After being sent to the United States for repairs and an extensive modernization, the ship served with the British Home Fleet in early 1944 before being deployed to the Eastern Fleet for operations against the Japanese in the Indian Ocean. Damaged in both attacks, the ship was slowly repaired before eventually being turned over to Free French control after the Allied invasion of North Africa in November 1942. There, she came under repeated British attacks that had been intended to either compel the battleship to join the Free French Naval Forces or sink her these included during Operation Catapult in July 1940 and the Battle of Dakar in September. As war with Germany became increasingly likely, work on the ship was rushed to prepare her for commissioning in April 1940.Ĭompleted just days before the Germans won the Battle of France in June, Richelieu fled to Dakar in French West Africa to keep her under French control. Richelieu was laid down in 1935 and was launched in 1939, just before the outbreak of World War II in Europe. They were scaled up to accommodate a much more powerful main battery of eight 380 mm (15 in) guns (compared to the 330 mm (13 in) guns of the Dunkerques), with increased armor to protect them from guns of the same caliber. Built as a response to the Italian Littorio class, the Richelieus were based on their immediate predecessors of the Dunkerque class with the same unconventional arrangement that grouped their main battery forward in two quadruple gun turrets. Richelieu was a French fast battleship, the lead ship of the Richelieu class. General characteristics Original configurationĩ,500 nautical miles (17,600 km 10,900 mi) at 15 kn (28 km/h 17 mph) Richelieu in September 1943 after her refit
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