Henri Dupuy de Lôme

Stanislas Charles Henri Dupuy de Lôme (1816 to 1885) was a French naval architect, born in Ploemeur near Lorient in Brittany and educated at the École Polytechnique and ENSTA. He was most active between 1840 and 1870. After studying iron shipbuilding and steam navigation in England around 1842, he argued in an 1845 report for a screw-driven frigate with an iron hull and armour plating. His Le Napoléon, ordered in 1847 and launched in 1850, became the first steam-powered and first screw-driven battleship, reaching nearly 14 knots. In 1857 he became head of the French Constructive Corps, and his design for La Gloire, the earliest seagoing ironclad, was approved the same year.