Sold for Scrap 21 December 1955
The French battleship Paris was a Courbet-class dreadnought battleship of the French Navy. The Courbet class were designed by M. Lyasse. Paris was built as part of the 1910 naval building programme.
Paris was the only of the Courbet class to be built by the Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée firm in La Seyne Arsenal. She and her sister ship, France, were sent to St. Petersburg, Russia as part of French President Raymond Poincare's official visit. Both ships were en route home through the Baltic Sea when the First World War broke out in August 1914. At the time, France was not fully armed and had no ammunition aboard. Paris would have had to defend both of them if an enemy ship were sighted, but they managed to escape the German High Seas Fleet.
Along with her three sister ships, Paris served in the Mediterranean Sea during the War against Austro-Hungarian and Turkish Naval forces.
During the Second World War, on June 11, 1940 she was damaged by German bombing at le Havre, France, and was towed to Brest for repairs. Before France surrendered, she sailed to Plymouth, England.
In the wake of the Armistice, she was docked at Portsmouth; on the 3 July 1940, as part of "Operation Catapult", she was forcibly boarded by British forces, along with the destroyers Le Triomphant and the Léopard, her sister-ship Courbet, eight torpedo boats, five submarines and a number of other ships of lesser importance. After "Operation Catapult" when battleship was in British hands it was planned to transfer the ship to Polish Navy. The ceremony was to be held on July 15, 1940 and it was planned to rename the ship to OF Paris (OF - Okret Francuski - "French ship") but due to lack of personnel finally ship was not handed over and was used by British as an accommodation ship in Devonport. On August 21, 1945, after the war had ended, she was towed to Brest. She was never used again, and was sold for scrap on December 21, 1955.
