Russian battleship Pobeda

''Pobeda'' (russian: Победа, lit=Victory) was the last of the three pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Imperial Russian Navy at the end of the nineteenth century. The ship was assigned to the Pacific Squadron upon completion and based at Port Arthur from 1903. During the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, she participated in the battles of Port Arthur and the Yellow Sea. Having escaped serious damage in these engagements, ''Pobeda'' was sunk by gunfire during the siege of Port Arthur, and then salvaged by the Japanese and placed into service under the name .

Rearmed and re-boilered by the Japanese, ''Suwo'' was reclassified by the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) as a coastal defense ship in 1908 and served as a training ship for several years. She was the flagship of the Japanese squadron that participated in the Battle of Tsingtao at the beginning of World War I and continued in that role until she became a gunnery training ship in 1917. The ship was disarmed in 1922 to comply with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty and probably scrapped around that time.

Design and description

The design of the ''Peresvet'' class was inspired by the British second-class battleships (typically faster, but with thinner armor and smaller guns than first-class battleships) of the . The British ships were intended to defeat commerce-raiding armored cruisers like the Russian ships and , and the ''Peresvet'' class was designed to support the armored cruisers. This role placed a premium on high speed and long range at the expense of heavy armament and armor.McLaughlin 2003, p. 108

''Pobeda'' was long overall, had a beam of and a draft of . Designed to displace , she was almost overweight and displaced . Her crew consisted of 27 officers and 744 enlisted men. The ship was powered by three vertical triple-expansion steam engines using steam generated by 30 Belleville boilers. The engines were rated at , using forced draught, and designed to reach a top speed of . ''Pobeda'', however, reached a top speed of from during her sea trials in October 1901. She carried a maximum of of coal, which allowed her to steam for at a speed of .

The ship's main battery consisted of four guns mounted in two twin- gun turrets, one forward and one aft of the superstructure. The secondary armament consisted of eleven Canet quick-firing (QF) guns, mounted in casemates on the sides of the hull and in the bow, underneath the forecastle. Smaller guns were carried for defense against torpedo boats. These included twenty QF guns, twenty Hotchkiss guns and eight guns. She was also armed with five torpedo tubes, three above water and two submerged. The ship carried 45 mines to be used to protect her anchorage. ''Pobeda''s waterline armor belt consisted of Krupp cemented armor and was thick. The armor of her gun turrets had a maximum thickness of 9 inches and her deck ranged from in thickness.

Construction and service

Sister ship at anchor in 1901
''Pobeda'' (Victory) was ordered on 26 April 1898 from the Baltic Works and construction began on 30 May 1898 at the company's Saint Petersburg shipyard, well before the formal keel-laying ceremony on 21 February 1899. The ship was launched on 10 May 1900 and towed to Kronstadt on 31 August 1901 for fitting out. She made her machinery trials in October, well before she was completed the next year. She sailed to Reval (modern Tallinn) on 1 August to participate in the naval review held there a few days later to commemorate the visit of the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, to Russia. ''Pobeda'' entered service upon completing her artillery trials in October 1902, although she was not officially accepted until 10 March 1903, at a cost of 10,050,000 rubles. She had already sailed from Libau on 13 November 1902 and arrived at Port Arthur on 13 June 1903 for assignment to the Pacific Squadron.McLaughlin 2003, p. 115

Battle of Port Arthur

After the Japanese victory in the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894–95, tensions had arisen between Russia and Japan over their ambitions to control both Manchuria and Korea. A further issue was the Russian failure to withdraw its troops from Manchuria in October 1903, as it had promised. Japan had begun negotiations to ease the situation in 1901, but the Russian government was slow and uncertain in its replies because it had not yet decided exactly how to resolve the problems. Japan interpreted these as deliberate prevarications designed to buy time to complete the Russian armament programs. The final straws were news of Russian timber concessions in northern Korea and the Russian refusal to acknowledge Japanese interests in Manchuria while continuing to place conditions on Japanese activities in Korea. These led the Japanese government to decide in December 1903 that war was now inevitable. The Pacific Squadron began mooring in the outer harbor at night as tensions with Japan increased, so as to react more quickly to any Japanese attempt to land troops in Korea.

On the night of 8/9 February 1904, the IJN launched a surprise attack on the Russian fleet at Port Arthur. ''Pobeda'' was not hit in the initial torpedo-boat attack, and sortied the following morning when the Combined Fleet, commanded by Vice Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō, attacked. Tōgō had expected the surprise night attack by his ships to be much more successful than it was, anticipating that the Russians would be badly disorganized and weakened, but they had recovered from their surprise and were ready for his attack. The Japanese ships were spotted by the protected cruiser , which was patrolling offshore and alerted the Russian defenses. Tōgō chose to attack the Russian coastal defenses with his main armament and engage the ships with his secondary guns. Splitting his fire proved to be a poor decision as the Japanese and six-inch guns inflicted little damage on the Russian ships, which concentrated all their fire on the Japanese ships with some effect. ''Pobeda'' was hit once or twice amidships near the waterline, losing two men killed and four wounded, but the shell(s) failed to penetrate the ship's armor and little damage was done.

On 22 March, ''Pobeda'' joined several other battleships firing indirectly at Japanese ships bombarding Port Arthur's harbor and hit the once, killing seven men.McLaughlin, p. 48 She participated in the action of 13 April, when Tōgō successfully lured out a portion of the Pacific Squadron, including Vice Admiral Stepan Makarov's flagship, the battleship . When Makarov spotted the five Japanese battleships, he turned back for Port Arthur, and ''Petropavlovsk'' struck a mine laid by the Japanese the previous night. The ship sank in less than two minutes after one of her magazines exploded, and Makarov was one of the 677 killed. When ''Pobeda'' was returning to port after ''Petropavlovsk'' sank, she struck a mine herself, but was able to steam to the harbor under her own power despite an 11° list. Her repairs were completed on 9 June although some of her guns were removed during this time to reinforce the defenses of the port. ''Pobeda'' lost a total of three 6-inch, two 75-millimeter, one 47-millimeter and four 37-millimeter guns. She sailed with the rest of the Russian squadron on 23 June in an abortive attempt to reach Vladivostok. The new fleet commander, Vice Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft, ordered the squadron to return to Port Arthur when it encountered the Japanese fleet shortly before sunset as he did not wish to engage the numerically superior Japanese in a night battle. ''Pobeda'' bombarded Japanese positions besieging the port on 28 July.

Battle of the Yellow Sea

The Japanese bombardment of 9 August, coupled with a direct order from Tsar Nicholas II, forced Vitgeft to make another attempt to reach Vladivostok. The squadron sortied in an attempt to escape to Vladivostok the next morning. At 12:25, it was spotted by Japanese cruisers and intercepted by the Combined Fleet in what became the Battle of the Yellow Sea. ''Pobeda'' was third in line during the battle, and was not seriously damaged during the early long-range stage of the action. Around 18:00, two 12-inch shells from the battleship penetrated the conning tower of the Russian flagship , killing Vitgeft and the helmsman, severely wounding the captain, and causing the ship to come to a dead stop after executing a sharp turn. Thinking that this was a maneuver planned by Vitgeft, the Russian battleline started to execute the same turn, causing all of the ships directly behind ''Tsesarevich'', including ''Pobeda'', to maneuver wildly to avoid hitting the stationary flagship.

As the Japanese ships continued to pound the ''Tsesarevich'', the battleship boldly charged Tōgō's battleline in an attempt to divert the Japanese shellfire, followed shortly afterward by ''Peresvet'', the flagship of the squadron's second-in-command, Rear Admiral Prince Pavel Ukhtomsky. The Japanese battleline immediately shifted fire to the oncoming ships, badly damaging both and forcing them to turn away.McLaughlin 2003, p. 163 Ukhtomsky signaled the other Russian ships to follow him back to Port Arthur, but the signal was hard to discern because the flags had to be hung from the bridge railings because ''Peresvet''s topmasts had been shot away; the signal was only gradually recognized.McLaughlin 2008, p. 46 Although ''Pobeda'' was struck by eleven large-caliber hits that killed 4 men and wounded 29, including one below the waterline, they failed to penetrate her armor and she reached Port Arthur without any difficulties; the hits did knock out one 10-inch gun and three 75-millimeter guns.

Siege of Port Arthur

Returning to Port Arthur on 11 August, the Russian squadron found the city still under siege by the Japanese Third Army led by Baron Nogi Maresuke. The new commander, Rear Admiral Robert N. Viren, decided to use the men and guns of the Pacific Squadron to reinforce the defenses of Port Arthur and even more guns were stripped from the squadron's ships. This proved to make little difference and ''Pobeda'' was struck by several and 4.7-inch shells on 28 September that did no significant damage. The Japanese bombardment with medium guns continued for the next month and a half and the ship was repeatedly struck, without much effect. Japanese troops were able to seize 203 Hill which overlooked the harbor on 5 December. This allowed the Imperial Japanese Army's siege guns to fire directly at the Russian ships; they hit ''Pobeda'' approximately 30 times and sank her in shallow water on 7 December 1904. Russian attempts to destroy the ship before they surrendered were frustrated because her vital parts were already underwater.

Japanese career

''Pobeda'' was refloated by Japanese engineers on 17 October 1905 and was classified as a first-class battleship by the IJN. She was renamed as ''Suwo'' on 25 October,Lengerer, p. 44 after the ancient province.Silverstone, p. 337 She steamed under her own power to Sasebo Naval Arsenal, where she arrived on 16 December and began temporary repairs. Her reconstruction at Yokosuka Naval Arsenal began in May 1906 and lasted until 10 October 1908.

To improve her stability, ''Suwo''s forward fighting top was removed. ''Suwo'' was rearmed with four 10-inch 45 caliber guns, ten 6-inch guns and sixteen QF 12-pounder 12 cwt ()"Cwt" is the abbreviation for hundredweight, 12 cwt referring to the weight of the gun. guns. Two above-water 18-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes replaced her original torpedo armament and her crew now numbered 791 officers and enlisted men.

''Suwo'' was re-designated as a first-class coastal defense ship on 28 August 1912 and became a training ship for cadets and engineers. Initially assigned to the 1st Standing Squadron when World War I began, she shortly afterwards became the flagship of the 2nd Squadron, commanded by Vice Admiral Kato Sadakichi. The squadron was tasked to blockade the German-owned port of Tsingtao, China, and to cooperate with the Imperial Japanese Army in capturing the city. ''Tango'' and the other ships of the squadron, reinforced by the British pre-dreadnought , bombarded German fortifications throughout the siege until the Germans surrendered on 7 November. ''Suwo'' served as flagship of the Second Squadron of the Second Fleet in 1915–1916 before becoming a gunnery training ship at Yokosuka for the rest of the war.Preston, p. 186 In April 1922, in compliance with the Washington Naval Treaty, ''Suwo'' was disarmed at the Kure Naval Arsenal.Jentschura, Jung & Mickel, p. 20 While her armor was being removed, the ship capsized on 13 July. She was probably scrapped in 1922–1923, but at least one source suggests she was refloated and hulked, serving until being broken up at Kure in 1946.McLaughlin 2008, p. 49

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Pobeda
Peresvet-class battleships
Ships built at the Baltic Shipyard
1900 ships
Russo-Japanese War battleships of Russia
Maritime incidents in 1904
Shipwrecks of the Russo-Japanese War
Shipwrecks of China
Captured ships
Battleships of the Imperial Japanese Navy
Naval ships captured by Japan during the Russo-Japanese War
Ships sunk by coastal artillery