French destroyer Commandant Bory
Commandant Bory was one of a dozen s built for the French Navy in the first decade of the 20th century.
Design and description
The Bouclier class were designed to a general specification and varied significantly from each other in various ways. The ships had an overall length of, a beam of, and a draft of. Designed to displace, they displaced at normal load. Their crew numbered 80–83 men.Commandant Bory was powered by a pair of Rateau steam turbines, each driving one propeller shaft using steam provided by four water-tube boilers. The engines were designed to produce which was intended to give the ships a speed of. Commandant Bory exceeded that speed, reaching during her sea trials. The ships carried enough fuel oil to give them a range of at cruising speeds of.
The primary armament of the Bouclier-class ships consisted of two [Canon de 100 mm Modèle 1891|] Modèle 1893 guns in single mounts, one each fore and aft of the superstructure, and four Modèle 1902 guns distributed amidships. They were also fitted with two twin mounts for torpedo tubes amidships.
During World War I, a or [Canon de 75 modèle 1897|] anti-aircraft gun, two machine guns, and eight or ten Guiraud-type depth charges were added to the ships. The extra weight severely overloaded the ships and reduced their operational speed to around.
Construction and career
Commandant Bory was ordered from Dyle et Bacalan and was launched from its Bordeaux shipyard on 14 September 1912. The ship was completed the following year.When the First World War began in August 1914, Commandant Bory was assigned to the 6th Destroyer Flotilla of the 1st Naval Army. During the preliminary stages of the Battle of Antivari, Montenegro, on 16 August, the 1st, 4th and 5th Destroyer Flotillas were tasked to escort the core of the 1st Naval Army while the 2nd, 3rd and 6th Flotillas escorted the armored cruisers of the 2nd Light Squadron and two British cruisers. After reuniting both groups and spotting the Austro-Hungarian protected cruiser and the destroyer, the French destroyers played no role in sinking the cruiser, although the 4th Flotilla was sent on an unsuccessful pursuit of Ulan. Having broken the Austro-Hungarian blockade of Antivari, Vice-Admiral Augustin Boué de Lapeyrère, commander of the 1st Naval Army, decided to ferry troops and supplies to the port using a small requisitioned passenger ship,, escorted by the 2nd Light Squadron, reinforced by the armored cruiser, and escorted by the destroyer with the 1st and 6th Destroyer Flotillas under command while the rest of the 1st Naval Army bombarded the Austro-Hungarian naval base at Cattaro, Montenegro, on 1 September. Four days later, the fleet covered the evacuation of Danilo, Crown Prince of Montenegro, aboard Bouclier, to the Greek island of Corfu. The flotilla escorted multiple small convoys loaded with supplies and equipment to Antivari, beginning in October and lasting for the rest of the year, always covered by the larger ships of the Naval Army in futile attempts to lure the Austro-Hungarian fleet into battle. Amidst these missions, the 1st and 6th Flotillas were led by the as they conducted a sweep south of Cattaro on the night of 10/11 November in an unsuccessful search for Austro-Hungarian destroyers.
The torpedoing of the on 21 December caused a change in French tactics as the battleships were too important to risk to submarine attack. Henceforth, only the destroyers would escort the transports, covered by cruisers at a distance of from the transports. The first convoy of 1915 to Antivari arrived on 11 January and more were made until the last one on 20–21 April. After Italy signed the Treaty of London and declared war on the Austro-Hungarian Empire on 23 May, the ship was still assigned to the 6th Flotilla when the unit was transferred to the 1st Division of Destroyers and Submarines of the 2nd Squadron based at Brindisi, Italy.
While returning from an attack on a suspected Austro-Hungarian submarine base in the Gulf of Drin by a mixed group of Italian, British and French cruisers and destroyers on 9 June, the British light cruiser was torpedoed by the submarine U-4. The close escort managed to drive the submarine away, and Dublin successfully reached Brindisi without further damage. Commandant Bory was not part of the close escort of the cruiser and unsuccessfully pursued the submarine. On 12 July, the 6th Destroyer Flotilla, including Commandant Bory, was part of the force that raided the island of Lastovo off the Austrian coast of the Adriatic, destroying oil stores and the telegraph station. This attack was simultaneous with the Italian occupation of Palagruža.