''Provence'' was a

74-gun The "seventy-four" was a type of two- decked sailing ship of the line, which nominally carried 74 guns. It was developed by the French navy in the 1740s, replacing earlier classes of 60- and 62-gun ships, as a larger complement to the recently-de ...

ship of the line A ship of the line was a type of naval warship constructed during the Age of Sail from the 17th century to the mid-19th century. The ship of the line was designed for the naval tactic known as the line of battle, which depended on the two colu ...

of the

French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in t ...

. Her keel was laid down in Toulon in 1812 as ''Kremlin''. During her construction, she was renamed ''Provence'' during the

Bourbon Restoration Bourbon Restoration may refer to: France under the House of Bourbon: * Bourbon Restoration in France (1814, after the French revolution and Napoleonic era, until 1830; interrupted by the Hundred Days in 1815) Spain under the Spanish Bourbons: * ...

, ''Hercule'' briefly during the

Hundred Days The Hundred Days (french: les Cent-Jours ), also known as the War of the Seventh Coalition, marked the period between Napoleon's return from eleven months of exile on the island of Elba to Paris on20 March 1815 and the second restoration ...

, when she was launched, and back to ''Provence'' from July 1815. She was commissioned after 12 years, in 1827, but sustained heavy damage when she collided with the ''Scipion'' which was returning from the

Battle of Navarino The Battle of Navarino was a naval battle fought on 20 October (O. S. 8 October) 1827, during the Greek War of Independence (1821–29), in Navarino Bay (modern Pylos), on the west coast of the Peloponnese peninsula, in the Ionian Sea. Allied fo ...

, and had to return to Toulon for repairs. After the "fan incident", she sailed for Algiers to attempt talks, arriving on 3 August 1829. In July 1830, she was the flagship of Vice-admiral Duperré for the

Invasion of Algiers in 1830 The invasion of Algiers in 1830 was a large-scale military operation by which the Kingdom of France, ruled by Charles X, invaded and conquered the Deylik of Algiers. Algiers was annexed by the Ottoman Empire in 1529 after the capture of Algie ...

. On 17 July 1830, she was renamed ''Alger'' to celebrate the capitulation of the city. In 1831, ''Alger'' took part in the

Battle of the Tagus The Battle of the Tagus was a naval engagement that took place on 11 July 1831 at the mouth of the Tagus river, in Portugal. A French fleet attacked and subdued Portuguese fortifications at the entrance of the Tagus, with the aim to strong-arm ...

, under Captain Jacques Leblanc, and later in the

Crimean war The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia. Geopolitical causes of the war included the de ...

, bombarding Sevastopol. From 1855, she was used as a hospital hulk, and was eventually broken up in 1881.

References

Ships of the line of the French Navy Téméraire-class ships of the line Ships built in France 1815 ships Crimean War naval ships of France {{France-line-ship-stub

See also

References