Battleship Petropavlovsk (1914) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

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...

battleship

Battleship

A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...

Petropavlovsk was the third of the four dreadnought

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...

s, the first Russian class

Ship class

A ship class is a group of ships of a similar design. This is distinct from a ship-type, which might reflect a similarity of tonnage or intended use. For example, the is a nuclear aircraft carrier of the Nimitz class....

of dreadnoughts, built 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...

. She was named after the Russian victory over the British and the French in the Siege of Petropavlovsk

Siege of Petropavlovsk

The Siege of Petropavlovsk was the main operation on the Pacific Theatre of the Crimean War. The Russian casualties are estimated at 100 soldiers; the Allies lost five times as many....

in 1854. The ship was completed during the winter of 1914–15, but was not ready for combat until mid-1915. Her role was to defend the mouth of the Gulf of Finland

Gulf of Finland

The Gulf of Finland is the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea. It extends between Finland and Estonia all the way to Saint Petersburg in Russia, where the river Neva drains into it. Other major cities around the gulf include Helsinki and Tallinn...

against the Germans, who never tried to enter, so she spent her time training providing cover for minelaying operations. Her crew joined the general mutiny

Mutiny

Mutiny is a conspiracy among members of a group of similarly situated individuals to openly oppose, change or overthrow an authority to which they are subject...

of the Baltic Fleet

Baltic Fleet

The Twice Red Banner Baltic Fleet - is the Russian Navy's presence in the Baltic Sea. In previous historical periods, it has been part of the navy of Imperial Russia and later the Soviet Union. The Fleet gained the 'Twice Red Banner' appellation during the Soviet period, indicating two awards of...

after the February Revolution

February Revolution

The February Revolution of 1917 was the first of two revolutions in Russia in 1917. Centered around the then capital Petrograd in March . Its immediate result was the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, the end of the Romanov dynasty, and the end of the Russian Empire...

of 1917 and she was the only dreadnought available to the Bolshevik

Bolshevik

The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

s for several years after the October Revolution

October Revolution

The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...

of 1917. She bombarded the rebellious garrison of Fort Krasnoye Gorka and supported Bolshevik light forces operating against British ships supporting the White Russians

White movement

The White movement and its military arm the White Army - known as the White Guard or the Whites - was a loose confederation of Anti-Communist forces.The movement comprised one of the politico-military Russian forces who fought...

in the Gulf of Finland

Gulf of Finland

in 1918–19. Later, her crew joined the Kronstadt Rebellion

Kronstadt rebellion

The Kronstadt rebellion was one of many major unsuccessful left-wing uprisings against the Bolsheviks in the aftermath of the Russian Civil War...

of 1921 and she was renamed Marat after the rebellion was crushed.

Marat was reconstructed from 1928 to 1931 and represented the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

at the Coronation Naval Review at Spithead in 1937. Two years later, she bombarded a Finnish

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

coastal artillery position during the Winter War

Naval warfare in the Winter War

The Naval warfare in the Winter War was the naval part of the Winter War between Finland and the Soviet Union from 30 November 1939 to 13 March 1940. Overall, the level of naval activity was low. However, Finland had coastal artillery batteries which took part of battles along its coast.-Navies in...

once before the Gulf of Finland iced up. Shortly afterwards, her 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...

armament was upgraded. When the Germans invaded

Operation Barbarossa

Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...

on 22 June 1941 she was in Kronstadt

Kronstadt

Kronstadt , also spelled Kronshtadt, Cronstadt |crown]]" and Stadt for "city"); is a municipal town in Kronshtadtsky District of the federal city of St. Petersburg, Russia, located on Kotlin Island, west of Saint Petersburg proper near the head of the Gulf of Finland. Population: It is also...

and provided gunfire support to Soviet troops in September as the Germans approached Leningrad

Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...

. Later that month she had her bow blown off and sank in shallow water after two hits by 1000 kilograms (2,204.6 lb) bombs that detonated her forward 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:...

. She was refloated several months later and became a stationary battery, providing gunfire support during the Siege of Leningrad

Siege of Leningrad

The Siege of Leningrad, also known as the Leningrad Blockade was a prolonged military operation resulting from the failure of the German Army Group North to capture Leningrad, now known as Saint Petersburg, in the Eastern Front theatre of World War II. It started on 8 September 1941, when the last...

. Plans were made to reconstruct her after the war, using the bow of her 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...

Frunze

Russian battleship Poltava (1911)

Poltava was the second of the s of the Imperial Russian Navy built before World War I. The Ganguts were the first class of Russian dreadnoughts. She was named after the Russian victory over Charles XII of Sweden in the Battle of Poltava in 1709. She was completed during the winter of 1914–15, but...

, but they were not accepted and were formally cancelled in 1948. She was renamed Volkhov, after the nearby river

Volkhov River

Volkhov is a river in Novgorod Oblast and Leningrad Oblast in northwestern Russia.-Geography:The Volkhov flows out of Lake Ilmen north into Lake Ladoga, the largest lake of Europe. It is the second largest tributary of Lake Ladoga. It is navigable over its whole length. Discharge is highly...

, in 1950 and served as a stationary training ship until stricken in 1953 and broken up afterwards.

Design

Petropavlovsk was 180 metre long at the waterline and 181.2 metre long overall. She had a beam

Beam (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 26.9 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 8.99 metre, 49 centimetre more than designed. Her displacement was 24800 tonnes (24,408 LT) at load, over 1500 t (1,476 LT) more than her designed displacement of 23288 t (22,920 LT).

Petropavlovsks machinery was built by the Baltic Works. 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 turbine

Steam turbine

A steam turbine is a mechanical device that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam, and converts it into rotary motion. Its modern manifestation was invented by Sir Charles Parsons in 1884....

sets drove the four propellers. The engine rooms were located between turret

Turret

In architecture, a turret is a small tower that projects vertically from the wall of a building such as a medieval castle. Turrets were used to provide a projecting defensive position allowing covering fire to the adjacent wall in the days of military fortification...

s three and four in three compartments. The outer compartments each had a high-pressure ahead and reverse turbine for each wing propeller shaft. The central engine room had two low-pressure ahead and astern turbines as well as two cruising turbines driving each of the two center shafts. The engines had a total designed output of 42000 shp, but they produced 52000 shp during her sister

Sister ship

's full-speed trials on 21 November 1915 and gave a top speed of 24.1 knots. Twenty-five 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...

Admiralty-type small-tube boilers

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...

provided steam to the engines at a designed working pressure of 17.5 atm (1,773.2 kPa; 257.2 psi). Each boiler was fitted with Thornycroft

John I. Thornycroft & Company

John I. Thornycroft & Company Limited, usually known simply as Thornycroft was a British shipbuilding firm started by John Isaac Thornycroft in the 19th century.-History:...

oil sprayers for mixed oil/coal burning. They were arranged in two groups. The forward group consisted of two boiler rooms in front of the second turret, the foremost of which had three boilers while the second one had six. The rear group was between the second and third turrets and comprised two compartments, each with eight boilers. At full load she carried 1847.5 long tons (1,877 MT) of coal and 700 long tons (711 MT) 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...

and that provided her a range of 3500 nautical miles (6,482 km) at a speed of 10 knots (19.6 km/h).

Her main armament consisted of a dozen Obukhovskii 12 inches (305 mm) Pattern 1907 52-caliber guns mounted in four triple turrets distributed the length of the ship. The Russians did not believe that superfiring

Superfire

The idea of superfire is to locate two turrets in a row, one behind the other, but with the second turret located above the one in front so that the second turret could fire over the first...

turrets offered any advantage as they discounted the value of axial fire and believed that superfiring turrets could not fire while over the lower turret because of muzzle blast

Muzzle flash

Muzzle blast is the term used to describe the release of high temperature, high pressure gases expelled from the muzzle of a firearm when it is discharged. Muzzle flash is the term used to describe the visible light of the muzzle blast. The blast and flash are caused by the combustion products of...

problems. They also believed that distributing the turrets, and their associated 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:...

s, over the length of the ship improved the survivability of the ship. Sixteen 4.7 inches (119 mm) 50-caliber Pattern 1905 guns were 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 as the secondary battery intended to defend the ship against torpedo boat

Torpedo boat

A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval vessel designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs rammed enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes, and later designs launched self-propelled Whitehead torpedoes. They were created to counter battleships and other large, slow and...

s. She was completed with only a single 3 inches (8 cm) 30-caliber Lender anti-aircraft

Anti-aircraft warfare

(AA) gun mounted on the quarterdeck. Other AA guns were probably added during the course of World War I, but details are lacking. Conway's says that four 75 millimetres (3 in) guns were added to the roofs of the end turrets during the war. 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 mounted with three torpedo

Torpedo

The modern torpedo is a self-propelled missile weapon with an explosive warhead, launched above or below the water surface, propelled underwater towards a target, and designed to detonate either on contact with it or in proximity to it.The term torpedo was originally employed for...

es for each tube.

Service

Petropavlovsk was built by the Baltic Works

Baltic Shipyard

The Baltic Shipyard is one of the oldest shipyards in Russia. It is located in Saint Petersburg in the south-western part of the Vasilievsky Island. It is one of the three shipyards active in Saint Petersburg...

in Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...

. Her keel was laid down on 16 June 1909 and she was launched on 22 September 1911. She entered service on 5 January 1915, six months after the start of World War I

World War I

, when she reached Helsingfors

Helsinki

Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is...

and was assigned to the First Battleship Brigade of the Baltic Fleet

Baltic Fleet

. Petropavlovsk and her sister provided distant cover for minelaying

Minelayer

Minelaying is the act of deploying explosive mines. Historically this has been carried out by ships, submarines and aircraft. Additionally, since World War I the term minelayer refers specifically to a naval ship used for deploying naval mines...

operations on 10–11 November and 6 December 1915. She saw no action of any kind during 1916. Her crew joined the general mutiny

Mutiny

Mutiny is a conspiracy among members of a group of similarly situated individuals to openly oppose, change or overthrow an authority to which they are subject...

of the Baltic Fleet on 16 March 1917, after the idle sailors received word of the February Revolution

February Revolution

in Saint Petersburg. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was a peace treaty signed on March 3, 1918, mediated by South African Andrik Fuller, at Brest-Litovsk between Russia and the Central Powers, headed by Germany, marking Russia's exit from World War I.While the treaty was practically obsolete before the end of the year,...

required the Soviets to evacuate their naval base at Helsinki in March 1918 or have their ships interned by newly independent Finland

Finland

even though the Gulf of Finland

Gulf of Finland

was still frozen over. Petropavlovsk and her sisters led the first group of ships on 12 March and reached Kronstadt

Kronstadt

five days later in what became known as the 'Ice Voyage'

Ice Cruise of the Baltic Fleet

Ice Cruise of the Baltic Fleet was an operation which transferred the ships of the Baltic Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy from their bases at Tallinn and Helsinki to Kronstadt in 1918, caused by the possible threat to those bases from the final German offensives against Russia during World War...

.

Petropavlovsk was the only operable dreadnought belonging to the Soviets and provided cover to smaller ships on raiding missions. On 1 June 1918 she fired in support of the and several minesweeper

Minesweeper (ship)

A minesweeper is a small naval warship designed to counter the threat posed by naval mines. Minesweepers generally detect then neutralize mines in advance of other naval operations.-History:...

s that had taken the bait laid by the British forces supporting the White Russians

White movement

. The British destroyer

Destroyer

In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast and maneuverable yet long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against smaller, powerful, short-range attackers. Destroyers, originally called torpedo-boat destroyers in 1892, evolved from...

appeared to be operating alone and the Soviets sortied to attack her, but a number of other British destroyers were positioned to sweep in behind the Soviets. Azad retreated at full speed and Petropavlovsk opened fire on Walker at about 14000 yards (12,802 m). She hit Walker twice, inflicting only minor damage and wounding two sailors, but the British destroyers disengaged when they got too close to Soviet coastal artillery

Coastal artillery

Coastal artillery is the branch of armed forces concerned with operating anti-ship artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal fortifications....

and minefields. A few days later Petropavlovsk and the pre-dreadnought battleship bombarded Fort Krasnaya Gorka

Krasnaya Gorka fort

Krasnaya Gorka is a coastal artillery fortress west of Lomonosov, Russia on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland, opposite Kotlin Island and the Baltic Fleet's base at Kronshtadt...

whose garrison had mutinied against the Bolsheviks. She fired no less than 568 12-inch shells and the garrison surrendered on 17 June when Leon Trotsky

Leon Trotsky

Leon Trotsky , born Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and theorist, Soviet politician, and the founder and first leader of the Red Army....

promised them their lives, only to order them machine-gunned. On 17 August 1919 Petropavlovsk was claimed as torpedoed and put out of action by the British Coastal Motor Boat

Coastal Motor Boat

During the First World War, following a suggestion from three junior officers of the Harwich destroyer force that small motor boats carrying a torpedo might be capable of travelling over the protective minefields and attacking ships of the German Navy at anchor in their bases, the Admiralty gave...

CMB 88 during a night attack in Kronstadt harbor, but was, in fact, not damaged at all. The crew of the Petropavlovsk joined the Kronstadt Rebellion

Kronstadt rebellion

The Kronstadt rebellion was one of many major unsuccessful left-wing uprisings against the Bolsheviks in the aftermath of the Russian Civil War...

of March 1921. After it was bloodily crushed she was renamed Marat to honor the French revolutionary leader Jean-Paul Marat

Jean-Paul Marat

Jean-Paul Marat , born in the Principality of Neuchâtel, was a physician, political theorist, and scientist best known for his career in France as a radical journalist and politician during the French Revolution...

on 31 March 1921. By 1922 her primary rangefinder had been moved to a platform on the foremast and she mounted three 3-inch 'Lender' AA guns each on the roofs of the fore and aft turrets.

Marat was partially reconstructed between the fall of 1928 and 8 April 1931 at the Baltic Works. The most obvious external change was a much more elaborate forward superstructure needed to house new fire control instruments. A KDP-6 fire control director, with two 6 metres (20 ft) Zeiss rangefinder

Rangefinder

A rangefinder is a device that measures distance from the observer to a target, for the purposes of surveying, determining focus in photography, or accurately aiming a weapon. Some devices use active methods to measure ; others measure distance using trigonometry...

s, was positioned at the top of the tubular foremast. A 8 metres (26 ft) Zeiss rangefinder was also added on the rear superstructure. The top of the forward funnel was lengthened by about 2 metres (6.6 ft) and angled backwards in an attempt to keep the exhaust gases away from the control and gunnery spaces. A derrick

Derrick

A derrick is a lifting device composed of one tower, or guyed mast such as a pole which is hinged freely at the bottom. It is controlled by lines powered by some means such as man-hauling or motors, so that the pole can move in all four directions. A line runs up it and over its top with a hook on...

was added to the mainmast to handle a KR-1 flying boat

Flying boat

A flying boat is a fixed-winged seaplane with a hull, allowing it to land on water. It differs from a float plane as it uses a purpose-designed fuselage which can float, granting the aircraft buoyancy. Flying boats may be stabilized by under-wing floats or by wing-like projections from the fuselage...

imported from Germany that was stored above the third turret. No aircraft catapult

Aircraft catapult

An aircraft catapult is a device used to launch aircraft from ships—in particular aircraft carriers—as a form of assisted take off. It consists of a track built into the flight deck, below which is a large piston or shuttle that is attached through the track to the nose gear of the aircraft, or in...

was fitted so the aircraft had to take off and land on the water. A forecastle

Forecastle

Forecastle refers to the upper deck of a sailing ship forward of the foremast, or the forward part of a ship with the sailors' living quarters...

was added to the bow, which was also given much more sheer and flare to improve her sea-keeping abilities. Her turrets were overhauled, her guns replaced and new 8-meter rangefinders were installed on every turret. Her boilers were converted to only burn fuel oil and the more powerful boilers allowed the forward three boilers to be removed. The space freed up was used for anti-aircraft ammunition and various control spaces. The cruising turbines were also removed which simplified the ship's machinery at a small cost in power. These changes increased her displacement to 26170 tonnes (25,757 LT) at full load and her overall length to 184 metres (603.7 ft). Her metacentric height

Metacentric height

The metacentric height is a measurement of the static stability of a floating body. It is calculated as the distance between the centre of gravity of a ship and its metacentre . A larger metacentric height implies greater stability against overturning...

increased to 1.93 metres (6.3 ft) from her designed 1.76 metres (5.8 ft) mainly because she now carried much of her fuel in her double bottom rather than in coal bunkers high on the sides of the ship. More weight was added to her before World War II, including an increase in the thickness of her turret roofs to 152 millimetres (6 in), that decreased her metacentric height to only 1.7 metres (5.6 ft). This was unsatisfactory and plans were made to reconstruct her again, but they were cancelled when the Germans attacked in 1941.
Marat took part in the 1937 Coronation Review in Britain. Her participation in the Winter War

Naval warfare in the Winter War

was minimal as she bombarded Finnish 10 inches (25 cm) coast defense guns one time at Saarenpää in the Beryozovye Islands

Beryozovye Islands

Beryozovye Islands , alternatively spelled Berezovye Islands, is an island group in Leningrad Oblast, Russia. The islands are situated at the bottom of the Gulf of Finland, just outside the town of Primorsk on the Karelian Isthmus....

with 133 high explosive shells before the Gulf of Finland iced over. In early 1940 her anti-aircraft armament was reinforced. She exchanged her elderly 3-inch 'Lender' guns for modern 76.2 millimetres (3 in) 34-K guns and two twin 76.2 mm 81-K mounts were mounted on her quarter deck. The magazines for these guns were situated in the rearmost casemates on each beam, which lost their 120 mm guns. At some point six automatic 37 millimetres (1.5 in) 70-K guns were also added. These additions boosted her displacement to 26700 tonnes (26,278 LT) at full load. She sailed to Tallinn

Tallinn

Tallinn is the capital and largest city of Estonia. It occupies an area of with a population of 414,940. It is situated on the northern coast of the country, on the banks of the Gulf of Finland, south of Helsinki, east of Stockholm and west of Saint Petersburg. Tallinn's Old Town is in the list...

shortly after the Soviets occupied Estonia, although she returned to Kronstadt on 20 June 1941, two days before the German invasion of Russia

Operation Barbarossa

began. Marat opened fire on troop positions of the German 18th Army from the Leningrad Sea Canal on 8 September. She was lightly damaged by German 15 centimetres (5.9 in) guns on 16 September.

She was sunk at her moorings on 23 September 1941 by two near-simultaneous hits by 1000 kilograms (2,204.6 lb) bombs near the forward superstructure. They caused the explosion of the forward 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:...

which heaved the turret up, blew the superstructure and forward funnel over to starboard and demolished the forward part of the hull from frames 20 to 57. 326 men were killed and the ship gradually settled to the bottom in 11 metres (36.1 ft) of water. Her sinking is commonly credited to the Stuka Ace

Ace

An ace is a playing card. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit symbol located in the middle of the card, sometimes large and decorated, especially in the case of the Ace of Spades...

pilot Leutnant

Second Lieutenant

Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces.- United Kingdom and Commonwealth :The rank second lieutenant was introduced throughout the British Army in 1871 to replace the rank of ensign , although it had long been used in the Royal Artillery, Royal...

Hans-Ulrich Rudel

Hans-Ulrich Rudel was a Stuka dive-bomber pilot during World War II and a member of the Nazi party. The most highly decorated German serviceman of the war, Rudel was one of only 27 military men to be awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, and the only...

of III./StG 2

Sturzkampfgeschwader 2

Sturzkampfgeschwader 2 Immelmann was a Luftwaffe Dive bomber-wing of World War II. It was named after Max Immelmann in 1939.The unit was originally formed as Fliegergruppe Schwerin in 1934; the first Stuka wing of its type, attaining the sobriquet 'Immelmann' in 1935...

, but Rudel only dropped one of the two bombs. The rear part of the ship was later refloated and she was used as a floating battery although all of her 120 mm guns were removed. Initially only the two rearmost turrets were operable, but the second turret was repaired by the autumn of 1942. She fired a total of 1971 12-inch shells during the Siege of Leningrad

Siege of Leningrad

. In December 1941 granite slabs 40 millimetre thick from the nearby harbor walls were laid on her decks to reinforce her deck protection. Another transverse bulkhead was built behind frame 57 and the space between them was filled with concrete to prevent her sinking if the original bulkhead was ruptured.

She returned to her original name on 31 May 1943. After the war there were several plans to reconstruct her, using the bow of the Frunze

Russian battleship Poltava (1911)

, but they were not accepted and were formally cancelled on 29 June 1948. She was renamed Volkhov, after the nearby river

Volkhov River

, on 28 November 1950 and served as a stationary training ship until stricken on 4 September 1953. The ship was subsequently broken up.

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