French cruiser Dupleix

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For other ships of the same name, see French ship Dupleix.

Career (France)
The Dupleix
Namesake:	Joseph François Dupleix
Builder:	Arsenal de Brest
Laid down:	14 November 1929
Launched:	9 October 1930
Commissioned:	7 July 1932
Fate:	scuttled at Toulon, 27 November 1942
General characteristics
Class and type:	Suffren class cruiser
Displacement:	10,000 tonnes (standard) 12,780 tonnes (full load)
Length:	196 metres
Beam:	20 metres
Draught:	7.3 metres
Propulsion:	3-shaft Rateau-Bretagne SR geared turbines, 9 Guyot boilers, 100,000 shp
Speed:	32 knots
Range:	4500 at 15 knots
Complement:	773
Armament:	8 203mm/50 Modèle 1924 (4 × 2) 8 90 mm (3.5 inch) 55-calibre anti-aircraft guns (8 × 1) 8 37 mm anti-aircraft guns (4 × 2) 12 13.2 mm AA (4 × 3) 6 550 mm (21.7 inch) torpedo tubes (2 × 3);
Armour:	belt 60 millimetres; deck 25 millimetres; turrets and tower, 30 millimetres.
Aircraft carried:	2 Loire-Nieuport 130, 2 catapults

The Dupleix was a French heavy cruiser of the Suffren type, that saw service during World War II. She was named for the 18th century Governor-General of French India Joseph François Dupleix.

She was commissioned on 7 July 1932 and based in Toulon, as part of the 1st light division of the 1st squadron. In 1937, she was completely refitted. From 14 October 1939 to the end of January 1940, along with the cruiser Algérie, she was part of Force X based in Dakar.

While on patrol in the Atlantic with the destroyers, Le Fantasque and Le Terrible, she intercepted and captured the German freighter Santa Fé, on October 25, 1939, On June 14, 1940, Dupleix participated in the French raid on Genoa, with sister ships Foch and Colbert.

After the surrender, Dupleix remained with the Vichy Fleet at Toulon. When the Germans occupied Vichy France, she was scuttled, in the Scuttling of the French fleet in Toulon. German officers, attempting to take the ship intact, rushed aboard and forced the French crew below decks, and successfully located and closed the sea valves. The ship's captain, capitaine de vaisseau Moreau, ordered the scuttling charges in the main turrets to be lit with shortened fuses and when they exploded and fires took hold, Moreau ordered the final evacuation. French and Germans aboard all fled the vessel. Explosions of the ship's torpedo stores destroyed the vessel, which burned for 10 days.

The Italians raised the ship on 3 July 1943, but she was sunk again during an allied air raid in 1944.