Gloire- the French first (semi) Ironclad
France unnerved neighbouring Great Britain when it presented its wooden, steam-powered, screw driven warship - the 90-cannon Le Napoleon - in 1850. The French continued to build more steam-powered wooden ships of the line and added eight more Le Napoleon-class warships, while converting another twenty-eight sailing frigates and liners to steam propulsion as well. This inevitably forced the British in a frenzy to overbuild their French counterparts for the control of the oceans. Thus Britain succeeded in building eighteen new wooden steamships, all of which were of its own production, and forty-one older ships were converted to steam propulsion to further strengthen its maritime stability. Such warships were extremely capable, albeit somewhat cumbersome, machines capable of engaging an enemy from a distance with powerful shipboard cannons and of getting close to enemies with wooden ships that still used wooden hulls. Steam-powered ironclads were able to maintain their speed even in combat conditions because they did not require wind power in their sails as their main propulsion.
French ironclad La Gloire, 1860
The French authorities knew that they could not compete directly with UK ship production, so a new initiative was needed. During the Crimean War, France witnessed the success of French and British steam-powered iron-hulled barges with their paixhans ( rifled cannons firing explosive grenades) against Russian embankments. Thus, in 1857, the design of a new class of ship that would challenge the powerful British fleet fell to the famous French naval architect Dupuy de Lome.
La Gloire, 1860 photograph, by “La Royale” Jean Randier
One of these ships was the Gloire ( Glory ) the first ironclad frigate . Even though she had no real iron hull. She was built in Toulon in 1858, and was fitted with an iron keel and frames, but her planking was wooden, with a layer of iron on top of the planks. As expected from the industrial age, de Lome did not count much on the comfort of the crew below deck, so that the ventilation was bad at best - her boilers and steam engines produced a lot of heat and pushed the smoke within the limits of the ship. Oil lamps were still needed for lighting, and this only contributed to the rising internal temperatures, which were further insulated by the iron plates covering the hull. The gun ports were located close together, making the gun deck a little crowded for gun control. The sails were upgraded from the original arrangement of a barkentine sail rigging to a square rigged bark design. While their main means of propulsion was steam, her captain could rely on the wind power in her sails in an emergency (full confidence in the engines was not yet available at that point in history) or combine both methods to achieve maximum effect during the voyage. This always brought her a top speed of 11 knots.
Model of La Gloire, which was presented at the 1867 World Exposition in Paris
She served in the French Navy for nine years before undergoing a thorough overhaul and being rearmed. When she was rearmed, her original thirty-six muzzle loading cannons were replaced by the 8 x 239 mm BL Model 1864 and 6 x 193 mm BL Model 1866 cannons.
When La Gloire was launched in France, the British Admiralty had already heard about it and promptly ordered the construction of two ironclad ironclad ships and four iron hulled ships. With the launch of the HMS Warrior - an iron-hulled ship - the La Gloire became obsolete and her reign as mistress of the sea lasted only one year.
La Gloire 1858 (above) and HMS Warrior 1860 (below)
The rush to build her and her sister ships with unseasoned timber - a practice adopted throughout the French shipbuilding initiative - eventually led to maintenance problems, including frequent repairs, dry rot and higher operating costs for the French government. La Gloir had only been in service for two decades before being broken up in 1883.
