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HISTORY
The
L'orenoque was one of the first French frigates to be fitted
with both steam and sail propulsion in 1848. It displaced 2568
tons. Although it was provided with a mechanical propulsion
advanced in conception, it still kept the typical masting of
frigates of that time. Scarcely armed, it was primarily used to
transport troops.
L’Orenoque was designed and built as a Troop transport,
particularly for cavalry during the steam era for the French
armed forces. She was an advanced hybrid steam and sail vessel
that had real steam propulsion but continued to have a real
sailing rig to prevent the vessel from having to rely completely
on the supply of coal in distant ports. The vessel was rated as
a frigate, but was relatively lightly armed with only 18 guns on
the gun deck. Overall the vessel has quite a modern appearance
with a rather fine hull that in appearance is closer to the
clipper ships that started to appear soon rather than the
earlier full hull shape of vessel like Le Superbe. The vessel
also had rather extensive deck houses that are more common for
later vessels.
The vessel was an early version of a dedicated expeditionary
vessel. An expeditionary vessel was used to carry troops and
supplies to a location where a waterborne invasion was to take
place. Generally naval power projection (offensive action
against another country) is pointless if the power can only be
projected from the sea without occupying the shore based
objective. As such, navies that do not exist for just defensive
purposes, also tend to include vessels that can carry troops and
deliver them to shore. Originally such vessels were simply
commercial vessels that were pressed into service for troop
delivery purposes. However, such vessels may be less than
optimized for this task and therefore advanced navies developed
specialized vessels of which L’Orenoque was an early example.
Today, only the United States maintains a significant number of
vessels that can deliver troops and equipment to distant and
hostile shores. The United States includes these vessels under
its amphibious operations fleet. While not as large as at the
completion of WWII, US amphibious operations capabilities
continue to be very impressive with dedicated vessels that
approach the size of aircraft carriers that can deploy troops
and heavy equipment like tanks from the sea to shore with
helicopters, landing craft and hovercraft (other countries may
have some amphibious capabilities, but they all pale against US
capabilities in being able to deliver an effective amount of
troops rapidly over very long distances). These vessels are
integrated and self contained fighting vessels that carry the
helicopters, landing craft, hovercraft troops and tanks and are
direct descendents of L’Orenoque.
Vessel History
L’Orenoque served in the Crimean War (1853-1856) as part of the
Black Sea Expeditionary Fleet when France declared war on Russia
on March 27, 1854. She landed troops at Varna, a port situated
on the Danube River Delta, and forced the Russians to retreat.
Again needed to transport troops, she sailed for Eupatoria where
British and French forces landed. Eventually allied forces
defeat Russia after several costly battles. After the
proclamation of the Third Republic, L’Orenoque departed Toulon
on October 30, 1870 under Leo Briot with 267 men. The vessel
departed for Civitavecchia where she stayed until 1874. In June
1870 six men are killed and twelve wounded when two boats
collide with the jetty by the port entrance. Leon Briot achieved
the rank of Captain on January 2, 1873. She participated in the
siege of Rome during 1873 but later returned to Civitavecchia
because of changes in the war. On October 16, 1874, she departs
for Toulon. In 1878, the French Navy sold her and she became a
whaler off Newfoundland, Saint Pierre and Miquelon.
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