The Monsund battle in various military conflicts

The Moonsund archipelago occupies a strategic position in the Baltic Sea. Because of this, he often became the arena of battles in the twentieth century. It includes four large islands, each of which belongs to Estonia today - Vormsi, Muhu, Saaremaa and Hiiumaa.

The Battle of 1917

During the First World War, the Moonsund battle took place, which occurred in September-October 1917. Another common name is Operation Albion.

It was an attack by a German squadron and ground forces. The command set the task to seize the archipelago, which belonged to Russia. German troops began landing on the island of Saaremaa on 12 October. Before this fleet it was possible to suppress Russian batteries: the personnel was in captivity. At the same time, several German ships were damaged, exploding on mines off the coast (Bayer's battleship, etc.).

Many did not survive the Battle of Moonsund. 1917 was one of the last chords in the confrontation on the eastern front. A month later, in Petrograd, the Bolsheviks came to power, who later signed the Brest Peace.

Two days later the squadrons of rivals clashed a tete-a-tete. The destroyer of the Russian fleet "Thunder" received serious damage during the battle with the German battleship Kaiser. The fire on board led to the failure of the guns and the sinking of the ship. The Moonsund battle in the Irben strait, where the cruisers and dreadnoughts clashed, was especially fierce.

On October 16, German ships cleared the Gulf of Riga. There were several battleships and cruisers of the Reich. In order to protect ships from mines, the squadron also had trawlers. Another danger to German ships was the fire, an open Russian artillery. From the attack they defended themselves with smoke screens around the minesweepers.

When it became clear that the Russian squadron could not hold the archipelago, an order was given to send the surviving ships north. In turn, the Germans captured the island of Moon (October 18) and Hiiumaa (October 20). Thus ended the Battle of Moonsund in 1917 during the First World War.

The Battle of 1941

During the Second World War, the Moonsund Archipelago witnessed two military operations. In 1941 Nazi troops came here. The offensive operation was called the Reich's "Beowulf" headquarters. This was the next (second) Moonsund battle.

On September 8, troops were landed on the island of Vormsi, which was in the hands of the Germans after three days of stubborn fighting. A week later, the main forces were sent to Mukhu, whose garrison lasted a week.

The next one was Saremaa. Here the battle lasted two weeks. The Soviet command managed to evacuate the remnants of the army on Hiiumaa. However, this scrap of land was soon under the control of the Reich.

The result

The Soviet army tried all its forces to linger on the archipelago and delay the attack on Leningrad. In a sense, this goal was fulfilled. Full annexation occurred only on October 22 after nearly two months of battles. The fleet, which detained the enemy in the Gulf of Riga, was also active. Defenders of the islands converted local tractors, making them improvised tank analogues (machine guns were attached). When the Battle of Moonsund ended, the surviving personnel were finally evacuated to the Hanko peninsula.

Landing in 1944

The third Moonsund battle is also known in historiography. 1944 was marked by the fact that German troops retreated massively from the occupied territories. The parts of the Leningrad front were sent to the islands, of which the 8th Rifle Corps was specially formed.

The operation began with the landing on September 27 on the coast of the island of Vormsi. Further, other parts of the archipelago followed. The last was the island of Saaremaa: it was the largest and most important in this region. In the late evening of October 8, a big battle was fought near Tehumardi. A barrage of fire was fought against Soviet troops. In addition, the position of the army was complicated by the lack of space for an effective maneuver.

The defense was broken only a month later on November 23, when aviation joined the battle. Previous attempts failed. The most tragic was the landing at Wintry, when about 500 people died. Anyway, but after the final surrender, the Germans lost 7,000 dead. Another hundred ships were sunk or damaged.