Battleship "Petropavlovsk": history, description of design, characteristics. The death of the battleship "Petropavlovsk"

"Petropavlovsk" - a squadron battleship, once belonging to the Russian Imperial Navy. He was the flagship of the 1st Pacific Squadron, which took part in the Russo-Japanese War. In late March 1904, the ship sank near Port Arthur, exploding on an enemy mine. His death was one of the most tragic pages in the history of the Russian fleet.

Ship building

Preconditions for the adoption of the program for the accelerated development of the Baltic Fleet of Russia in 1890 was an unprecedented increase in the German Navy. Over the next five years, it was planned to build 50 torpedo boats, 10 battleships, as well as several cruisers and gunboats. It was decided to name all the armored ships in honor of the battles of the Russian army and navy in the 18th and 19th centuries. In particular, the name "Petropavlovsk" was associated with the victory of Russian troops defending the port of Petropavlovsk on Kamchatka.

The battleship "Petropavlovsk" began to build on March 19, 1892, and its official laying was held May 7 in St. Petersburg. It was attended by the Emperor Alexander III himself. Already after two and a half years, namely October 28, 1894, it was launched. Tests of the battleship passed from the end of 1897 to the beginning of 1899. After the ship was fully equipped with the necessary weapons, he went on his first voyage to the Far East, where he demonstrated his excellent seaworthiness. In general, the battleship "Petropavlovsk" at that time was considered a well-armed military ship with a rather high maximum speed of 16.86 knots.

Battleship "Petropavlovsk": description of the construction

This ship, like other armadilloes of the Poltava type, had a rather unusual shape of the hull: the sides above the main deck were, as it were, littered inwards. This feature is mainly characteristic of French ships. It allowed to considerably facilitate the weight of the above-water part of the hull. The length of the vessel at the waterline was 112.5 m, width - 21.3 m, sludge in laden form - 8.6 m.

The ship had a rounded stern and three decks: top, main, or battery, and lower. The hull had a straight stem and ram, protruding forward by 2 m. It was backed by a spy on the outside and an armored deck inside. The ship had three masts: a main-and-fore-mast, as well as a ventilation mast, located between two chimneys. The last one was lower, which was the main distinguishing feature of this vessel (see photo of the battleship "Petropavlovsk").

Reservation

In this respect, this ship was practically no different from other ships of the same class. He had a main armored belt with a height of 2.29 m and a length of 73.15 m, located at the waterline, which protected the boilers, machines and the bottom of the gun turrets. It was about 65% of the entire length of the body. The thickness of armor in different parts of the ship was significantly different. So, the center of the ship was protected by armor in 406 mm, and the towers of the main caliber were equipped with 305-mm slabs.

Above the main armored belt was the upper one, which reached the towers of the main caliber. Its thickness was 127 mm, height - 2.29 m, and length - about 50 m. In addition, the towers and barbettes of the main caliber were also reinforced with armor 254 mm thick and medium - 127 mm slabs. But the four 152-mm guns and did not have any protection, except for the standard side skin.

Artillery

The guns of the main caliber of the battleship consisted of four guns, located in pairs in the stern and nasal towers. Their rotation and vertical guidance was carried out by means of hydraulic, and the supply of ammunition - by means of electric drives. The medium-caliber guns consisted of twelve canoe guns, eight of which were in two-turret towers, and the rest were located between them.

Mine artillery was represented by 38 guns of Gochkis and was scattered all over the ship's territory. In the arsenal of the assault there were two guns Baranovsky. Depending on the situation, they could be installed on both wheeled and pedestal carriages.

The Russo-Japanese War

On the night of January 27, 1904, the battleship Petropavlovsk, along with the rest of the ships that were part of the Pacific squadron, was in the roadstead near Port Arthur. Suddenly, the Russian fleet was attacked by Japanese destroyers, who launched 16 torpedoes in its direction. As it turned out later, the squadron was completely unprepared for such a turn of events and could not effectively repel the enemy's attack.

In the ensuing confusion, that Admiral Spark could not believe that the war with the Japanese had begun, and almost for an hour ordered to transmit signals from the flagship Petropavlovsk with the requirement not to open fire. And at this time enemy torpedoes managed to destroy the Russian cruiser Pallada and the battleships Retvizan and Tsesarevich.

By morning, the main forces of the Japanese, consisting of nine cruisers and six battleships, including the ships of Admiral H. Togo, appeared near Port Arthur. They engaged in a battle with the Russian squadron, which lasted no more than 40 minutes. After that, the Japanese retreated. This battle did not bring any significant results to any of the warring parties, although several ships were damaged. Among them was the battleship Petropavlovsk. Several shells hit him, but they did not do much damage, so they did not affect the combat capability of the ship.

The new squadron commander

In the first days of the war, as a result of the inept leadership of Admiral Spark, the Russian fleet lost several of its ships. After his resignation, the commander of the squadron appointed Vice-Admiral SO Makarov, who arrived in Port Arthur at the end of February 1904. He raised his flag first on the cruiser Askold, and then transferred it to the battleship Petropavlovsk.

Within the next month the ship under the command of SO Makarov several times went to sea to work out a plan for joint maneuvering. One such day a two-hour exchange of fire took place between the Japanese and Russian squadrons, but because of too long a distance the shells did not reach the target and fell into the water. Only once with a volley from the ship "Victory", on board which there were long-range guns, it was possible to damage the enemy battleship "Fuji".

Tricky plan

The Japanese Admiral H. Togo developed a plan to block the Russian fleet in the harbor of Port Arthur by means of steamships-fire-ships. The essence of his plan was to quietly install a minefield and after that lure the Russian squadron directly at him, with a detachment consisting of several cruisers.

This plan was implemented on the night of March 31. The Russians noticed a Japanese detachment of ships, but they did not attack him. They took them for their own destroyers, sent by S.O. Makarov to the patrol the previous evening to the area of the Elliott Islands. Shortly after landing at sea, two ships - "Scary" and "Brave" - somehow lagged behind the main unit, and then, after dividing themselves, they began to act independently. Having reached the sought-after islands and not having discovered in this place an enemy, six Russian destroyers returned to Port Arthur. The "terrible" behind them in the dark took the Japanese detachment of ships for their own and sided with him. But when the morning came, and the Russian destroyer was discovered by the enemy, he was immediately attacked. In the course of a short battle, he was hit and drowned. To him, the cruiser Bayan was sent to help, who managed to save only a few sailors.

The death of the battleship "Petropavlovsk"

Without waiting for the entire squadron to exit and not to raid the raid, SO Makarov on the battleship, accompanied by "Poltava" and four more cruisers from the very morning went to the site of the sinking of the destroyer "Scary". This time, he managed to easily bypass the enemy minefield. At this time several Japanese cruisers appeared on the horizon, according to which fire was opened from Petropavlovsk. The enemy began to retreat to the east, but soon his main forces came to his aid. Seeing this, the Russian ships turned to Port Arthur. Already along the way, two armadilloes joined them - Peresvet and Pobeda. After this, S.O. Makarov decided to again go on rapprochement with the enemy and took a course directly to the area mined by the Japanese.

At 9.43. March 31, 1904 with the turn of the ship "Petropavlovsk" from its starboard side exploded explosion. He damaged the nasal tower of the main caliber, thereby detonating ammunition. The explosion was of such power that overboard threw out the 305-millimeter gun turret, shrouds and chimneys. In addition, there was a collapse of the fok-mast, which completely destroyed the running and command bridges. The battleship began to sink slowly into the water with its bow, and soon the last powerful explosion also thundered-the boilers shot up to the air. After this, the ship broke up into two parts and quickly went under the water.

Effects

The boats that were sent to save the survivors managed to pick up only about 80 people. Among them were the commander of the ship NM Yakovlev and the cousin of Nicholas II Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich. But SO Makarov, with ten staff and eighteen ship officers, perished. The explosion also took the lives of more than six hundred sailors. In addition, it was found that on board the ship at that time was and V. V. Vereshchagin - a famous artist who died on the battleship "Petropavlovsk" along with the rest of the crew. His job was to make sketches during the campaign, which would then be useful for writing future paintings.

The explosion of the battleship "Petropavlovsk" had very unfavorable consequences, which affected the combat activity of the entire Pacific squadron. Not only that the fleet lost one of the best battleships, so he also lost the talented organizer and head of defense of Port Arthur - Admiral SO Makarov, who was highly respected and loved by his subordinates. He could not find an equivalent replacement until the very end of the Russo-Japanese War. It so happened that the engineer-inventor M. P. Naletov witnessed the death of the battleship. It was this event that prompted him to think about the creation of such a subclass of ships as underwater minelayers.

Memory

In late June 1913 in the presence of Emperor Nicholas II in Kronstadt solemnly opened a monument to S. O. Makarov. The author of this project was the sculptor L. V. Sherwood, who depicted the death of the battleship Petropavlovsk on the pedestal. To commemorate the 100th anniversary of this tragedy in St. Petersburg, a memorial plaque was installed , on which the names of all 635 crew members of this ship are imprinted. In addition, in the chapel of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker at the sea church of Spas-na-Vodah has a commemorative brass plate. And for those who are interested in ships, there is an opportunity to make an armored car "Petropavlovsk" with their own hands, the model of which can be easily found on specialized resources.

Search

At the end of 2011, a joint Russian-Chinese search expedition was organized, the purpose of which was to establish the exact location of the death of the famous ship. The search for the battleship "Petropavlovsk" was conducted on the territory of China in the area of Lüshun (former Port Arthur). Members of the expedition in the Yellow Sea were found a metal massif that is about 90 meters in length and 13 meters wide. Experts are inclined to think that this is the battleship "Petropavlovsk" sunk during the Russian-Japanese war. At the bottom were found some items that could confirm this conjecture, but they have not yet been raised to the surface.