La Touraine
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The La Touraine was a transatlantic passenger steamer put into service in 1891 by the French shipping company Compagnie Générale Transatlantique (CGT). It was decommissioned in 1922 after 31 years of service and scrapped the following year. The La Touraine was one of the most popular French passenger ships at the turn of the century.
history
Since 1861 the semi-state French shipping company Compagnie Générale Transatlantique (CGT) has been one of the companies that offered regular mail and passenger services on the North Atlantic. The pioneering era of twin-screw steamers on the Atlantic began in 1888/89 with the British City of New York or City of Paris and the four luxury liners of the German " Augusta Victoria class". This made the single screw ships of the CGT seem out of date almost overnight. Although a lot of money had flowed into the relatively young fleet of the “ La Champagne class”, the CGT had to react with its own twin-screw steamer, if only for reasons of national prestige. Because there was actually no real need for such a ship in France. The result was La Touraine in 1891 , a state-of-the-art floating piece of France on the ocean. In terms of its external appearance, White Stars Teutonic and Majestic looked very similar, only the compact, sloping chimneys symbolized lasting independence and became the trademark of the new Atlantic liner. And just as innovative as on the two White Star liners, the main restaurant was located in the middle, in the area between the two chimneys, where the movements of the ship on the high seas could be felt far less, in a stomach-friendly way, than with the otherwise predominant arrangement in the front third of one Atlantic liners.
Despite the limitations of the port of Le Havr, which the “La Touraine” exhausted to the maximum, she was one of the largest and fastest ships of her time. The steamship was built at the Chantiers de Penhoët shipyard , subsidiary of the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, in Saint-Nazaire and was launched on March 21, 1890. With a tonnage of 8,893 gross registered tonnes (GRT), she was the largest ship of the CGT until then. It was not until around ten years later that the sister ships La Lorraine and La Savoie (both 11,168 GRT) put larger ocean liner into service.
The ship is 163.65 meters long and 17.07 meters wide and had two chimneys and originally three masts. It was powered by two three-cylinder triple expansion steam engines, which acted on two propellers and enabled a cruising speed of 19 knots. The relatively large and fast steamer was built for the North Atlantic passenger and mail traffic from Le Havre to New York and was designed to accommodate 392 passengers in first class, 98 in second class and 600 in third class.
The interior design was exquisite and met the highest demands of the era with a music, writing and smoking salon. The same goes for the restaurant with an open fireplace, where "haute cuisine" was celebrated in all its diversity and excellence. However, what set the La Touraine apart from all other ships was called the “Escalier Grande” - the great staircase. This entrance area of the luxury liner was looking for its equal. In France you had a feel for the grandiose, dramatic appearance, even if the other rooms on the steamer had to step back a little. A double staircase, spanned by a dome, paneled in mahogany and satin wood, with balconies, lanterns, paintings as well as mirrors and gold inlays made the entrance to the La Touraine absolutely overwhelming, at least for the passengers of the first class.
On June 20, 1891, the La Touraine started on her maiden voyage to New York. In July 1892, she managed a crossing in six days, 17 hours and 30 minutes and briefly reached a top speed of 21.2 knots on the so-called "measured mile". However, the normal service speed was around 19 knots. Thus the counting La Touraine Although the fastest ships of its time, but was of the current records of the City of Paris and the City of New Yor k far from the average speeds of over 20 knots could run on the Atlantic. Contrary to other claims , the La Touraine never won the " Blue Ribbon " or any other speed record on the Atlantic. Relatively shortly after her commissioning, the "La Touraine" was substantially rebuilt, which brought her (and not only during her stay in the shipyard in 1901) among other things, the removal of the middle mast. In an advertising brochure from 1895, the ship can already be seen with only two masts. On September 10, 1894, the "La Touraine" collided with the ship "Sully" in thick fog and at high speed. Whether the resulting damage was the reason for the conversion, including the reduction to two masts, cannot be clearly proven, but given the proximity in time it is a plausible probability. Between November 23, 1901 and January 17, 1902, she underwent a renovation in Saint-Nazaire, during which a bilge keel was installed and the engines were overhauled. The passenger capacity of the third class was increased to 1000 passengers. As a result of the renovations, the volume was reduced to 8429 GRT. On January 21, 1903, there was a fire on board at the berth in Le Havre. The main staircase, the dining room and the luxury cabins were destroyed and had to be completely replaced before the ship could sail back to New York.
In 1910, further conversions were carried out so that the cabins of the La Touraine could now accommodate 69 passengers in the first, 263 in the second and 686 in the third class. The La Touraine was one of the numerous ships that warned the Titanic of icebergs on its maiden voyage in April 1912 . Between May 1913 and June 1914, she carried out five tours on the route Le Havre - Québec - Montreal and only carried passengers in the second and third class. On one of these crossings, the La Touraine came to the aid of the British passenger steamer Volturno in October 1913 , which was burning and rudderless on the Atlantic. The La Touraine took 40 people and almost collided during the rescue operation with the much larger Kroonland of the Red Star Line , which, along with other ships, had also come to the scene of the accident.
It was not until March 13, 1915 that she ran out again for a trip on the original route Le Havre - New York. Only a month later, on April 13, 1915, it was moved to the Bordeaux- New York route. In September 1915, the La Touraine picked up again castaways from a passenger ship in flames, this time from the Greek steamer Athinai . From February 9, 1919, the La Touraine commuted again between Le Havre and New York and on September 26, 1922, after more than 30 years of service, she ran out of this route for her last Atlantic crossing. Immediately afterwards, the steamer was sold to anchor as a hotel ship under the name Maritime in Gothenburg, Sweden. From there the very last route of the former La Touraine led to Dunkirk , where it was demolished and scrapped in October 1923.
Web links
- Brief summary of the ship's history in The Ships List (upper third)
- Technical and historical data on the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique website
Individual evidence
- ↑ Le Génie civil: revue générale des industries françaises et étrangères. June 27, 1891, Retrieved July 16, 2020 .
- ↑ John H. Gould: Grand winter excursion to the Mediterranean, the Orient, and the Holy Land: including the Azores, Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Sicily, Egypt, Palestine, Turkey, Greece, Malta, Tunis, and Algeria by the well-known fast twin-screw express steamship "La Touraine," 10,000 tons, 14,000 horse-power, length 540 feet, commander Santelli: sailing from New York, February 4th, 1896, and returning about April 5th, 1896, duration of round trip, two months. New York? :, 1895 ( handle.net [accessed July 16, 2020]).
- ^ Records and Briefs of the United States Supreme Court . 1906 ( google.de [accessed on July 16, 2020]).