The Gueydon-class cruiser was a three-ship class of armored cruisers built in the first decade of the twentieth century for the French Navy (French: Marine Navale).
Designed by the naval architect Emile Bertin, the Gueydon-class ships were intended to be smaller and cheaper than the preceding armored cruiser design, . Like the older ship, they were intended to fill the commerce-raiding strategy of the Jeune École. The ships measured 137.97m (452.66feet) long overall with a beam of 19.38m (63.58feet) and had a maximum draft of 7.67m (25.16feet). They displaced 9367sp=usNaNsp=us. They had a crew of 566 officers and enlisted men.[1]
The Gueydon class had three vertical triple-expansion steam engines, each driving a single propeller shaft. Steam for the engines was provided by 20 or 28 boilers and they were rated at a total of 19600ihp22000ihp that gave them a speed of 21kn22kn. The ships carried up to 1575t of coal and could steam for 8500nmi at a speed of .[2]
The ships of the Gueydon class had a main armament that consisted of two 40-caliber 194abbr=onNaNabbr=on guns that were mounted in single gun turrets, one each fore and aft of the superstructure. Their secondary armament comprised eight 45-caliber quick-firing (QF) 164abbr=onNaNabbr=on guns in casemates. For anti-torpedo boat defense, they carried four 45-caliber QF 100abbr=onNaNabbr=on guns on the forecastle deck, ten QF 47abbr=onNaNabbr=on and four QF 37abbr=onNaNabbr=on Hotchkiss guns. They were also armed with two submerged 450mm torpedo tubes.
The Harvey armor belt of the Gueydon-class cruisers extended from 4feet below the waterline to the main deck. It reached the upper deck for a length of 141feet from the bow and covered the entire length of the ship except for 13feet of the stern where it ended in a transverse bulkhead 3.3- thick. The lower strake of armor was generally 150mm thick, although it reduced to 3.6sp=usNaNsp=us forward, 3.2sp=usNaNsp=us aft, and thinned to 2sp=usNaNsp=us at its lower edge. The upper strake of armor had thicknesses of 3.8- and 2.2- between the main and upper decks.
The curved lower protective deck ranged in thickness from 2 to 2.2 inches. In addition there was a light armor deck 0.8sp=usNaNsp=us thick at the top of the lower armor strake. A watertight internal cofferdam, filled with cellulose, stretched between these two decks. The gun turrets were protected by 160- armor and had roofs 0.9sp=usNaNsp=us thick. Their ammunition hoists had 2 inches of armor and the 100-millimeter guns were protected by gun shields. The sides of the conning tower were 160 millimeters thick. The forward end of the casemate compartment was closed off by a 4.7inches bulkhead and a 4inches bulkhead extended down to the lower deck at the rear end of the compartment.
| Builder | Laid down[3] | Launched | Commissioned | Fate[4] | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arsenal de Lorient | 13 August 1898 | 20 September 1899 | 1 September 1903 | Sunk by aircraft, 27 August 1944 | ||
| Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée, La Seyne-sur-Mer | 27 September 1898 | 27 March 1900 | 20 March 1902 | Sunk by aircraft, 16 August 1944 | ||
| Arsenal de Toulon | 17 April 1899 | 5 July 1901 | 28 August 1905 | Torpedoed and sunk by, 8 August 1918 |
. Naval Weapons of World War One: Guns, Torpedoes, Mines and ASW Weapons of All Nations: An Illustrated Directory. Seaforth . Barnsley, UK. 2011 . 978-1-84832-100-7. Norman Friedman.