French battleship Masséna Masséna was a pre - dreadnought battleship of the French Navy , built in the 1890s . She was a member of a group of five broadly similar battleships , along with " Charles Martel " , " Jauréguiberry " , " Bouvet " , and " Carnot " , that were ordered in response to the British . She was named in honour of Marshal of France André Masséna . " Masséna " significantly exceeded her design weight and suffered from serious stability problems that inhibited accurate firing of her guns ; as a result , she was considered to be an unsuccessful design . " Masséna " served in both the Northern and Mediterranean Squadrons during her career , which included a period as the flagship of the Northern Squadron . She was withdrawn from service before the outbreak of World War I in 1914 . The following year , she was hulked at Toulon . She was later towed to Cape Helles at the end of the Gallipoli peninsula where on 9 November 1915 she was scuttled to create a breakwater to protect the evacuation of the Allied expeditionary force withdrawing from the Gallipoli Campaign . Design . " Masséna " was the fourth member of a group of five battleships built to a broadly similar design , but different enough to be considered unique vessels . The first ship was " Charles Martel " , which formed the basis for " Masséna " and three other ships . Design specifications were identical for each of the ships , but different engineers designed each vessel . The ships were based on the previous battleship " Brennus " , but instead of mounting the main battery all on the centerline , the ships used the lozenge arrangement of the earlier vessel " Magenta " , which moved two of the main battery guns to single turrets on the wings . The five ships were built in response to the British s . General characteristics and machinery . " Masséna " was long between perpendiclars , and had a beam of and a draft of . She was designed to displace at normal load , but she was significantly overweight when completed , and she displaced . This caused the ship to sit lower in the water than intended , which partially submerged her armored belt . She was built with a pronounced snout bow to improve her buoyancy . She had a crew of 667 officers and enlisted men . " Masséna " had three vertical triple expansion engines each driving a single screw , with steam supplied by twenty - four Lagrafel d ' Allest water - tube boilers . Her propulsion system was rated at , which allowed the ship to steam at a speed of ; this was a knot slower than her design speed of . With only two - thirds of her boilers operating for more economic cruising , these figures fell to and , respectively . As built , she could carry of coal , though additional space allowed for up to in total . Armament and armor . " Masséna " s main armament consisted of two Canon de 305 mm Modèle 1893 gun s in two single - gun turrets , one each fore and aft . Each turret had an arc of fire of 250° . The placement of the forward gun turret close to the bow placed a great deal of weight too far forward . This exacerbated stability problems with the ship , and rendered accurate shooting more difficult . She also mounted two Canon de 274 mm Modèle 1893 gun s in two single - gun turrets , one amidships on each side , sponsoned out over the tumblehome of the ship ' s sides . Her secondary armament consisted of eight Canon de 138 . 6 mm Modèle 1891 gun s , which were mounted in manually operated twin turrets at the corners of the superstructure with 160° arcs of fire . She also carried eight quick - firing guns , twelve 3 - pounder quick - firers , and eight 1 - pounder guns . Her armament suite was rounded out by four torpedo tube s , two of which were submerged in the ship ' s hull . The ship ' s armor was constructed with Harvey steel manufactured by Creusot . The main belt was thick , and ran for a length of along the hull . It was wide . Above the belt was thick side armor . The bulkheads at either end of the armored belt were thick . The main battery guns were protected with of armor , and the secondary turrets had thick sides . The main armored deck was thick , and the splinter deck below it was thick . The conning tower had thick sides . Service . " Masséna " was laid down at the " Ateliers et Chantiers de la Loire " shipyard in September 1892 and launched nearly three years later in July 1895 . She was completed in June 1898 , in time for the Northern Squadron maneuvers conducted in July 1898 . She was assigned as the flagship of the Northern Squadron , and flew the flag of Vice Admiral Ménard . The Northern Squadron conducted annual training exercises in June ; the following month , they joined the Mediterranean Squadron for combined fleet maneuvers . In 1900 , four engineering officers were seriously injured while disassembling a pipe to repair it . They had disassembled it too quickly , and were severely scalded by escaping steam . In 1903 , the ship was transferred from the Northern Squadron to the Mediterranean , where she was assigned to the 2nd Squadron along with several of her half - sister ships . On 18 August 1903 , the ship participated in a gunnery trial with the new battleship off Île Longue . A mild steel plate thick , measuring , was attached to the side of " Suffren " s forward turret to determine the resistance of an armour plate to a large - calibre shell . " Masséna " anchored away from " Suffren " and fired a number of shells at the plate . The first three were training shells that knocked splinters off the armor plate . The last two shells , fired with full charges , cracked the plate , but " Suffren " s turret was fully operational , as was her Germain electrical fire - control system and the six sheep placed in the turret were unharmed . One splinter struck " Masséna " above her armor belt and left a 15 - centimetre sized hole in her hull . Another splinter landed within a few meters of the Naval Minister , Camille Pelletan , who was observing the trials . In September 1906 , Jean Cras was assigned to the ship . By 1908 , " Masséna " had been withdrawn from service and placed in the Reserve Squadron , along with five other old battleships . " Masséna " remained on active duty until 1913 , when she was withdrawn and placed out of service . She was reduced to a hulk in 1915 . She was towed from Toulon to Cape Helles on the Gallipoli peninsula at the end of the year , and scuttled there on 9 November to form a breakwater to protect the evacuation effort that withdrew the Allied expeditionary force in January 1916 .