in 1882, and the ship was commissioned on 22 November 1882 to begin sea trials. She was then placed in reserve. Bayard was recommissioned in May 1883 under the command of capitaine de vaisseau Parrayon as the flagship of Admiral Amédée Courbet, who had recently been appointed to the command of France's Trial division (division des essais), established in April 1883. On 31 May 1883, in the wake of the defeat and death of Commandant Henri Rivière in Tonkin (northern Vietnam) at the Battle of Paper Bridge, Courbet was placed in command of a newly created Tonkin Coasts naval division. In early June Courbet left for the Far East with the ironclads Bayard and and the screw corvette . Tonkin campaign and the Sino-French War Bayard arrived in Along Bay on 10 July, and for the next eleven months served as flagship of the Tonkin Coasts naval division. In August 1883, in the Battle of Thuận An, she bombarded the coastal defences of Hué, receiving minor shot damage from the Vietnamese shore batteries. From October 1883 to June 1884, during the period of growing tension that preceded the outbreak of the Sino-French War (August 1884–April 1885), she took part in a French naval blockade of the coast of Tonkin. On 30 November 1883, in response to the threat of an imminent Vietnamese attack on the French post at Quảng Yên, Bayards landing company was hastily installed in the town's citadel, successfully deterring the threatened attack. In June 1884 Bayard became the flagship of the Far East Squadron, an exceptional naval grouping created for the war with China by the amalgamation of the Tonkin Coasts and Far East naval divisions. On 5 August 1884 sailors from Bayard took part in a French landing at Keelung, but were forced to re-embark on 6 August by a heavy Chinese counterattack. Bayard took no part in the Battle of Fuzhou (23 August 1884), the opening battle of the Sino-French War, as she drew too much water to enter the Min River. Instead, she was left to guard the telegraph station at Sharp Peak near Matsu that allowed the squadron to communicate with France. On 1 October 1884 Bayard and several other French warships supported the French landing at Keelung with a naval bombardment of Chinese shore positions. On 8 October Bayards landing company took part in the failed French landing at Tamsui, which condemned