French submarine Sirène (Q123)
Sirène (Q123) was a French Navy commissioned in 1927. She participated in World War II, first on the side of the Allies from 1939 to June 1940, then in the navy of Vichy France. She was scuttled in November 1942. Characteristics The Sirène-class submarines had a displacement of surfaced and submerged. They had an endurance of at , with a maximum surface speed of , and a submerged speed of . Their armament was seven torpedo tubes (three forward, two amidships, and two aft) and carried 13 torpedoes. As with all French submarines of this period, the midships torpedo tubes were fitted externally in trainable mounts. The submarines had a single and two 8 mm machine guns. The submarines were manned by crews of 41 men. Construction and commissioning Laid down at Ateliers et Chantiers de la Loire in Saint-Nazaire, France, on 28 November 1923 with the pennant number Q123, Sirène was launched on 6 August 1925. She ran her official trials from 1 September 1925 to 11 March 1926. On 1 June 1926, she was departing Brest Arsenal at Brest, France, when her steering failed and she collided with the torpedo boat . She suffered a deep tear in her stern above the waterline, but no one aboard either vessel suffered injuries. Sirène completed fitting out between 25 January and 12 March 1927. She was commissioned on 12 March 1927. Service history French Navy Jean-Marie Querville, a future admiral, served as Sirènes commanding officer from 1934 to 1936. World War II began with the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, and when France entered the war on 3 September, Sirène was a unit of the 19th Submarine Division at Toulon, France, with the submarines , , and . With the outbreak of war, the division was placed under the command of the maritime prefect of the 3rd Region. French naval forces at Toulon primarily were concerned with opposing Italian forces in the event that Italy entered the war on Germany's side. The Battle of France began when German ground forces advanced into France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg on 10 May 1940. The threat of Italian entry into the war increased thereafter, and in response the French on 26 May began stationing two Toulon-based submarines — Sirène among them — on a rotating basis at Îles d'Hyères, from which they could reach defensive patrol areas off Nice and Saint-Tropez within two hours. On 1 June 1940, as tensions with Italy continued to increase, the French began stationing two submarines on the coast of Corsica, with Sirène taking station that day on alert at Calvi and Galatée at Ajaccio. On 5 June, Galatée relieved Sirène at Calvi and went on one-hour alert to get underway there, while Sirène moved to Ajaccio for a rest period. Italy declared war on France on 10 June 1940 and joined the invasion of France that day. From 10 to 19 June, Sirène and Galatée took turns maintaining a defensive patrol in the