La Galissonnière

Design

With the conclusions of the London naval treaty of the 1930, the Marine Nationale understood that cruiser design projects would shifted away from the 10,000-ton “heavy-cruiser”. Following the completion of Algerié, In it’s place, the navy argued that 6000-ton "light cruisers" would be more economical; easier, and simpler to build in greater quantities. this suited the French, whom required ships to police her out-reached empires by sea. Using their work on Émile Bertin as a prototype, the navy set out to design a new class of light cruisers that could match the latest offerings by the British: the Leander-class cruisers. The new class of cruisers were designed with balance in mind; incorporating speed, firepower, and armour, as the previous design philosophy of “speed equals protection” did not always ring true, as seen with the Condottieri-class cruisers. with this in mind, after a year since the 1930 Naval Treaty, the design of what would become the La Galissonnière cruisers were set.

Starting the hull design with what was used for Émile Bertin, the cruiser used the same protection scheme pioneered on Algerié but on a lighter scale due to wight restrictions. while concessions had to be made for less vital components of the ship, the navy was uncompromising on it’s stance that the ships required a main belt of 100mm and a main deck of 30mm; adamant that this was the bare minimum required for adequate protection. The original idea was to use a 4 shaft system to power the cruisers, as the redundancy was a measure of safety itself. But the designers realized that if the system was dropped down to two shafts, there it would save 100 tonnes and increase endurance by another 500 nautical miles; the benefits outweighed the costs and the machinery was decreased. With less machinery to protect, the citadel and the necessary superstructure was able to be condensed and better protected. But due to the use of state-of-the-art boilers, the ship class saw no reduction in power output

To keep design and construction time as low as possible, the armament systems were of a similar design as the ones implemented on Émile Bertin, but on a much more heavily armoured scale, as the turrets mounted greater armour; requiring more power to use them. There was a desire for the main weapon systems to be under a high level of autonomous control, but unfortunately they were plagued by many technical defects through their service lives and were unable to deliver on the performances specs they promised. Another sign of simplification came at the desired anti-aircraft armament. whereas there was a plethora of secondary weapons on Algerié, the la gal cruisers emphasized their antiaircraft defence on 40mm cannons. In concession of weight, only couple-tube launchers were mounted for torpedoes, as opposed to the usual triple tube launchers.

In all, six (6) La Galissonnière cruisers were built in the span of 1931 to 1933. They were commissioned into service in the Marine Nationale between 1936 and 1937.

Service

The cruisers served the pre-war years split evenly between the 3rd Cruiser Division (La Galissonnière, Jean de Vienne, Marseillaise) of the Mediterranean Squadron or the 4th Cruiser Division (Geoges Leygues, Montcalm, La Gloire) of the Atlantic Fleet.

With the start of the war, the 4th Cruiser Division was regularly used to screen the Atlantic convoys heading to Europe from the Americas. By early 1940, the Marine Nationale were in action off the coast of Norway and cruiser Montcalm came to relief of Émile Bertin and contributed to the evacuation of Namsos. As Italy moved towards a war-footing in late May 1940, action in and around the Mediterranean Sea was anticipated. In response, the French admiralty sent both 3rd and 4th Cruiser Divisions to be stationed at Algiers in North Africa.

With the capitulation of France on 22 June 1940, the cruisers fell under the control of the Vichy government, who ordered them to head for Mers-el-Kébir to counter the oncoming British Force H. Unable to arrive in time, the Vichy French government had no other option but to detour both divisions to berth at Toulon. A few months later, when Free French Forces took over French Equatorial Africa, the Vichy government sent the 4th Cruiser Division to counter this. Unfortunately due to mechanical and logistical issues, the 4th Division was diverted to Dakar instead, where they would be stationed till 1943. While in Dakar, they partook in the defense against Operation Menace.

Meanwhile in Toulon, the 3rd Cruiser Division were incorporated into the High Seas Force, which saw no major action against enemy combatants, due to a fuel shortage problem. When the Allies invaded North Africa in 1942, the Germans pushed into the “Zone Libre” and were making their way for Toulon. Not wishing to allow their vessels to be commandeered by the Germans, the Vichy Forces scuttled their High Seas Force.

The 4th Cruiser Division — stationed in Africa — joined the Allied Forces there. Between 1943 and 1944, Geoges Leygues, Montcalm, and La Gloire regularly carried out patrols in the Mediterranean, only to be intermittently sent to the United States to be refitted.

By 1944, all six cruisers supported Operations Overlord and Dragoon, the Allied landings on mainland Europe. Later that year, they returned to the Mediterranean to continue their patrols off Italian waters.

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  La Galissonnière

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  ONI report on the La Galissonnière-class.