French Navy Ships, 1816-1859
A plan of the paddle frigate (ex steam packet) Panama dated 28 February 1847.
This portion of the Shipscribe site contains a reference guide to the ships of the French navy between 1816 and 1859, the period during which the navy transitioned from sail to steam. More complete data are now available in Winfield and Roberts, French Warships in the Age of Sail, 1786-1861 as noted above, but the data here remain valid. The main part of this site consists of data pages for ships added to the navy between 1816 and 1859. Most of the data is from the French naval archives, collected while the author was researching his Ph.D dissertation, The Introduction of Steam Technology in the French Navy, 1818-1852 (University of Chicago, 1976). The dissertation provides historical context for this data (but not the data itself) and is available on ProQuest (Dissertations) to those with academic access. This site also contains a list of ships in the French navy as of 1816 and a historical introduction that includes data tables on building programs, the strength of the navy, its guns, steam engine builders, etc. The data format was based on Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships. Information on sail and screw transports was added in March 2009. To begin select one of the following links.
and, for the main listing,
Go to Shipscribe Home Page
This entire site, including all its pages, is copyright © Stephen S. Roberts 2001-2021 or later as indicated.