 Suchet in Toulon early in her career
| |
| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Preceded by | Davout |
| Succeeded by | Forbin class |
| History | |
 France | |
| Name | Suchet |
| Ordered | 1 March 1887 |
| Laid down | 1 October 1887 |
| Launched | 10 August 1893 |
| Commissioned | 1 January 1894 |
| Decommissioned | 11 November 1905 |
| Stricken | 24 April 1906 |
| Fate | Broken up, 1927 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type | Protected cruiser |
| Displacement | 3,440 t (3,390 long tons; 3,790 short tons) |
| Length | 98.95 m (324 ft 8 in) loa |
| Beam | 12.12 m (39 ft 9 in) |
| Draft | 5.35 m (18 ft) |
| Installed power |
|
| Propulsion | |
| Speed | 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph) |
| Complement | 335 |
| Armament |
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| Armor |
|
Suchet was a protected cruiser of the French Navy built in the late 1880s and early 1890s. The ship was ordered during the tenure of Admiral Théophile Aube as the French Minister of Marine, who favored a fleet centered on large numbers of cruisers of various types. Suchet and the similar vessel Davout were ordered to fill the role of a medium cruiser in Aube's plans; the two cruisers were meant to be identical, but problems during Davout's construction forced design changes to Suchet, resulting in two unique vessels rather than a single class. Suchet was armed with a main battery of six 164 mm (6.5 in) guns in individual mounts and had a top speed of 20.4 knots (37.8 km/h; 23.5 mph).
After completing her sea trials in 1894, Suchet was assigned to the Mediterranean Squadron the next year. She took part in the opening ceremonies for the Bizerte Canal later that year. She continued to operate with the unit through early 1897, when she was sent to the Levant Division in the eastern Mediterranean. The ship was reassigned to the Naval Division of the Atlantic Ocean in 1900, and she was one of the first responders to the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelée in May, helping to rescue survivors from Saint-Pierre and its harbor, along with other towns on the island of Martinique. In total, she evacuated around 1,200 people to Fort-de-France. The next month, she was involved in a minor diplomatic incident with Venezuela, where six Frenchmen had been arrested; Suchet's intervention secured their release. The ship returned to France later in 1902, where she was placed in reserve. Struck from the naval register in 1906, Suchet was broken up for scrap.