French destroyer Mistral

Mistral was a built for the French Navy during the 1920s.

Design and description

The Bourrasque class had an overall length of, a beam of, and a draft of. The ships displaced at load and at deep load. They were powered by two geared steam turbines, each driving one propeller shaft, using steam provided by three du Temple boilers. The turbines were designed to produce, which would propel the ship at. The ships carried enough fuel oil to give them a range of at.
The main armament of the Bourrasque-class ships consisted of four Canon de Modèle 1919 guns in shielded single mounts, one superfiring pair each fore and aft of the superstructure. Their anti-aircraft (AA) armament consisted of a single Canon de Modèle 1924 gun. The ships carried two triple mounts of torpedo tubes amidships. A pair of depth charge chutes were built into their stern that housed a total of sixteen depth charges.

When France surrendered to Germany in June 1940 during World War II, Mistral sought refuge at Plymouth Dockyard in Devon, England. On 3 July 1940, the British executed Operation Catapult, in which they seized or destroyed French warships in French and British ports to prevent them from falling into German or Vichy French hands. That day, Mistral was partially scuttled at Plymouth during the operation. The British later salvaged her and placed her in Royal Navy service as HMS Mistral.
Operating with the Free French Naval Forces in support of the Allies of [World War II|Allied] invasion of Normandy, Mistral was damaged by German artillery fire in the English Channel off Quinéville, Manche, France, on 10 June 1944. She was declared a constructive total loss.