in Conning tower 100 120 mm 3 9 4 7 in As tensions rose shortly before the beginning of World War I in August 1914 the ship was reactivated When the war began she was assigned to defend Allied shipping in the English Channel and intercept German ships attempting to pass through Transferred back to the Mediterranean in 1915 Kleber played a minor role on the periphery of the Gallipoli Campaign until a resurgence in German commerce raiding caused the Allies to transfer more cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping in mid 1916 The ship was deemed surplus to requirements the following year on her way back to France to decommission Kleber struck a naval mine on 27 June and sank with the loss of 38 crewmen Contents 1 Design and description 1 1 Armament and protection 2 Service history 2 1 World War I 3 References 4 BibliographyDesign and description EditThe Dupleix class ships were much smaller and more lightly armed than the preceding Jeanne d Arc They measured 132 1 meters 433 ft 5 in long overall 1 with a beam of 17 8 meters 58 ft 5 in and had a maximum draft of 7 46 meters 24 ft 6 in The cruisers displaced 7 700 metric tons 7 578 long tons as designed They normally had a crew of 19 officers and 550 enlisted men but accommodated 24 officers and 583 enlisted men when serving as a flagship 2 The sister ships propulsion machinery consisted of three vertical triple expansion steam engines each driving a single propeller shaft using steam provided by water tube boilers but the types of machinery differed between them Kleber had three cylinder engines that used 20 Niclausse boilers at a working pressure 18 kg cm2 1 765 kPa 256 psi The engines of all three ships were designed to produce a total of 17 100 metric horsepower 12 600 kW that was intended to give them a maximum speed of 21 knots 39 km h 24 mph Only Kleber exceeded their designed speed during her sea trials on 14 October 1903 attaining 21 5 knots 39 8 km h 24 7 mph from 17 177 metric horsepower 12 634 kW The sisters carried up to 1 200 metric tons 1 200 long tons 1 300 short tons of coal and could steam for 6 450 nautical miles 11 950 km 7 420 mi at a speed of 10 knots 19 km h 12 mph 3 Armament and protection Edit The ships of the Dupleix class had a main armament that consisted of eight quick firing QF Canon de 164 7 mm Modele 1893 1896 guns They were mounted in four twin gun turrets one each fore and aft of the superstructure and a pair of wing turrets amidships 4 The cruisers secondary armament consisted of four QF Canon de 100 mm 3 9 in Modele de 1893 guns on single mounts in unprotected casemates in the hull For defense against torpedo boats they carried ten 47 millimeter 1 9 in and four 37 millimeter 1 5 in Hotchkiss guns all of which were on single mounts 5 The ship were also equipped with two above water 450 millimeter 17 7 in torpedo tubes one on each broadside 1 The nickel steel armor belt of the Dupleix class cruisers covered the entire waterline length of the ship except for 18 9 meters 62 ft 4 of the stern The belt armor was 102 millimeters 4 in thick although it reduced to 84 millimeters 3 3 in in front of the forward turret The curved protective deck had a total thickness of 42 millimeters 1 7 in on the flat and 70 millimeters 2 8 in on the upper part of the curved portion where it met the bottom edge of the belt armor The face and sides of the gun turrets were protected by 110 millimeter 4 3 in Harvey face hardened armor plates The armor protection of the gun barbettes was 120 millimeters 4 7 in thick The sides of the elliptical conning tower were 100 to 120 millimeters thick 6 Service history Edit nbsp Kleber and the protected cruiser Galilee at Tangier illustrated in Le Petit Parisien in 1904Named after the French Revolutionary era General Jean Baptiste Kleber 7 the ship was ordered from Forges et Chantiers de la Gironde on 28 December 1897 Construction was considerably delayed when the armament configuration was revised after the ship had already been laid down the contract for Kleber was revised to account for the changes on 22 August 1899 Kleber was laid down at their shipyard in Bordeaux in early 1899 8 and launched on 20 September 1902 9 When the ship was launched she struck the river bottom because the height of the tide had been misjudged Despite the damage the ship began her formal sea trials on 26 September Repairs and trials took two years and she was finally commissioned on 4 July 1904 The ship cost 19 258 000 francs 10 Kleber was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet s Light Squadron Escadre legere upon completion together with her sister Desaix The latter ship was transferred away in September 1905 but rejoined the squadron in November 1906 replacing Kleber which was transferred to the Atlantic where she became the flagship of the Antilles Division Division des Antilles 11 During a visit to the United States the ship accidentally rammed an American cargo ship the 2 183 gross register ton GRT iron hulled screw steamer Hugoma on the Mississippi River off New Orleans Louisiana on 20 February 1907 Hugoma subsequently sank in 100 feet 30 m of water There were 25 people on board the freighter and sources disagree as to whether all of them survived or seven crewmen died 12 13 By 20 May Kleber was visiting New York City together with the armored cruiser Victor Hugo and the protected cruiser Chasseloup Laubat The trio sailed to Jamestown Virginia on 31 May where they participated in the Jamestown Exposition and in the naval review presided over by President Theodore Roosevelt on 10 June 14 In January 1908 Kleber became flagship of the Moroccan Division Division du Maroc and was placed in reserve the following year In 1911 the ship was assigned to the Far East Naval Division Division navale de l Extreme Orient joining her sister Dupleix Kleber struck an uncharted reef on 12 July 1912 and received temporary repairs at Kobe Japan before returning to Lorient France in January 1913 where she returned to reserve 15 World War I Edit As tensions rose during the July Crisis of 1914 Kleber Desaix and the other cruisers in reserve were reactivated The sisters were assigned to the 3rd Light Division 3e Division legere DL of the 2nd Light Squadron Escadre 2e legere which was tasked to defend the English Channel in conjunction with the British The 3rd DL was on station in the western end of the Channel by 4 August where their mission was to intercept German shipping and provide distant cover for the smaller ships escorting the transports conveying the British Expeditionary Force to France In early September Kleber and the armored cruisers Gloire and Gueydon established a new patrol line further south off the southern coast of Brittany 16 nbsp Kleber s damaged bow after the collisionImproved defenses in the Channel and the stabilization of the front in early 1915 allowed the cruisers to be released from their tasks so Kleber was transferred to the Dardanelles to support Allied forces in the Gallipoli Campaign in May She was assigned to the Dardanelles Squadron Escadre des Dardanelles when that unit was formed on 16 May The ship briefly ran aground off Scala Nuova Bay and was engaged by coastal artillery without effect before she could free herself Kleber Dupleix and the armored cruisers Bruix and Latouche Treville were now assigned to blockade the coast of Asia Minor based out of Lesbos 17 Kleber collided with the Royal Australian Navy troopship HMT Boorara in the Aegean Sea on 17 July 1915 forcing Boorara to beach herself on Mudros and damaging the cruiser s bow 18 19 After the Kingdom of Bulgaria joined the Central Powers in mid October Kleber the Russian protected cruiser Askold and four destroyers was tasked to raid the Aegean coast of Bulgaria between Dedeagatch and Porto Lago while other forces bombarded the former town and its nearby railroad junction on 21 October The successes of merchant raiders like Mowe in 1916 caused the Allies to transfer cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping Kleber became the flagship of a new 6th DL which consisted of all three sisters in July 1916 based in Dakar French West Africa 20 To release manpower for higher priority patrol boats the 6th DL was reduced to two ships and renamed the Coast of Africa Division Division navale de la cote d Afrique on 18 May 1917 Contre amiral Rear Admiral Louis Jaures transferred his flag to Dupleix En route to Brest France Kleber struck a mine at 06 00 on 27 June that the German U boat UC 61 had laid off the Iroise entrance to Brest The mine exploded abreast the forward boiler rooms knocking them and the forward auxiliary machine room offline The aft boilers were only operable for 20 more minutes before bulkheads began to give way at 06 30 and abandon ship was ordered Nearby fishing trawlers a French torpedo boat and a British steamship were able to rescue all but 38 of her crew 21 References Edit a b Silverstone p 79 Jordan amp Caresse p 82 Jordan amp Caresse pp 82 94 a b Chesneau amp Kolesnik p 305 Jordan amp Caresse pp 82 89 90 Jordan amp Caresse pp 91 92 Silverstone p 103 Jordan amp Caresse pp 81 82 Naval amp Military intelligence The Times No 36879 London 22 September 1902 p 8 Jordan amp Caresse pp 81 82 94 95 213 Jordan amp Caresse pp 95 210 U S Department of Commerce and Labor Bureau of Navigation 1907 Thirty Ninth Annual List of Merchant Vessels of the United States for the Year Ending June 30 1907 1936 37 1939 41 Report series no 1 4 8 11 Washington D C Government Printing Office p 379 Hugoma 1907 Wrecksite Retrieved 26 September 2019 Sieche pp 150 155 157 Jordan amp Caresse p 95 Jordan amp Caresse pp 223 224 Jordan amp Caresse pp 224 236 Australian troopship A42 HMAT Boorara ex Pfalz at Mudros after being rammed by French cruiser Australian War Memorial Retrieved 3 May 2020 NETLEY ENGLAND 1918 03 TORPEDO DAMAGE TO THE SIDE OF SS BOORARA SHOWN AFTER SHE WAS BEACHED Australian War Memorial Retrieved 16 May 2020 Corbett pp 172 174 Jordan amp Caresse pp 237 242 Jordan amp Caresse pp 245 246Bibliography EditChesneau Roger amp Kolesnik Eugene M eds 1979 Conway s All the World s Fighting Ships 1860 1905 Greenwich UK Conway Maritime Press ISBN 0 8317 0302 4 Corbett Julian 1997 1940 Naval Operations History of the Great War Based on Official Documents Vol III 2nd ed London Nashville Tennessee Imperial War Museum in association with the Battery Press ISBN 1 870423 50 X Jordan John amp Caresse Philippe 2019 French Armoured Cruisers 1887 1932 Barnsley UK Seaforth Publishing ISBN 978 1 5267 4118 9 Sieche Erwin F 1990 Austria Hungary s Last Visit to the USA Warship International XXVII 2 142 164 ISSN 0043 0374 Silverstone Paul H 1984 Directory of the World s Capital Ships New York Hippocrene Books ISBN 0 88254 979 0 Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title French cruiser Kleber amp oldid 1136843543, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
