French cruiser Gueydon

The Gueydon was an armoured cruiser of the French Navy, lead ship of her class. She was named in honour of Louis Henri de Gueydon, first governor of Algeria under the 3rd Republic.

Gueydon was commissioned in Toulon harbour in 1903, and undertook a first campaign to East Asia. She took part in the First World War, supervising patrols in Southern America and in the Caribbean.

In 1923, she was refitted in Brest harbour. In 1926, she was again modified to serve as a gunnery school; she entered this role the following year, replacing the armoured cruiser Pothuau in Brest.

In 1941, her hull was used by the Germans (with two old French sloops) to form the basis for a decoy-dummy of the Prinz Eugen.

The hulk of Gueydon was bombed by aircraft from the RAF's 617 Squadron on 13 and 14 August 1944, along with the other hulks at Brest, to prevent them from being used by the Germans as blockships. The wreck was broken up after the end of the war.