Poor en flûte

Capture of the Alcide and the Lys in battle on June 8, 1755 ; the 64-gun ship Lys was armed en flûte , the armament was reduced to 22 guns.

Armer en flûte ( French: armer en flûte = "to arm like a flute ") is a French expression from the age of sailing ships. It describes the reduced armament of a warship that was used as a transport ship .

Origin of name

The expression comes from the French name for flute, which was widely used as a merchant ship and naval auxiliary ship . This name comes from the Dutch name Fluit, which was probably the most common transport ship during the 17th century .

In contrast, ships that were fully equipped with sailors, cannons and ammunition were referred to as armé en guerre ( French armé en guerre = "armed for war").

description

Some warships, such as ships of the line and frigates , were occasionally lighter armed by reducing the number of cannons and the caliber of the cannons. Since ships can hold a limited amount of cargo, they could be armed en flûte to have capacity for other cargo such as troops or ammunition. This, of course, reduced his own defensive capabilities.

This tactic was paramount in the age of sailing ships, when the battery decks took up most of the space above the waterline . Reducing the armament of a ship meant enormous space savings, as the number of gunners and their equipment and food could also be reduced. The size of the crew of a sailing ship was mainly determined by the number of cannons. Several men were needed for each cannon, since most of the cannons on one side of the ship were needed at the same time. The number of men needed for battle was much higher than the crew needed for sailing. The armament of a ship of the line en flûte had about a quarter of the usual armament and could transport over 1,000 soldiers.

For example, during the Seven Years' War in North America , the French sent 3,000 soldiers aboard a large squadron of warships to aid Canada . These ships were armed en flûte to accommodate the soldiers.

literature

• Alfred Dudszus, Alfred Köpcke: The big book of ship types . Augsburg, Weltbild Verlag (licensed edition, transpress, Berlin), 1995. ISBN 3-89350-831-7 , p. 106

Individual evidence

1. ^ Charles Romme: Dictionnaire de la marine françoise avec figures. , Paris 1792, p. 39 ( online )
2. ^ Charles Romme: Dictionnaire de la marine françoise avec figures. , Paris 1792, p. 319 ( online )