The surviving ships escorted troop convoys from French North Africa to France for several months after the beginning of World War I in August 1914 . '' Amiral Charner '' and '' Latouche-Tréville '' were then assigned to the Eastern Mediterranean where they blockaded the Ottoman-controlled coast and supported Allied operations . During this time , '' Amiral Charner '' helped to rescue several thousand Armenians from Syria during the Armenian Genocide of 1915 . She was sunk in early 1916 by a German submarine , with only a single survivor rescued . '' Latouche-Tréville '' was lightly damaged in 1915 by an Ottoman shell while providing naval gunfire support during the Gallipoli Campaign . Unlike her sisters , '' Bruix '' was transferred to the Atlantic to support Allied operations against the German colony of Kamerun in September 1914 . She was briefly assigned to support Allied operations in the Dardanelles in early 1915 before she began patrolling the Aegean Sea and Greek territorial waters
Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
Amiral Charner-class cruiser