French Gold Coins 50 Euro 2013, Great French Ships - La Gloire
The fifth coin of a new series featuring great French ships. Every year for five years, this series will pay tribute to a sailing ship, a warship and an ocean liner. This 50 Euro Proof Gold coin depicts The Gloire.
COLLECTION OF "GREAT FRENCH SHIPS"
La Gloire is considered as the first battleship on the open sea of west in the service of the French Navy. This wooden frigate of 5 630 tons presented a hull covered with wrought iron protective patches about 115mm from the battery to the flotation. Making obsolete all the vessels of the line then in service, its launch naval activated an arms race. However, the wooden hull deteriorated very fast and the Gloire was struck off of service in 1879, and then destroyed in 1883.
The battleship, the Gloire, is represented on the top of the coin’s obverse with its sails and its chimney. On the low part, under a rope, appears the detail of the battleship and scubbles (opening in the side of a ship by which pass the gun barrels).
The reverse is a composition which is common to all the warships and is featured in all the five coins. The silhouettes of five ships of this series are surmounted by a blue-collar into which comes the face value. An arc of a circle of links surrounds the year.
Artist : Monnaie de Paris
Weight : 8,45 g
Diameter : 22 mm
Mintage : 1000
Metal : Gold 920/1000
Proof : Proof
Vintage : 2013
Face value : 50 Euro
Price (incl. taxes): 420.00 Euro
French ironclad Gloire - La Gloire
The French ironclad Gloire ("Glory") was the first ocean-going ironclad, launched in 1859. She was developed following the Crimean War, in response to new developments in naval gun technology, especially the Paixhans guns and rifled guns, which used explosive shells with increased destructive power against wooden ships, and followed the development of the ironclad floating batteries built by the British and French for the bombardment of Russian forts during the Crimean War.She was designed by the French naval architect Henri Dupuy de Lôme as a 5,630-ton broadside ironclad with a wooden hull. Her 12 cm-thick (4.7 in) armour plates, backed with 43 cm (17 in) of timber, resisted the experimental firing of the strongest guns of the time (the French 50-pounder and the British 68-pounder) at full charge, at a distance of 20 metres (65 ft).
Her official top speed was 13.1 knots but other reports suggested no more than 11.75 knots had been reached and that 11 knots was the practical maximum.
As was common for the era, Gloire was constructed with sails as well as a steam-powered screw. The original rigging was a light barquentine rig providing 1,096 sq. m (11,800 sq. ft) of surface area. This was later increased to a full rig providing 2,508 sq. m (27,000 sq. ft) of surface.
Gloire was launched at the arsenal of Mourillon, Toulon, on 24 November 1859; and entered service in August 1860.
She was struck from the French fleet registry in 1879, and scrapped in 1883.
Importance in naval history
As the first ocean-going ironclad, Gloire rendered obsolete traditional unarmoured wooden ships-of-the-line, and all major navies had no choice but to build ironclads of their own. However Gloire was soon herself rendered obsolete by the launching in 1860 of the British HMS Warrior, the world's first iron-hulled ironclad warship.