"Bretagne" served as a troopship during the Second Italian War of Independence in 1859, and a few months later the led the bombing of Tétouan forts in Morocco, where a cannonball hit her hull. In 1860, she sailed to Napoli for the funeral of Prince Jérôme Napoléon. She then sailed to Gaeta in October, under Admiral Adelbert Lebarbier de Tinan, to oppose a Sardinian attack against Napolitan forces, leading to the Battle of Garigliano. She spend most of 1861 ferrying French troops deployed in Syria back to France, before returning to Toulon.