page_title: French cruiser Kléber
section_title: World War I
hierarchical_section_title: French cruiser Kléber / Service history / World War I
caption_attribution_description: English: The damaged bow of the French armored cruiser Kléber after her collision with HMT Boorara
context_page_description: Kléber was one of three Dupleix-class armored cruisers built for the French Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. Designed for overseas service and armed with four 164.7-millimeter guns, the ships were smaller and less powerfully armed than their predecessors. Completed in 1904, Kléber was initially assigned to the Mediterranean Squadron before she was transferred to the Atlantic Division three years later, where she often served as a flagship. The ship was reduced to reserve in 1909–1910 before she was sent to the Far East in 1911. Kléber returned to France two years later and was again placed in reserve.
  As tensions rose shortly before the beginning of World War I in August 1914, the ship was reactivated. When the war began she was assigned to defend Allied shipping in the English Channel and intercept German ships attempting to pass through. Transferred back to the Mediterranean in 1915, Kléber played a minor role on the periphery of the Gallipoli Campaign until a resurgence in German commerce raiding caused the Allies to transfer more cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping in mid-1916.
context_section_description: As tensions rose during the July Crisis of 1914, Kléber, Desaix and the other cruisers in reserve were reactivated. The sisters were assigned to the 3rd Light Division (3ᵉ Division légère (DL)) of the 2nd Light Squadron (Escadre 2ᵉ légère) which was tasked to defend the English Channel in conjunction with the British. The 3rd DL was on station in the western end of the Channel by 4 August, where their mission was to intercept German shipping and provide distant cover for the smaller ships escorting the transports conveying the British Expeditionary Force to France. In early September, Kléber and the armored cruisers Gloire and Gueydon established a new patrol line further south off the southern coast of Brittany. 
  Improved defenses in the Channel and the stabilization of the front in early 1915 allowed the cruisers to be released from their tasks, so Kléber was transferred to the Dardanelles to support Allied forces in the Gallipoli Campaign in May. She was assigned to the Dardanelles Squadron (Escadre des Dardanelles) when that unit was formed on 16 May. The ship briefly ran aground off Scala Nuova Bay and was engaged by coastal artillery without effect before she could free herself. Kléber, Dupleix, and the armored cruisers Bruix and Latouche-Tréville were now assigned to blockade the coast of Asia Minor, based out of Lesbos. Kléber collided with the Royal Australian Navy troopship HMT Boorara in the Aegean Sea on 17 July 1915, forcing Boorara to beach herself on Mudros and damaging the cruiser's bow. 
  After the Kingdom of Bulgaria joined the Central Powers in mid-October, Kléber, the Russian protected cruiser Askold and four destroyers was tasked to raid the Aegean coast of Bulgaria between Dedeagatch and Porto Lago while other forces bombarded the former town and its nearby railroad junction on 21 October. The successes of merchant raiders like Möwe in 1916 caused the Allies to transfer cruisers to the Atlantic to protect their shipping. Kléber became the flagship of a new 6th DL, which consisted of all three sisters, in July 1916, based in Dakar, French West Africa.
  To release manpower for higher-priority patrol boats, the 6th DL was reduced to two ships and renamed the Coast of Africa Division (Division navale de la côte d'Afrique) on 18 May 1917; Contre-amiral (Rear Admiral) Louis Jaurès transferred his flag to Dupleix. En route to Brest, France, Kléber struck a mine at 06:00 on 27 June that the German U-boat UC-61 had laid off the Iroise entrance to Brest. The mine exploded abreast the forward boiler rooms, knocking them and the forward auxiliary machine room offline. The aft boilers were only operable for 20 more minutes before bulkheads began to give way at 06:30 and abandon ship was ordered. Nearby fishing trawlers, a French torpedo boat and a British steamship were able to rescue all but 38 of her crew.
caption: Kléber's damaged bow after the collision
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