Battleship Imperatritsa Mariya
Encyclopedia
Imperatritsa Mariya (: Empress Maria) was an dreadnought
of the Imperial Russian Navy
, lead ship
of her class. Construction began before World War I
and she saw service with the Black Sea Fleet
during the war. She provided cover for older pre-dreadnought battleships as they bombarded Ottoman
facilities, although she engaged the ex-German light cruiser
Midilli
several times without inflicting anything more serious than splinter damage. Imperatritsa Mariya was sunk at anchor in Sevastopol
by a magazine
explosion on 20 October 1916. She was subsequently raised, but her condition was very poor, and she was finally scrapped in 1926.
of 27.43 metre and a draft
of 8.36 metre. Her displacement was 23600 long tons (23,979 t) at load, 1000 LT (1,016 t) more than her designed displacement of 22600 LT (22,963 t). She proved to be very bow-heavy in service and tended to ship large amounts of water through her forward casemates. The ammunition for the forward 12 inches (305 mm) guns was reduced from 100 to 70 rounds each while the 130 millimetres (5.1 in) ammunition was reduced from 245 to 100 rounds per gun in an attempt to compensate for her trim. This did not fully cure the problem, but Imperatritsa Mariya was lost before any other changes could be implemented.
Imperatritsa Mariya was fitted with four Parsons
-type steam turbines imported from John Brown & Company
of the United Kingdom
. They were designed for a total of 26000 shp, but produced 33200 shp on trials. 20 mixed-firing triangular Yarrow
water-tube boiler
s powered the turbines with a working pressure of 17.5 atm (1,773 kPa; 257 psi). Designed speed was 21 kn (26 mph; 41 km/h). Her maximum coal capacity was 1700 long tons (1,727 t) plus 500 LT (508 t) of fuel oil
which gave her a range of 1640 nautical miles (3,037 km) at 21 kn (26 mph; 41 km/h). All of her electrical power was generated by three Curtis 360-kilowatt main turbo generator
s and two 200-kilowatt auxiliary units.
Her main armament consisted of a dozen 12-inch Obukhovskii Pattern 1907 52-caliber
guns mounted in four triple turrets distributed the length of the ship. Her secondary armament consisted of twenty 130 mm/55 B7 Pattern 1913
guns mounted in casemate
s. They were arranged in two groups, six guns per side from the forward turret to the rear funnel and the remaining four clustered around the rear turret. She was fitted with four 75 millimetres (3 in) anti-aircraft
guns, one mounted on the roof of each turret. Four 17.7 inches (450 mm) submerged torpedo tube
s were carried, two tubes on each broadside
abaft the forward magazine.
at Nikolayev
, Ukraine
. She was laid down on 30 October 1911 along with the Imperator Aleksander III and the Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya, but this was just a ceremonial event as the design had not yet been finalized or the contract signed. She was launched on 19 October 1913 and arrived in Sevastopol
on 13 July 1915, where she completed her fitting out during the next few months and conducted sea trial
s. On 1 October she provided cover for the pre-dreadnoughts as they bombarded targets in Kozlu, Zonguldak
and Karadeniz Ereğli
. She did much the same when the older battleships bombarded targets in Bulgaria
on 20–22 October and then Varna
itself on 27 October. The light cruiser Midilli
narrowly escaped from a running engagement with Imperatritsa Mariya on 4 April 1916 as the battleship narrowly missed her several times before she could disengage. Three months later both Imperatritsa Mariya and her half-sister
, alerted by intercepted radio transmissions, sortie
d from Sevastopol in an attempt to intercept the ex-German battlecruiser
Yavuz
as she returned from a bombardment of the Russian port of Tuapse
on 4 July. Yavuz dodged north and avoided the Russians by paralleling the Bulgarian coastline back to the Bosphorus. Midilli mined
the harbor of Novorossiysk
on 21 July, but the Russians, again alerted by radio intercepts, attempted to catch her on her return journey. Midilli was lured into range of Imperatritsa Mariyas guns the next day when she pursued the Russian destroyer Schastlivy, but managed to escape with only splinter damage.
On the morning of 20 October 1916 a fire was discovered in the forward powder magazine while at anchor in Sevastopol, but it exploded before any efforts could be made to fight the fire. However, sailors led by Engineer-Mechanic Michman Ignat'ev had flooded the forward shell magazine before the explosion at the cost of their own lives. Their action probably prevented a catastrophic detonation, but all of the other magazines were flooded as a precaution. About forty minutes after the first explosion a second explosion occurred in the vicinity of the torpedo flat that destroyed the watertight integrity of the rest of the forward bulkheads. Imperatritsa Mariya began to sink by the bow and listed to starboard. She capsized a few minutes later, taking 228 sailors with her. The subsequent investigation determined that the explosion was probably the result of spontaneous combustion of the ship's nitrocellulose
-based propellant as it decomposed.
Following a complex salvage
operation, the ship was eventually refloated on 18 May 1918 and moved into Sevastopol's Northern Drydock on 31 May, still upside down. However, in the chaos of the Russian Revolution
and Civil War
, no further repair work was done although her 130-mm guns were removed. By 1923 the wooden blocks supporting her in place were starting to rot and she was floated out and grounded in shallow water in 1923. She was approved for scrap
ping in June 1925 and officially stricken on 21 November 1925, although the work did not begin until 1926 when she was refloated and moved back into the drydock. Her gun turrets, which had fallen out of the ship when she capsized, were later salvaged. Two of them were used as the 30th Coast Defense Battery defending the city during the Siege of Sevastopol during World War II
.
Dreadnought
The dreadnought was the predominant type of 20th-century battleship. The first of the kind, the Royal Navy's had such an impact when launched in 1906 that similar battleships built after her were referred to as "dreadnoughts", and earlier battleships became known as pre-dreadnoughts...
of the Imperial Russian Navy
Imperial Russian Navy
The Imperial Russian Navy refers to the Tsarist fleets prior to the February Revolution.-First Romanovs:Under Tsar Mikhail Feodorovich, construction of the first three-masted ship, actually built within Russia, was completed in 1636. It was built in Balakhna by Danish shipbuilders from Holstein...
, lead ship
Lead ship
The lead ship or class leader is the first of a series or class of ships all constructed according to the same general design. The term is applicable military ships and larger civilian craft.-Overview:...
of her class. Construction began before World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and she saw service with the Black Sea Fleet
Black Sea Fleet
The Black Sea Fleet is a large operational-strategic sub-unit of the Russian Navy, operating in the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea since the late 18th century. It is based in various harbors of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov....
during the war. She provided cover for older pre-dreadnought battleships as they bombarded Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
facilities, although she engaged the ex-German light cruiser
Light cruiser
A light cruiser is a type of small- or medium-sized warship. The term is a shortening of the phrase "light armored cruiser", describing a small ship that carried armor in the same way as an armored cruiser: a protective belt and deck...
Midilli
SMS Breslau
SMS Breslau was a Magdeburg-class light cruiser of the German Kaiserliche Marine , built in the early 1910s. Following her commissioning, Breslau and the battlecruiser were assigned to the Mittelmeerdivision in response to the Balkan Wars...
several times without inflicting anything more serious than splinter damage. Imperatritsa Mariya was sunk at anchor in Sevastopol
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
by a magazine
Magazine (artillery)
Magazine is the name for an item or place within which ammunition is stored. It is taken from the Arabic word "makahazin" meaning "warehouse".-Ammunition storage areas:...
explosion on 20 October 1916. She was subsequently raised, but her condition was very poor, and she was finally scrapped in 1926.
Description
Imperatritsa Mariya was 168 metre long at the waterline. She had a beamBeam (nautical)
The beam of a ship is its width at the widest point. Generally speaking, the wider the beam of a ship , the more initial stability it has, at expense of reserve stability in the event of a capsize, where more energy is required to right the vessel from its inverted position...
of 27.43 metre and a draft
Draft (hull)
The draft of a ship's hull is the vertical distance between the waterline and the bottom of the hull , with the thickness of the hull included; in the case of not being included the draft outline would be obtained...
of 8.36 metre. Her displacement was 23600 long tons (23,979 t) at load, 1000 LT (1,016 t) more than her designed displacement of 22600 LT (22,963 t). She proved to be very bow-heavy in service and tended to ship large amounts of water through her forward casemates. The ammunition for the forward 12 inches (305 mm) guns was reduced from 100 to 70 rounds each while the 130 millimetres (5.1 in) ammunition was reduced from 245 to 100 rounds per gun in an attempt to compensate for her trim. This did not fully cure the problem, but Imperatritsa Mariya was lost before any other changes could be implemented.
Imperatritsa Mariya was fitted with four Parsons
Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company
Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company was a British engineering company based in Wallsend, North England, on the River Tyne.-History:The company was founded by Charles Algernon Parsons in 1897 with £500,000 of capital, and specialised in building the steam turbine engines that he had invented for...
-type steam turbines imported from John Brown & Company
John Brown & Company
John Brown and Company of Clydebank was a pre-eminent Scottish marine engineering and shipbuilding firm, responsible for building many notable and world-famous ships, such as the , the , the , the , the , and the...
of the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. They were designed for a total of 26000 shp, but produced 33200 shp on trials. 20 mixed-firing triangular Yarrow
Yarrow Shipbuilders
Yarrow Limited , often styled as simply Yarrows, was a major shipbuilding firm based in the Scotstoun district of Glasgow on the River Clyde...
water-tube boiler
Water-tube boiler
A water tube boiler is a type of boiler in which water circulates in tubes heated externally by the fire. Fuel is burned inside the furnace, creating hot gas which heats water in the steam-generating tubes...
s powered the turbines with a working pressure of 17.5 atm (1,773 kPa; 257 psi). Designed speed was 21 kn (26 mph; 41 km/h). Her maximum coal capacity was 1700 long tons (1,727 t) plus 500 LT (508 t) of fuel oil
Fuel oil
Fuel oil is a fraction obtained from petroleum distillation, either as a distillate or a residue. Broadly speaking, fuel oil is any liquid petroleum product that is burned in a furnace or boiler for the generation of heat or used in an engine for the generation of power, except oils having a flash...
which gave her a range of 1640 nautical miles (3,037 km) at 21 kn (26 mph; 41 km/h). All of her electrical power was generated by three Curtis 360-kilowatt main turbo generator
Turbo generator
A turbo generator is a turbine directly connected to an electric generator for the generation of electric power. Large steam powered turbo generators provide the majority of the world's electricity and are also used by steam powered turbo-electric ships.Smaller turbo-generators with gas turbines...
s and two 200-kilowatt auxiliary units.
Her main armament consisted of a dozen 12-inch Obukhovskii Pattern 1907 52-caliber
Caliber (artillery)
In artillery, caliber or calibredifference in British English and American English spelling is the internal diameter of a gun barrel, or by extension a relative measure of the length....
guns mounted in four triple turrets distributed the length of the ship. Her secondary armament consisted of twenty 130 mm/55 B7 Pattern 1913
130 mm/55 B7 Pattern 1913
The 130mm/55 B7 Pattern 1913 naval gun was a 5.1-inch naval gun used predominantly on ships of the Imperial Russian Navy and later by the Soviet Navy. It was manufactured mainly by the Obukhov State Plant in St. Petersburg, as well as under licence by Vickers Limited in Great Britain...
guns mounted in casemate
Casemate
A casemate, sometimes rendered casement, is a fortified gun emplacement or armored structure from which guns are fired. originally a vaulted chamber in a fortress.-Origin of the term:...
s. They were arranged in two groups, six guns per side from the forward turret to the rear funnel and the remaining four clustered around the rear turret. She was fitted with four 75 millimetres (3 in) anti-aircraft
Anti-aircraft warfare
NATO defines air defence as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action." They include ground and air based weapon systems, associated sensor systems, command and control arrangements and passive measures. It may be to protect naval, ground and air forces...
guns, one mounted on the roof of each turret. Four 17.7 inches (450 mm) submerged torpedo tube
Torpedo tube
A torpedo tube is a device for launching torpedoes. There are two main types of torpedo tube: underwater tubes fitted to submarines and some surface ships, and deck-mounted units installed aboard surface vessels...
s were carried, two tubes on each broadside
Broadside
A broadside is the side of a ship; the battery of cannon on one side of a warship; or their simultaneous fire in naval warfare.-Age of Sail:...
abaft the forward magazine.
Service
Imperatritsa Mariya was built by the Russud ShipyardShipyard named after 61 Communards
Shipyard named after 61 Communards is a major shipyard located in Mykolaiv, Ukraine. In modern times, the shipyard has been most commonly referred to as Nikolaev North Shipyard but was also known as Soviet Shipyard No. 200.- History :...
at Nikolayev
Mykolaiv
Mykolaiv , also known as Nikolayev , is a city in southern Ukraine, administrative center of the Mykolaiv Oblast. Mykolaiv is the main ship building center of the Black Sea, and, arguably, the whole Eastern Europe.-Name of city:...
, Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
. She was laid down on 30 October 1911 along with the Imperator Aleksander III and the Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya, but this was just a ceremonial event as the design had not yet been finalized or the contract signed. She was launched on 19 October 1913 and arrived in Sevastopol
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
on 13 July 1915, where she completed her fitting out during the next few months and conducted sea trial
Sea trial
A sea trial is the testing phase of a watercraft . It is also referred to as a "shakedown cruise" by many naval personnel. It is usually the last phase of construction and takes place on open water, and can last from a few hours to many days.Sea trials are conducted to measure a vessel’s...
s. On 1 October she provided cover for the pre-dreadnoughts as they bombarded targets in Kozlu, Zonguldak
Zonguldak
Zonguldak is a city and the capital of Zonguldak Province in the Black Sea region of Turkey. Its population, according to the 2009 census, was 108,792. It is an important port on the Black Sea because of the coal mining in Zonguldak Province...
and Karadeniz Ereğli
Karadeniz Eregli
Karadeniz Ereğli is a city and district in Zonguldak Province of Turkey, on the Black Sea shore at the mouth of the Kılıçsu River. Population is 98 545 as of 2009. The mayor is Halil Posbıyık .-Facts:...
. She did much the same when the older battleships bombarded targets in Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
on 20–22 October and then Varna
Varna
Varna is the largest city and seaside resort on the Bulgarian Black Sea Coast and third-largest in Bulgaria after Sofia and Plovdiv, with a population of 334,870 inhabitants according to Census 2011...
itself on 27 October. The light cruiser Midilli
SMS Breslau
SMS Breslau was a Magdeburg-class light cruiser of the German Kaiserliche Marine , built in the early 1910s. Following her commissioning, Breslau and the battlecruiser were assigned to the Mittelmeerdivision in response to the Balkan Wars...
narrowly escaped from a running engagement with Imperatritsa Mariya on 4 April 1916 as the battleship narrowly missed her several times before she could disengage. Three months later both Imperatritsa Mariya and her half-sister
Sister ship
A sister ship is a ship of the same class as, or of virtually identical design to, another ship. Such vessels share a near-identical hull and superstructure layout, similar displacement, and roughly comparable features and equipment...
, alerted by intercepted radio transmissions, sortie
Sortie
Sortie is a term for deployment or dispatch of one military unit, be it an aircraft, ship, or troops from a strongpoint. The sortie, whether by one or more aircraft or vessels, usually has a specific mission....
d from Sevastopol in an attempt to intercept the ex-German battlecruiser
Battlecruiser
Battlecruisers were large capital ships built in the first half of the 20th century. They were developed in the first decade of the century as the successor to the armoured cruiser, but their evolution was more closely linked to that of the dreadnought battleship...
Yavuz
SMS Goeben
SMS Goeben was the second of two Moltke-class battlecruisers of the Imperial German Navy, launched in 1911 and named after the German Franco-Prussian War veteran General August Karl von Goeben...
as she returned from a bombardment of the Russian port of Tuapse
Tuapse
Tuapse is a town in Krasnodar Krai, Russia, situated on the northeast shore of the Black Sea, south of Gelendzhik and north of Sochi. It serves as the administrative center of Tuapsinsky District, although administratively it is separate from it...
on 4 July. Yavuz dodged north and avoided the Russians by paralleling the Bulgarian coastline back to the Bosphorus. Midilli mined
Naval mine
A naval mine is a self-contained explosive device placed in water to destroy surface ships or submarines. Unlike depth charges, mines are deposited and left to wait until they are triggered by the approach of, or contact with, an enemy vessel...
the harbor of Novorossiysk
Novorossiysk
Novorossiysk is a city in Krasnodar Krai, Russia. It is the country's main port on the Black Sea and the leading Russian port for importing grain. It is one of the few cities honored with the title of the Hero City. Population: -History:...
on 21 July, but the Russians, again alerted by radio intercepts, attempted to catch her on her return journey. Midilli was lured into range of Imperatritsa Mariyas guns the next day when she pursued the Russian destroyer Schastlivy, but managed to escape with only splinter damage.
On the morning of 20 October 1916 a fire was discovered in the forward powder magazine while at anchor in Sevastopol, but it exploded before any efforts could be made to fight the fire. However, sailors led by Engineer-Mechanic Michman Ignat'ev had flooded the forward shell magazine before the explosion at the cost of their own lives. Their action probably prevented a catastrophic detonation, but all of the other magazines were flooded as a precaution. About forty minutes after the first explosion a second explosion occurred in the vicinity of the torpedo flat that destroyed the watertight integrity of the rest of the forward bulkheads. Imperatritsa Mariya began to sink by the bow and listed to starboard. She capsized a few minutes later, taking 228 sailors with her. The subsequent investigation determined that the explosion was probably the result of spontaneous combustion of the ship's nitrocellulose
Nitrocellulose
Nitrocellulose is a highly flammable compound formed by nitrating cellulose through exposure to nitric acid or another powerful nitrating agent. When used as a propellant or low-order explosive, it is also known as guncotton...
-based propellant as it decomposed.
Following a complex salvage
Marine salvage
Marine salvage is the process of rescuing a ship, its cargo, or other property from peril. Salvage encompasses rescue towing, refloating a sunken or grounded vessel, or patching or repairing a ship...
operation, the ship was eventually refloated on 18 May 1918 and moved into Sevastopol's Northern Drydock on 31 May, still upside down. However, in the chaos of the Russian Revolution
Russian Revolution of 1917
The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. The Tsar was deposed and replaced by a provisional government in the first revolution of February 1917...
and Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...
, no further repair work was done although her 130-mm guns were removed. By 1923 the wooden blocks supporting her in place were starting to rot and she was floated out and grounded in shallow water in 1923. She was approved for scrap
Scrap
Scrap is a term used to describe recyclable and other materials left over from every manner of product consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has significant monetary value...
ping in June 1925 and officially stricken on 21 November 1925, although the work did not begin until 1926 when she was refloated and moved back into the drydock. Her gun turrets, which had fallen out of the ship when she capsized, were later salvaged. Two of them were used as the 30th Coast Defense Battery defending the city during the Siege of Sevastopol during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.