Liberté - class battleship The " Liberté " class was a group of four pre - dreadnought battleship s of the French Navy . The class comprised " Liberté " , the lead ship , " Justice " , " Vérité " , and " Démocratie " . The ships were in most respects repeats of the previous , and the major difference was the adoption of guns for the secondary battery , rather than the guns of the " République " class . Due to their similarity , the two classes are sometimes treated as one basic design . The four " Liberté " - class ships were built between 1903 and 1908 ; they were completed over a year after the revolutionary British , which rendered the French ships obsolete before they entered service . In September 1909 , three of the ships , " Liberté " , " Justice " , and " Vérité " visited the United States for the Hudson - Fulton Celebration . Two years later , " Liberté " s forward magazines exploded in Toulon harbor , destroying the ship and killing approximately 250 of her crew . The three surviving ships saw action early in World War I at the Battle of Antivari , and spent the remainder blockading the Austro - Hungarian Navy in the Adriatic and were later stationed at Mudros in the Aegean . They were stricken from the naval register in 1921 – 1922 and broken up for scrap . " Liberté " was left on the bottom of Toulon harbor until 1925 , when she was raised and broken up for scrap . Design . The Fleet Law of 1900 authorized the French Navy to build six new battleships , along with a host of other warship types ; the law signaled an end to the " Jeune École " doctrine that emphasized commerce raiding and torpedo boat s instead of a battle fleet of capital ship s . The first two battleships ordered , the , formed the design basis for the subsequent four of the " Liberté " class . The naval engineer Émile Bertin designed both the " République " and " Liberté " classes . General characteristics and machinery . The ships were long between perpendiculars and had a beam of and a full - load draft of . The ships displaced between for " Vérité " to for " Justice " at full load . The ships were built with a tall forecastle deck that extended all the way to the mainmast . The ships retained a small fighting mast for the foremast , but had a lighter pole mast for the mainmast . They had a crew of between 739 and 769 officers and enlisted men . The ships had a metacentric height of , and were equipped with bilge keels to increase their stability . The ships were powered by three 4 - cylinder vertical triple expansion engines with twenty - two Belleville boiler s , with the exception of " Justice " , which was equipped with twenty - four Niclausse boiler s . The boilers were divided into three boiler rooms , each of which were trunked into their own funnel . The engines were rated at and provided a top speed of . Normal coal storage amounted to , and at a cruising speed of , the ships had a radius of action of . Additional space aboard the ship could be used to store a total of of coal , which increased the cruising radius to . Armament and armor . The main battery for the " Liberté " - class ships consisted of four Canon de 305 mm Modèle 1893 / 96 gun s mounted in two twin gun turret s , one forward and one aft . The secondary battery consisted of ten Canon de 194 mm Modèle 1902 guns ; six were mounted in single turrets , and four in casemate s in the hull . They also carried thirteen 9 - pounder guns and ten 3 - pounder guns for close - range defense against torpedo boat s . The ships were also armed with two torpedo tube s submerged in the hull . The ships ' armor layout was nearly identical to the previous " République " class . The main belt was thick at the waterline and extended for almost the complete length of the hull , from the bow to near the stern . The belt was reduced to on the top edge and on the bottom . On the bow and stern , the thicknesses were reduced to , , and 81 mm , respectively . The armored deck was thick amidships , and increased to on the slopes that connected to the belt . The main battery was protected by up to of armor , and had bases with thick armor plate . The secondary turrets had thick faces and 280 mm thick back plates to balance the turrets , and were mounted on bases with 140 mm thick armor , compared to the thick armor of the " République " s ' turret bases . The casemate guns were protected with 140 mm of armor . The conning tower had thick sides . Service history . " Liberté " , the lead ship of the class , was laid down at the " Ateliers et Chantiers de la Loire " shipyard in November 1902 , launched on 19 April 1905 , and completed in March 1908 . " Justice " and " Vérité " were both laid down in April 1903 , " Justice " at the La Seyne shipyard in Toulon and " Vérité " at the " Forges et Chantiers de la Gironde " shipyard in Bordeaux . " Justice " was launched on 27 October 1904 and completed in February 1908 , and " Vérité " was launched on 28 May 1907 and completed in June 1908 . " Démocratie " , the last vessel of the class , was laid down at the Arsenal de Brest shipyard on 1 May 1903 , launched on 30 April 1904 , and completed in January 1908 . The ships were completed after the revolutionary British battleship ; her design , which incorporated a uniform main battery of ten guns and high - speed steam turbines , rendered all other pre - dreadnought s like the " Liberté " class obsolete . In September 1909 , " Liberté " , " Justice " , and " Vérité " visited the United States for the Hudson - Fulton Celebration . In early 1911 , " Justice " and " Vérité " were used with success in the Navy ' s experiments with wireless telegraphy . Later that year , in September , " Liberté " was destroyed by a huge explosion in her forward propellant magazines . Several nearby warships were damaged by debris , including the battleship " République " . The explosion aboard " Liberté " killed some 250 officers and men . The wreck was left in Toulon until 1925 , when it was raised and broken up for scrap . At the outbreak of World War I in August 1914 , the three surviving ships were assigned to the 2nd Squadron of the Mediterranean Fleet . They assisted in escorting troop convoys from French North Africa to metropolitan France in the first days of the war , and then moved to the southern Adriatic to prevent the Austro - Hungarian Navy from breaking out into the Mediterranean . There , at the Battle of Antivari , the French battlefleet caught and sank the Austro - Hungarian cruiser in late August . Later in the war , " Justice " , " Vérité " , and " Démocratie " were sent to Mudros . After the end of the conflict , all three ships were placed in reserve and stricken from the naval register in 1921 – 1922 and sold for scrap .