Downloadable French Documents



The Introduction of Steam Technology in the French Navy, 1818-1852 (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1976), by Stephen S. Roberts (Shipscribe).

• The Introduction of Steam Technology in the French Navy, 1818-1852
  

-- The research for this dissertation conducted in the French naval archives in 1973-1974 produced much of the data on which are based the French "From Sail to Steam" portion of this website and the post-1816 portions of the book by Rif Winfield and Stephen S. Roberts, French Warships in the Age of Sail 1786-1861 (Seaforth, 2015).

Résumé analytique des affaires examinées par le Conseil des travaux de la Marine (Analytical summary of cases examined by the Council of Works of the Navy), extracts, 1872-1905, with a list of topics discussed in 1865-1871.

• Conseil des travaux, 1865-1871 (list only)
  
• Conseil des travaux, 1872-1884 (summary of proceedings)
  
• Conseil des travaux, 1885-1890 (summary of proceedings)
  
• Conseil des travaux, 1891-1897 (summary of proceedings)
  
• Conseil des travaux, 1898-1905 (summary of proceedings)
  

-- The Conseil des travaux de la Marine was formed in 1831 to advise the Minister of Marine on technical issues relating to the construction of ships, including ship design. In English travaux means "works," as in "public works." The four sections above from 1872 to 1905 are from a multi-volume printed summary of the Council's proceedings, from which copies of the first two annual sections, Programmes - Questions générales (Programs - General Questions) and Projets nouveaux de navires (New designs for ships) were supplied on microfilm in 1974 by the directors of the archives and library of the Service historique de la Marine at Vincennes, MM. Joël Audouy and Jean-Pierre Busson. A list of ship design topics discussed in 1865-1871, taken from other Council records, is also provided. The Conseil des travaux was replaced on 21 April 1905 by the Comité technique de la Marine (Navy Technical Committee).

Internal documents by Paul Dislere, Assistant Naval Engineer and Secretary of the Council of Works of the Navy (1875-1876).

• Documents généraux relatifs aux navires de la flotte (General documents relating to the ships of the fleet) (11 June 1875)
  
• Historiques des différents types de la Flotte (Historical background of the different ship types of the Fleet) (18 March 1876)
  

-- The 1875 document consists of tabular data on the ships of the navy "collected and put in order by M. Dislère." The data mostly came from the ships' devis d'armement, the technical specifications recorded by naval engineers when the ships were commissioned. The 1876 document consistes of "historical summaries compiled by M. Dislère, Secretary of the Conseil des travaux, to prepare and complete the deliberations of the Council" on specific ship types. These texts were in fact included in the minutes of the Council meetings, from which the missing text at the end on chaloupes-canonnières (gun launches) was recovered. Dislère compiled these internal documents just after publishing two books: La marine cuirassée (The Armored Navy) (1873) and Les croiseurs, La guerre de course (Cruisers and Commerce Raiding) (1875), which he wrote to bring his technical knowledge to bear on key contemporary naval issues. The 1875 document is the 7th issue of the Mémorial du Génie maritime for 1875, and the 1876 document was filed in the library of the Service historique de la Marine under call number 27.L.13.

Documents généraux relatifs aux divers types de bâtiments de la flotte (General documents relating to the various types of vessels in the fleet) (1884), signed by Jean-Rosier Albaret, Assistant Naval Engineer

• Documents généraux relatifs aux divers types de bâtiments de la flotte (15 October 1884)
  

-- Albaret produced this volume of tables for the Navy's senior advisory council, the Conseil d'Amirauté (Council of Admiralty). He based his tables on those compiled by Dislère (above) and like Dislère drew much of the data from the ships' devis d'armement, although he considerably expanded the technical information on topics such as weights and stability. He signed his first edition on 1 August 1881 and this second one on 15 October 1884. Albaret's tables, supplemented by those of Dislère, were key sources for the earlier parts of Shipscribe's book French Warships in the Age of Steam 1859-1914 (Seaforth, 2021). Both editions are in the archives of the Service historique de la Marine, the 1881 one with the call number 0DD1-40 and the 1884 one as BB8-968.

Renseignements sur les Bouches à Feu de l'Artillerie Navale de tous Calibres et Modèles (Information on the Guns of the Naval Artillery of all Calibers and Models) (1858-1912)

• Renseignements sur les Bouches à Feu de l'Artillerie Navale de tous Calibres et Modèles
  

-- This compilation of technical data on all French naval guns between Model 1858 and Model 1912, now in the U.S. National Archives (Record Group 38, Register 12008A), was forwarded on 17 July 1919 by the Directeur central de l'artillerie navale (Central Director of Naval Artillery) through official channels to the U.S. Naval Attaché in Paris, Rear Admiral Andrew Theodore Long, who had requested it on 31 May 1919. The French asked that the Americans reciprocate by providing similar information on American naval artillery, but it is not known if this occurred. It appears to date from just before World War I.

Devis d'armement (et de campagne)

• Batterie flottante Tonnante (1855, Crimean war)
  
• Garde-côtes cuirassé Rochambeau (1870, Franco-Prussian war)
  
• Cuirassé d'escadre Brennus (1896, as rebuilt)
  

-- As soon as a new ship completed fitting out and commissioning, the naval engineer in charge of that process signed and delivered to the ship's captain a devis (booklet of specifications) with a first part containing complete technical details on the dimensions, artillery, weights, stowage, machinery, trials, etc. of the ship. When a ship's captain was relieved, he would fill out and deliver to the new captain a second part of the devis containing his comments on all aspects of the ship during the period under his command (campagne) including a brief summary of the ship's activities. The remarks were then reviewed both locally and in Paris to evaluate the changes made to the ship after commissioning and the observations of the ship's captains on the performance of its component systems. In the 1860s the two parts of this devis were separated, the first becoming the Devis d'armement and the second the Devis de campagne. These devis are now stored in the ships' folders in series 7DD1 of the archives of the Service historique de la Marine.

Listes de la Flotte (Fleet Lists)

• Liste de la Flotte au 1er janvier 1900
  
• Liste de la Flotte au 1er janvier 1907
  
• Liste de la Flotte au 1er janvier 1914
  
• Liste de la Flotte au 1er mars 1920
  
• Liste de la Flotte au 1er janvier 1924
  
• Liste de la Flotte au 1er janvier 1936
  

-- In 1848 the Navy printed a Liste générale des bâtiments en chantier et à flot, which in 1853 became an État (général) des bâtiments composant la flotte and in 1861 a Liste de la Flotte. Such lists had existed for many years in other forms, often as parts of other documents, and ships were being struck rayés from the Navy as early as the 1660s.

World War I

• Constitution de la flotte de patrouille (Formation of the patrol fleet) (1914-1916), by Lieutenant de Vaisseau Leteux (1925)
  
• La traversée de l'atlantique par les chasseurs de sous marins construits en Amérique (The transatlantic crossing by submarine chasers built in America) (Aout 1917 - Novembre 1918), by Lieutenant de Vaisseau Barbier (1923)
  

-- These two theses were written by student officers at the École de Guerre Navale (Naval War College), Barbier in 1923 and Leteux in 1925, both soon after the events narrated. Leteux describes the French program of 1914-1916 to build a coastal patrol force (including some vessels built in the U.S.), and Barbier discusses a later French small craft program, the purchase of 100 American 110-foot subchasers in 1917, with emphasis on how the craft crossed the Atlantic in 1917-18. Although outside the focus of this website, these may be of interest to American as well as French researchers. They were filed in the library of the Service historique de la Marine, Barbier with the call number 11.T.6 and Leteux as 11.T.110.


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