The “Magnificent Age” - Catherine II TL
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Not sure: he was a capable officer, seemingly well-suited for the ongoing war.
One of you is quite enough: there is no reason for turning a piece of art into a mass production. I already explained while ago what the bribes amount to: 👍 😍. Of course, as befitting a deity, they are not being used for some material gain but just a way to figure out if a divine blabbing is still being appreciated by the true believers. 😂😂😂😂😂😂What, so you want more Alumas?
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You are completely unique love, there are none that match youWhat, so you want more Alumas?
26. The war. #3. Year 1770. Part 2
26. The war. #3. Year 1770. Part 2
The glorious year
Ryabaya Mogila. Rumyantsev’s main force reached Repnin’s position on June 16 (27) and at night of 17th (28) the attack started. Rumyantsev, after joining Repnin’s force, had less that 38,000 against approximately 70,000.
The Russian army was divided into several separate detachments, which attacked Kaplan-Giray's troops simultaneously from several sides. Rumyantsev's offensive put the Crimean-Turkish camp at risk to the encirclement and forced the khan to retreat to the Larga River, losing 400 people. The Russian army lost only 46 soldiers.
Despite the small scale of the battle itself, it became known because of the tactical innovations used by Rumyantsev: march-maneuver to the rear and on the flanks of the enemy’s army and and divisional squares instead of a traditional single army square. To increase the mobility, Rumyantsev also stopped usage of chevaux de frise as infantry’s protective measure against the cavalry charges, relying instead upon the artillery.
Lagra. All sorts of obstacles - natural and artificial - made it difficult to pursue. Khan took an even stronger position on the Larga River, where he decided to wait for the arrival of the main vizier's forces crossing the Danube and the cavalry of Abaza Pasha (15 thousand), coming from Brailov. Rumyantsev had no more than 25 thousand after the allocation of units to ensure the rear. Anticipating the intention of the enemy, he decided to break him piece by piece, without waiting for the connection of the entire 250,000th mass.
At Lagra Kaplan-Girey had 15,000 Turks, 65,000 Tatars and 33 artillery pieces. His position was located behind the Larga River, the right flank of which was fortified by trenches. Rumyantsev decided to immediately attack the enemy, and on July 4, advancing from Falci, stopped 8 versts from the Turkish camp. Several thousand Turkish-Tatar cavalry rushed to the Russian forward detachments, but were repulsed. The next day, the Turks and Tatars attacked with larger forces and failed again, and at dawn on July 7, the Russians themselves went on the offensive against the Turkish positions. Russian main attack was against enemy’s right flank while division of general Plemiannikov was demonstrating against the left flank. While being inferior in the numbers, Rumyantsev had a big advantage in the artillery (over 100 guns) and his troops had been much better organized.
When the divisions of Generals Baur and Repnin captured the Turkish trenches, Plemiannikov moved his division across Larga, and the general attack of the Russians forced the Turks to hastily abandon the last fortification and their camp. The Tatar cavalry, which tried to cover up the retreat, was overthrown by the Russian heavy cavalry of Count I. P. Saltykov.
Rumyantsev used a new tactic of movement of troops in columns, which turned in a loose formation in battle. As at Ryabaya Mogila, artillery was used as a protection from the cavalry charges.
The enemy lost more than 1,000 killed, 2,000 prisoners. 33 guns (including 3 mortars), 8 banners, and the camp. Russian losses were 29 killed and 61 wounded.
After the defeat at the Battle of Larga on July 7, the Turkish-Tatar forces of the Crimean Khan Kaplan II Giray retreated towards the Danube. Soon the advanced Russian troops found that the retreating had divided into two parts: the Tatars moved towards Izmail and Kiliya, where their properties and families were left, and the Turks retreated down the left bank of the Kagul River.
Catherine was ecstatic: “You will take in my century an undoubtedly excellent place of the leader of the reasonable, skillful and diligent. I consider you to give this justice and, so that everyone knows my way of thinking about you and my pleasure about your successes, I send you the Order of St. George I class.” Rumyantsev became the first (after Catherine who awarded herself as a founder) recipient of St. George I class. Award was accompanied by a list of the villages granted to him and his descendants.
Kagul. Two Grand Viziers have already been replaced; now the army was commanded by the third, Ivazzade Khalil Pasha. Having learned about the small number of Lagra’s winners and being reported by the Khan that Rumyantsev’s army is very short on food, Khalil crossed the Danube in the full hope that his 100,000-strong army would crush the enemy, who had no more than 17,000 [4]. Khan promised to attack the rear of the Russian troops, while the Grand Vizier was attacking them from the front.
At that time, Rumyantsev was waiting for the arrival of food, and thus made it possible for Iwazzade Khalil Pasha's army to join the detachment standing on Kagul. The number of the combined Turkish army was up to 150 thousand people, including 50 thousand infantry and 100 thousand cavalry.
In addition, on the left side of Lake Yalpug (Yalpukh) there are 80 thousand Tatars who were preparing to cross Salchu (a tributary of the river. Yalpug) to attack the Rumyantsev wagons moving along this river and the transport coming from Falchi. After that, the Tatars could attack the rear of the Russian army. Rumyantsev wanted to move immediately to the enemy, but did not consider it possible to do so without having at least seven-day provisions with him, and therefore sent an order for the immediate movement of wagons, and to speed up he sent regimental wagons, arming the drivers and increasing their numbers. Rumyantsev's position was as follows: there were 150,000 Turks in front of his front; on the right and left, the long lakes Kagul and Yalpug hindered free movement, food remained for two to four days. In case of failure, the army would be in a difficult situation, being locked in a narrow space between rivers and large lakes, attacked from the front and from the rear by the enemy ten times stronger. Rumyantsev could easily get out of this situation, it was enough only to retreat to Falci, and, having provided himself with food, wait for the enemy's attack on the chosen position. Then, even if he lost the battle, he could retreat to join the Second Army and then go on the offensive again. But Rumyantsev remained true to his rule: "not to bear the presence of the enemy without attacking him." Rumyantsev ordered the army luggage train coming from Falci to the Salcea River to go to the Kagul River to prevent a Tatar attack from behind the Yalpug.
The Turks noticed the immobility of Rumyantsev's army, but thought it come from the awareness of their own doom. At 10 a.m. on July 20, the Turkish army withdrew from its position and moved to the village of Grecheni. At the sight of the Turkish army, which stopped in the evening in two versts before reaching Trajan’s Wall and choosing a position, Rumyantsev despite the small size of his army, said to the surrounding officers: "If the Turks dare to set up at least one tent in this place, I will attack them that night." Vizier was planning to start his attack at 10AM but this plan was already hours late compared to Rumyantsev's plan: the Russian force was to launch its offensive at 1 a.m. — only an hour after midnight, with 17,000 infantrymen deployed in squares with sharpshooters defending their flanks as they have to fight their way against superior numbers of the enemy especially their cavalry, while the rest have to be put in reserve in case things went out of his plan.
When the Turks noticed the attackers, they ordered their numerous cavalry to attack, stretching in front of the entire Russian front. Russian squares stopped and opened fire. The fire of the Melissano batteries was especially effective. When the artillery repulsed the attack on the center, the Turks moved the attack to the right to strengthen the attack on the columns of General Bruce and Prince Repnin. Taking advantage of the hollow between these squares, the Turks surrounded them from all sides. At the same time, part of the Turkish cavalry, taking advantage of another valley, crossed the Trajan’s Wall and rushed into the rear of the Olits square. After completing this maneuver, the Ottomans settled in a ditch along the wall and opened rifle fire on Olits’s troops.
At this time, Rumyantsev sent reserves from the attacked columns to occupy the hollow and threaten the Turkish routes of retreat to the camp and retranshments. This maneuver was successful: the Turks, afraid of losing their retreat, rushed from the hollow to the retranchment under the canister fire of Russian artillery. At the same time, the rest of the Turkish cavalry, which attacked the square on the right and left flanks, also hastily retreated. Failure accompanied the Turks on their left flank, where General Baur not only repulsed the attack, but also went on the offensive and under fire successfully stormed the 25-gun battery, and then captured the retranchment, capturing 93 guns.
After repelling the Turkish attack, the Russian troops moved to the main retranshment of the Turkish camp at 8 o'clock in the morning. When Plemyannikov's square approached the retranschment, about 10,000 Janissaries descended into the hollow between the center and the left flank of the fortification and rushed on the square, broke into it and crushed some units. The square was upset, the janissaries seized two banners and several charging boxes; the Russian soldiers fled, trying to hide in the square of General Olits and thereby leading it to a mess. Noticing this and fearing for the fate of the square, Rumyantsev turned to the Prince of Oldenburg, who was nearby, and calmly said, "Now our business has come." With these words, he rode from Olits's square to the fleeing troops of Plemyannikov and with one phrase, "Guys, stop!", kept the runners, who stopped and grouped near Rumyantsev. At the same time, the Janissaries were opened fire by a Messino's battery, they were attacked on both sides by cavalry, and General Baur, who had already entered the retranschment, sent a battalion of jagers to attack the janissary on the left and to longitudinally shell the ditch in front of the retranchment, in which the Janissars also settled. After the confusion caused by the explosion of the charging box, the 1st Grenadier Regiment rushed into bayonets. The Janissaries fled, the cavalry began to pursue them. At the same time, the squares were put in order, the flank columns occupied the entire retranshment and recaptured the banners captured by the Turks. After the loss of fortifications, artillery and wagons, the Turks saw that Prince Repnin's corps was entering their rear, left the camp at 9 o'clock in the morning and fled under the flank fire of Repnin's corps. Vizier and other pashas were trying to stop the fleeing troops but without a success. The routed Ottomans went through a detachment of Anatolian Kurdish cavalrymen supposedly on its way to assist Ivazzade Pasha, but the detachment instead looted whatever belongings the soldiers on flight carried with them, therefore adding to the chaos the Ottoman army was already in.
The fatigue of the soldiers who had been on their feet since one o'clock in the morning prevented the Russian infantry from continuing to pursue more than four versts on the day of the battle, after which the pursuit continued with the cavalry. At the end of the battle, Rumyantsev took a position behind the former Turkish camp.
Soon the pursuit of the Turks continued outside the battlefield. To perform this task Rumyantsev assigned the Bauer's corps. On July 22 (August 2), the pursuers occupied the old Ottoman camp, located 20 versts from the place of the general battle. On July 23 (August 3), Bauer's corps reached Kartal, where they found the remains of the Grand Vizier's troops crossing to the other side of the Danube. Although the Turks had more than 300 ships at their disposal, there was a complete mess at the crossing site. Once at the boarding point, Bauer quickly assessed the situation and decided to attack the Ottomans. For this purpose, the Quartermaster General arranged his troops on a single front, the center of which was formed by infantry squares, and the flanks by cavalry units. In this order, Bauer's corps resolutely attacked the Turks, inflicting another defeat on them and thus completing the defeat of Ivazzade Khalil Pasha's troops. After the battle near the crossing, the winners captured the entire baggage train near the river, an artillery battery of 30 guns, as well as more than a thousand prisoners.
The total Ottoman losses amounted to 20,000 killed, wounded and captured 140 guns and 56 colors. The Russian losses were 951 dead and wounded. True to themselves, the Cossacks
After the end of the Battle ofKagul, the army of the Crimean Khan retreated to Izmail, but, faced with the displeasure of the local population, who did not want to attract the attention of the Russian army, the Tatars were forced to retreat to Ackerman. In accordance with the situation, Rumyantsev decided to start offensive in the direction of Izmail - a detachment of General Osip Igelström was sent for this purpose. Igelström's troops marched at the same time as Bauer's corps and soon seized the bridges at the mouth of the Yalpukh River near the village of Tobaka, as well as the luggage train that had withdrawn to the area. On July 23, Izmail was approached by Repnin's corps, reinforced by units under the command of Potemkin. On July 26 (August 6), Repnin's troops took Izmail, after which they moved on, consistently capturing the remaining strongholds on the Turks on the Lower Danube.
Catherine wrote to Rumyantsev:
“As the first duty, I was able to bring to Almighty God for his countless graces and generosity, kneeling thanks, that this morning (August 2) with all the people and the cannons salute in the Kazan church was fulfilled, and the whole city was very happy. Returning to the palace, sat down at the table and remembering a person giving us the reasons for joy and fun with his art, diligence and mind, was I drinking, with the cannons firing, the health of Mr. Field Marshal Count Rumyantsev, with which I congratulate you to the newly awarded and very well-deserved rank.”
The Ottomans left fortress of Brailov and Bucharest was occupied again. At that point Rumyantsev had to stop to get supplies and reinforcements.
Not too glorious. General Peter Panin was not too happy with his assignment to the less important 2nd Army and when he arrived to it, he became even less happy because his main task was hardly promising the easy laurels: he had to take the fortress of Benderi. Cautious Panin paid special attention to securing communication line with his base in Elizavetgrad, built a number of fortifications and at each night, following the example of Peter I, erected a redoubt. His army did not need anything. On July 6, Panin crossed the Dniester and besieged Bendery on the 15th.
The fortress was not too modern, to put it mildly, but it was defended by 12,500 Turks and had 400 guns. As a result, it was considered a potential threat to the communications of the 1st Army. The 2nd army had 34,000 and Panin started the siege on July 15 hoping to force the fortress to surrender with wear and cannon fire but the Ottomans did not comply. So the whole thing lasted into the September and Panin, was still sitting there suffering from the supply problems and losses due to the diseases. With the winter coming, he was facing a choice of two options, neither of them good: a costly direct assault or abandoning the siege with a loss of face. The first option involved soldiers lives, the second his career so guess which one he chose... You guessed correctly [5].
On September 15, a powerful mine (400 poods of gunpowder) was blown up, and part of the fortress wall collapsed from the explosion. On the night of September 16, Panin gave an order to storm. The fierce battle in the city lasted all night, by the morning the surviving defenders of the fortress laid down their weapons. About 7,000 Turks were killed during the assault, the rest were taken prisoner. Russian losses during the capture of the fortress amounted to 6,000 people, of whom 1,672 were killed. Thus, the capture of this powerful fortress was the bloodiest battle for the Russian side in the entire war. After capturing Benderi, the 2nd Army marched back to Ukraine.
Such a huge loss made a bad impression in the capital and it became even worse as a result of Panin’s report written in an inappropriately frivolous style. The storm was described as a bear hunt and the jokes did not sit well with the huge losses which he omitted to report. Well, the fortress captured and, by the statute, he was eligible to St.George I class, which he got. But the accompanying rescript was formal, short and cold. He was removed from command and replaced with Prince Dolgorukov.
On the Eastern flank. One of the first actions taken by Rumyantsev in 1769 was to sent a detachment to restore fortifications of Azov and Taganrog. The wharves of Voronez had been busy building the ships for a new Azov flotilla but there was a big problem: to get to the sea these ships had to get down the river and somehow pass over the shallow bar at its mouth. In other words, they had to be almost flat bottomed and, as a result, to have a very limited sea-worthiness. A brand, “the newly-invented”, design was developed, sailing and rowing vessels armed with 12-16 guns of 6-12 pounds caliber. The biggest one, three-masted “Khotin”, had 25 12 pounds guns and there were 7 two-masted and few cannon boats. They formed initial flotilla sailing under command of vice-admiral A.N.Senyavin. They were considered inadequate for the operations against the Ottoman Black Sea Fleet [6] so the decision was made to restore a wharf in Taganrog and start building the real sea-worthy ships.
And much more glory had been coming from the Med….
_______________
[1] The greatest Japanese swordsman ever. Won 61 duel. The best (AFAIK) was with another famous swordsman who was using a very long sword. Musashi came to a duel with a much longer heavy stick and kicked the s__t …oops… brains out of him. Not to be confused with a battleship of the same name, which won none of its encounters.
[2] A cavalry lieutenant with an impressive record of the strategic blunders.
[3] Artillery lieutenant who did not make it into Napoleon. As pretty much all his military “philosophy”, this piece of wisdom is highly questionable.
[4] Rumyantsev had 23,615 infantry and 3,495 cavalry with 106 regimental (3 pounders) and 149 field guns but he had to protect the magazines and supply train moving to the army with a 10-day supply of food from Falchi. To fulfill these goals, a detachment of General Fyodor Glebov was allocated with four grenadier battalions, as well as parts of regular and irregular cavalry. At the same time, Rumyantsev ordered the detachments of Major General Grigory Potemkin and Brigadier Ivan Gudovich to move towards the Yalpug River to cover the army from this direction against possible Tatar attack. Thus, just before the battle with the Ottoman Sultan's army, the main forces of the 1st Army numbered 17,000 infantry, as well as few thousand horsemen of regular and irregular cavalry.
[5] If not, I would be very disappointed. 🤔
[6] Strange as it may sound, in OTL this assessment proved to be too pessimistic.
“You win battles by knowing the enemy's timing, and using a timing which the enemy does not expect.”
Miyamoto Musashi [1]
“Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.”
Winston Churchill [2]
"We're surrounded, so they can't get away from us."
Baysangur Benoevsky
“There are no wars without losses, and sometimes victory brings so many losses that it looks more like a defeat.”
“When people are afraid, they either run away or fight.”
unknown authors
“The battle is won by the one who is determined to win it!”
Lev Tolstoy [3]
“You don’t count the enemies, you beat them.”
F.F.Ushakov
"If you dare to fight, it's inappropriate to be timid or indecisive. And if the enemy intends to eat you for lunch, you should have him for breakfast.”
Khosrev Ibn-Iskander
“Our glory and dignity do not allow to bear the presence of the enemy standing in sight of us without attacking him.”
Rumyantsev before Battle of Lagra
“How come, Your Excellency, that all your actions result in being a shame to the Fatherland? Can you do something to its glory?”
Saltykov-Schedrin, ‘ The modern Idyl”
"In sex, as in battle, taking a comfortable position does not yet guarantee success."
E. A. Sevrus (Borokhov)
Miyamoto Musashi [1]
“Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.”
Winston Churchill [2]
"We're surrounded, so they can't get away from us."
Baysangur Benoevsky
“There are no wars without losses, and sometimes victory brings so many losses that it looks more like a defeat.”
“When people are afraid, they either run away or fight.”
unknown authors
“The battle is won by the one who is determined to win it!”
Lev Tolstoy [3]
“You don’t count the enemies, you beat them.”
F.F.Ushakov
"If you dare to fight, it's inappropriate to be timid or indecisive. And if the enemy intends to eat you for lunch, you should have him for breakfast.”
Khosrev Ibn-Iskander
“Our glory and dignity do not allow to bear the presence of the enemy standing in sight of us without attacking him.”
Rumyantsev before Battle of Lagra
“How come, Your Excellency, that all your actions result in being a shame to the Fatherland? Can you do something to its glory?”
Saltykov-Schedrin, ‘ The modern Idyl”
"In sex, as in battle, taking a comfortable position does not yet guarantee success."
E. A. Sevrus (Borokhov)
The glorious year
Ryabaya Mogila. Rumyantsev’s main force reached Repnin’s position on June 16 (27) and at night of 17th (28) the attack started. Rumyantsev, after joining Repnin’s force, had less that 38,000 against approximately 70,000.
The Russian army was divided into several separate detachments, which attacked Kaplan-Giray's troops simultaneously from several sides. Rumyantsev's offensive put the Crimean-Turkish camp at risk to the encirclement and forced the khan to retreat to the Larga River, losing 400 people. The Russian army lost only 46 soldiers.
Despite the small scale of the battle itself, it became known because of the tactical innovations used by Rumyantsev: march-maneuver to the rear and on the flanks of the enemy’s army and and divisional squares instead of a traditional single army square. To increase the mobility, Rumyantsev also stopped usage of chevaux de frise as infantry’s protective measure against the cavalry charges, relying instead upon the artillery.
Lagra. All sorts of obstacles - natural and artificial - made it difficult to pursue. Khan took an even stronger position on the Larga River, where he decided to wait for the arrival of the main vizier's forces crossing the Danube and the cavalry of Abaza Pasha (15 thousand), coming from Brailov. Rumyantsev had no more than 25 thousand after the allocation of units to ensure the rear. Anticipating the intention of the enemy, he decided to break him piece by piece, without waiting for the connection of the entire 250,000th mass.
At Lagra Kaplan-Girey had 15,000 Turks, 65,000 Tatars and 33 artillery pieces. His position was located behind the Larga River, the right flank of which was fortified by trenches. Rumyantsev decided to immediately attack the enemy, and on July 4, advancing from Falci, stopped 8 versts from the Turkish camp. Several thousand Turkish-Tatar cavalry rushed to the Russian forward detachments, but were repulsed. The next day, the Turks and Tatars attacked with larger forces and failed again, and at dawn on July 7, the Russians themselves went on the offensive against the Turkish positions. Russian main attack was against enemy’s right flank while division of general Plemiannikov was demonstrating against the left flank. While being inferior in the numbers, Rumyantsev had a big advantage in the artillery (over 100 guns) and his troops had been much better organized.
When the divisions of Generals Baur and Repnin captured the Turkish trenches, Plemiannikov moved his division across Larga, and the general attack of the Russians forced the Turks to hastily abandon the last fortification and their camp. The Tatar cavalry, which tried to cover up the retreat, was overthrown by the Russian heavy cavalry of Count I. P. Saltykov.
Rumyantsev used a new tactic of movement of troops in columns, which turned in a loose formation in battle. As at Ryabaya Mogila, artillery was used as a protection from the cavalry charges.
The enemy lost more than 1,000 killed, 2,000 prisoners. 33 guns (including 3 mortars), 8 banners, and the camp. Russian losses were 29 killed and 61 wounded.
After the defeat at the Battle of Larga on July 7, the Turkish-Tatar forces of the Crimean Khan Kaplan II Giray retreated towards the Danube. Soon the advanced Russian troops found that the retreating had divided into two parts: the Tatars moved towards Izmail and Kiliya, where their properties and families were left, and the Turks retreated down the left bank of the Kagul River.
Catherine was ecstatic: “You will take in my century an undoubtedly excellent place of the leader of the reasonable, skillful and diligent. I consider you to give this justice and, so that everyone knows my way of thinking about you and my pleasure about your successes, I send you the Order of St. George I class.” Rumyantsev became the first (after Catherine who awarded herself as a founder) recipient of St. George I class. Award was accompanied by a list of the villages granted to him and his descendants.
Kagul. Two Grand Viziers have already been replaced; now the army was commanded by the third, Ivazzade Khalil Pasha. Having learned about the small number of Lagra’s winners and being reported by the Khan that Rumyantsev’s army is very short on food, Khalil crossed the Danube in the full hope that his 100,000-strong army would crush the enemy, who had no more than 17,000 [4]. Khan promised to attack the rear of the Russian troops, while the Grand Vizier was attacking them from the front.
At that time, Rumyantsev was waiting for the arrival of food, and thus made it possible for Iwazzade Khalil Pasha's army to join the detachment standing on Kagul. The number of the combined Turkish army was up to 150 thousand people, including 50 thousand infantry and 100 thousand cavalry.
In addition, on the left side of Lake Yalpug (Yalpukh) there are 80 thousand Tatars who were preparing to cross Salchu (a tributary of the river. Yalpug) to attack the Rumyantsev wagons moving along this river and the transport coming from Falchi. After that, the Tatars could attack the rear of the Russian army. Rumyantsev wanted to move immediately to the enemy, but did not consider it possible to do so without having at least seven-day provisions with him, and therefore sent an order for the immediate movement of wagons, and to speed up he sent regimental wagons, arming the drivers and increasing their numbers. Rumyantsev's position was as follows: there were 150,000 Turks in front of his front; on the right and left, the long lakes Kagul and Yalpug hindered free movement, food remained for two to four days. In case of failure, the army would be in a difficult situation, being locked in a narrow space between rivers and large lakes, attacked from the front and from the rear by the enemy ten times stronger. Rumyantsev could easily get out of this situation, it was enough only to retreat to Falci, and, having provided himself with food, wait for the enemy's attack on the chosen position. Then, even if he lost the battle, he could retreat to join the Second Army and then go on the offensive again. But Rumyantsev remained true to his rule: "not to bear the presence of the enemy without attacking him." Rumyantsev ordered the army luggage train coming from Falci to the Salcea River to go to the Kagul River to prevent a Tatar attack from behind the Yalpug.
The Turks noticed the immobility of Rumyantsev's army, but thought it come from the awareness of their own doom. At 10 a.m. on July 20, the Turkish army withdrew from its position and moved to the village of Grecheni. At the sight of the Turkish army, which stopped in the evening in two versts before reaching Trajan’s Wall and choosing a position, Rumyantsev despite the small size of his army, said to the surrounding officers: "If the Turks dare to set up at least one tent in this place, I will attack them that night." Vizier was planning to start his attack at 10AM but this plan was already hours late compared to Rumyantsev's plan: the Russian force was to launch its offensive at 1 a.m. — only an hour after midnight, with 17,000 infantrymen deployed in squares with sharpshooters defending their flanks as they have to fight their way against superior numbers of the enemy especially their cavalry, while the rest have to be put in reserve in case things went out of his plan.
When the Turks noticed the attackers, they ordered their numerous cavalry to attack, stretching in front of the entire Russian front. Russian squares stopped and opened fire. The fire of the Melissano batteries was especially effective. When the artillery repulsed the attack on the center, the Turks moved the attack to the right to strengthen the attack on the columns of General Bruce and Prince Repnin. Taking advantage of the hollow between these squares, the Turks surrounded them from all sides. At the same time, part of the Turkish cavalry, taking advantage of another valley, crossed the Trajan’s Wall and rushed into the rear of the Olits square. After completing this maneuver, the Ottomans settled in a ditch along the wall and opened rifle fire on Olits’s troops.
At this time, Rumyantsev sent reserves from the attacked columns to occupy the hollow and threaten the Turkish routes of retreat to the camp and retranshments. This maneuver was successful: the Turks, afraid of losing their retreat, rushed from the hollow to the retranchment under the canister fire of Russian artillery. At the same time, the rest of the Turkish cavalry, which attacked the square on the right and left flanks, also hastily retreated. Failure accompanied the Turks on their left flank, where General Baur not only repulsed the attack, but also went on the offensive and under fire successfully stormed the 25-gun battery, and then captured the retranchment, capturing 93 guns.
After repelling the Turkish attack, the Russian troops moved to the main retranshment of the Turkish camp at 8 o'clock in the morning. When Plemyannikov's square approached the retranschment, about 10,000 Janissaries descended into the hollow between the center and the left flank of the fortification and rushed on the square, broke into it and crushed some units. The square was upset, the janissaries seized two banners and several charging boxes; the Russian soldiers fled, trying to hide in the square of General Olits and thereby leading it to a mess. Noticing this and fearing for the fate of the square, Rumyantsev turned to the Prince of Oldenburg, who was nearby, and calmly said, "Now our business has come." With these words, he rode from Olits's square to the fleeing troops of Plemyannikov and with one phrase, "Guys, stop!", kept the runners, who stopped and grouped near Rumyantsev. At the same time, the Janissaries were opened fire by a Messino's battery, they were attacked on both sides by cavalry, and General Baur, who had already entered the retranschment, sent a battalion of jagers to attack the janissary on the left and to longitudinally shell the ditch in front of the retranchment, in which the Janissars also settled. After the confusion caused by the explosion of the charging box, the 1st Grenadier Regiment rushed into bayonets. The Janissaries fled, the cavalry began to pursue them. At the same time, the squares were put in order, the flank columns occupied the entire retranshment and recaptured the banners captured by the Turks. After the loss of fortifications, artillery and wagons, the Turks saw that Prince Repnin's corps was entering their rear, left the camp at 9 o'clock in the morning and fled under the flank fire of Repnin's corps. Vizier and other pashas were trying to stop the fleeing troops but without a success. The routed Ottomans went through a detachment of Anatolian Kurdish cavalrymen supposedly on its way to assist Ivazzade Pasha, but the detachment instead looted whatever belongings the soldiers on flight carried with them, therefore adding to the chaos the Ottoman army was already in.
The fatigue of the soldiers who had been on their feet since one o'clock in the morning prevented the Russian infantry from continuing to pursue more than four versts on the day of the battle, after which the pursuit continued with the cavalry. At the end of the battle, Rumyantsev took a position behind the former Turkish camp.
Soon the pursuit of the Turks continued outside the battlefield. To perform this task Rumyantsev assigned the Bauer's corps. On July 22 (August 2), the pursuers occupied the old Ottoman camp, located 20 versts from the place of the general battle. On July 23 (August 3), Bauer's corps reached Kartal, where they found the remains of the Grand Vizier's troops crossing to the other side of the Danube. Although the Turks had more than 300 ships at their disposal, there was a complete mess at the crossing site. Once at the boarding point, Bauer quickly assessed the situation and decided to attack the Ottomans. For this purpose, the Quartermaster General arranged his troops on a single front, the center of which was formed by infantry squares, and the flanks by cavalry units. In this order, Bauer's corps resolutely attacked the Turks, inflicting another defeat on them and thus completing the defeat of Ivazzade Khalil Pasha's troops. After the battle near the crossing, the winners captured the entire baggage train near the river, an artillery battery of 30 guns, as well as more than a thousand prisoners.
The total Ottoman losses amounted to 20,000 killed, wounded and captured 140 guns and 56 colors. The Russian losses were 951 dead and wounded. True to themselves, the Cossacks
After the end of the Battle ofKagul, the army of the Crimean Khan retreated to Izmail, but, faced with the displeasure of the local population, who did not want to attract the attention of the Russian army, the Tatars were forced to retreat to Ackerman. In accordance with the situation, Rumyantsev decided to start offensive in the direction of Izmail - a detachment of General Osip Igelström was sent for this purpose. Igelström's troops marched at the same time as Bauer's corps and soon seized the bridges at the mouth of the Yalpukh River near the village of Tobaka, as well as the luggage train that had withdrawn to the area. On July 23, Izmail was approached by Repnin's corps, reinforced by units under the command of Potemkin. On July 26 (August 6), Repnin's troops took Izmail, after which they moved on, consistently capturing the remaining strongholds on the Turks on the Lower Danube.
Catherine wrote to Rumyantsev:
“As the first duty, I was able to bring to Almighty God for his countless graces and generosity, kneeling thanks, that this morning (August 2) with all the people and the cannons salute in the Kazan church was fulfilled, and the whole city was very happy. Returning to the palace, sat down at the table and remembering a person giving us the reasons for joy and fun with his art, diligence and mind, was I drinking, with the cannons firing, the health of Mr. Field Marshal Count Rumyantsev, with which I congratulate you to the newly awarded and very well-deserved rank.”
The Ottomans left fortress of Brailov and Bucharest was occupied again. At that point Rumyantsev had to stop to get supplies and reinforcements.
Not too glorious. General Peter Panin was not too happy with his assignment to the less important 2nd Army and when he arrived to it, he became even less happy because his main task was hardly promising the easy laurels: he had to take the fortress of Benderi. Cautious Panin paid special attention to securing communication line with his base in Elizavetgrad, built a number of fortifications and at each night, following the example of Peter I, erected a redoubt. His army did not need anything. On July 6, Panin crossed the Dniester and besieged Bendery on the 15th.
The fortress was not too modern, to put it mildly, but it was defended by 12,500 Turks and had 400 guns. As a result, it was considered a potential threat to the communications of the 1st Army. The 2nd army had 34,000 and Panin started the siege on July 15 hoping to force the fortress to surrender with wear and cannon fire but the Ottomans did not comply. So the whole thing lasted into the September and Panin, was still sitting there suffering from the supply problems and losses due to the diseases. With the winter coming, he was facing a choice of two options, neither of them good: a costly direct assault or abandoning the siege with a loss of face. The first option involved soldiers lives, the second his career so guess which one he chose... You guessed correctly [5].
On September 15, a powerful mine (400 poods of gunpowder) was blown up, and part of the fortress wall collapsed from the explosion. On the night of September 16, Panin gave an order to storm. The fierce battle in the city lasted all night, by the morning the surviving defenders of the fortress laid down their weapons. About 7,000 Turks were killed during the assault, the rest were taken prisoner. Russian losses during the capture of the fortress amounted to 6,000 people, of whom 1,672 were killed. Thus, the capture of this powerful fortress was the bloodiest battle for the Russian side in the entire war. After capturing Benderi, the 2nd Army marched back to Ukraine.
Such a huge loss made a bad impression in the capital and it became even worse as a result of Panin’s report written in an inappropriately frivolous style. The storm was described as a bear hunt and the jokes did not sit well with the huge losses which he omitted to report. Well, the fortress captured and, by the statute, he was eligible to St.George I class, which he got. But the accompanying rescript was formal, short and cold. He was removed from command and replaced with Prince Dolgorukov.
On the Eastern flank. One of the first actions taken by Rumyantsev in 1769 was to sent a detachment to restore fortifications of Azov and Taganrog. The wharves of Voronez had been busy building the ships for a new Azov flotilla but there was a big problem: to get to the sea these ships had to get down the river and somehow pass over the shallow bar at its mouth. In other words, they had to be almost flat bottomed and, as a result, to have a very limited sea-worthiness. A brand, “the newly-invented”, design was developed, sailing and rowing vessels armed with 12-16 guns of 6-12 pounds caliber. The biggest one, three-masted “Khotin”, had 25 12 pounds guns and there were 7 two-masted and few cannon boats. They formed initial flotilla sailing under command of vice-admiral A.N.Senyavin. They were considered inadequate for the operations against the Ottoman Black Sea Fleet [6] so the decision was made to restore a wharf in Taganrog and start building the real sea-worthy ships.
And much more glory had been coming from the Med….
_______________
[1] The greatest Japanese swordsman ever. Won 61 duel. The best (AFAIK) was with another famous swordsman who was using a very long sword. Musashi came to a duel with a much longer heavy stick and kicked the s__t …oops… brains out of him. Not to be confused with a battleship of the same name, which won none of its encounters.
[2] A cavalry lieutenant with an impressive record of the strategic blunders.
[3] Artillery lieutenant who did not make it into Napoleon. As pretty much all his military “philosophy”, this piece of wisdom is highly questionable.
[4] Rumyantsev had 23,615 infantry and 3,495 cavalry with 106 regimental (3 pounders) and 149 field guns but he had to protect the magazines and supply train moving to the army with a 10-day supply of food from Falchi. To fulfill these goals, a detachment of General Fyodor Glebov was allocated with four grenadier battalions, as well as parts of regular and irregular cavalry. At the same time, Rumyantsev ordered the detachments of Major General Grigory Potemkin and Brigadier Ivan Gudovich to move towards the Yalpug River to cover the army from this direction against possible Tatar attack. Thus, just before the battle with the Ottoman Sultan's army, the main forces of the 1st Army numbered 17,000 infantry, as well as few thousand horsemen of regular and irregular cavalry.
[5] If not, I would be very disappointed. 🤔
[6] Strange as it may sound, in OTL this assessment proved to be too pessimistic.
27. The war. #3. Year 1770. Part 3
27. The war. #3. Year 1770. Part 3
Archipelago Expedition
A little bit of a historic background. In 1763, with the publication of a rescript, which contained an invitation to foreigners to settle in Russia, a campaign began to recruit not only Western colonists, but also sailors. The invitation forms were carried by Lieutenant General Roman Fullerton, who was sent from Russia to Britain in the spring of 1763 with state money and instructions for inviting venerable officers of different ranks to serve in the Russian Navy. Besides a purely formal side (search and negotiations had to be kept secret and permission to enter the Russian service had to be requested by the Russian diplomatic representatives, not directly by the officers; Fullerton, who was born in Britain, used as a coverup for his mission visit to the reltives), the task, however, was complicated by the fact that in Russia they demanded that these officers (especially flag officers, admiral officers) have a "good" reputation, were knowledgeable in "marine architecture" and "ship economy", spoke not only their native language, but also in French or German and were able to benefit the Admiralty ("could be worthy members in the management of our Admiralty").It is no coincidence that Fullerton never managed to persuade high-ranking sailors to go to Russia. A British admiral Gordon (?) with whom Fullerton got friendly explained to him that the British admirals became so rich in the Seven Years' War that they could not be seduced to Russian service with any salary or pension (and those flag officers who could agree were hardly suitable for service). Gordon advised Russian agents to focus on inviting captains, as among them were talented sailors who did not count on promotion in Britain, but were quite suitable to get admiral ranks in Russia. Elphinstone, recruited by I.G. Chernyshov (at that time ambassdor to Britain), was one of these captains. Circumstances of his hiring, beyond Chernyshov’s assurance that he “has a good recommendation” never were quite clear. One of the few known things is that, besides upgrade of a rank, he asked for and got the prize money according to the English formula, and in his contract, when switching to the Russian service, it was stated that he would receive 1/8 of all prizes that he and his squadron would capture. Upon the arrival he expected to find an ally in Samuel Greig, who was serving in the Russian navy since 1764 but this did not work out. A total number of the British sailors in the Archipelago Expedition is not known but a minimal assessment was 40 of all ranks.
To make certain behavioral patterns clear, Elphinstone seemingly quite sincerely despised the leaders of expedition, Orlov and Spiridov both for them being inferior to him both by pedigree and experience. Basically, his attitude to the Russian sailors, and naval organization in general, was rather negative (often not without a reason). Taking into an account his rather explosive temper, it is small wonder that, unlike Greig, his career in the Russian navy was rather tumultuous and short. To be fair, he was instrumental in introducing some new equipment which proved to be quite useful and probably was one of the “triggers” (admiral Charles Knowles being more prominent one), which initiated the big reforms in the Russian Admiralty.
Grand Strategy and reality. The initial plan of the expedition was excessively ambitious being a combination of Catherine’s “grand vision”, rather adventurous personality of Alexey Orlov and faulty intelligence. This plan assumed a capture of at least Morea (with at least one port on the peninsula or islands going to Russia permanently), for which purpose the small Russian contingent will serve as a nucleus for creation a big army of the Greek volunteers, supporting unrests in various coastal areas of the Ottoman Empire, destruction of the Ottoman fleet, blockade of the Dardanelles and, as a cherry on a cake, penetration of the Dardanelles and direct attack of the Constantinople. Besides this plan being quite unrealistic in the terms of the allocated resources, Catherine, in her usual style, threw a big monkey wrench into its implementation. In her long instruction to the commander of the 2nd Squadron, rear-admiral Elphinstone, she provided a lot of the details regarding his expected route, details of behavior in various ports, and numerous geopolitical considerations, defined his task was two-fold:
On May 9 (20), 1770, Elphinstone's squadron arrived on the shores of the Morea, in the Gulf of Kolofinca (eastern shore of the Peloponnese peninsula). On May 11 (22), Elphinstone landed troops at Rupina and decided the next day after his arrival to go in search of the Turkish fleet, which he learned from the Greeks, just moored.
On May 12 (23), he anchored and went to the Gulf of Napoli di Romagna, where the entire Turkish fleet was located. The Turkish squadron was just about to leave the Gulf of Napoli de Romagna. On May 16 (27), Elphinstone met and was not afraid to immediately attack the Turks, although for the first strike he had only 3 ships of the line and 2 frigates, and the Turks, commanded by the highest commander of the Ottoman fleet, the Kapudan Pasha, had 10 ships of the line, 6 frigates and caravels and several rowing galleys and vessels. The Russians opened fire, but the Turks did not accept the fight and hurried to take refuge in Napoli di Romagna under the cover of coastal batteries. The fight lasted about an hour. The losses suffered by Russian ships were negligible: in the hull of "Saratov" and "Do not touch me" there were only four hits of cannonballs, and on one of these ships the mast was slightly damaged; losses in personnel were only on "Do not touch me": 1 killed and 6 wounded. The escape of the Turkish fleet was possible because suddenly calm came, and the Russian ships were completely unable to advance, and the Turkish ships were towed by rowing vessels to the depths of the bay, to the shore. The Russians didn't have any rowing vessels at that time. Only in the afternoon of May 17 (28) a light wind blew out and Elphinstone again decided to attack the enemy, and at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon the Russian ships opened fire. The battle lasted about 3 hours, then the Turks took refuge under the walls of Napoli de Romagna, believing that they were fighting with the stretched Russian fleet. The battle ended without losses for the Russian fleet, the bowsprit was damaged on the Turkish flagship. Elphinstone first tried to block the Turkish fleet in this bay, but then he changed his mind and withdrew due to the overwhelming superiority of the Turkish forces. At this time, Spiridov with the main part of his squadron left the Navarin Bay, took the troops landed by Elphinston at Rupina, and moved to join the second squadron. On May 22 (June 2), Elphinstone's second squadron met with Spiridov's squadron. The united Russian squadron returned to Napoli di Romagna, but the Turks were no longer caught: the commander of the Turkish fleet Hasan Bey and his fleet fled towards Chios. Spiridov was accusing Elphinstone in a rash attack with a small force, which allowed the Turks to escape while Elphinstone was blaming Spiritov for being too slow to arrive ignoring the fact that he had to stop for picking up the landed force which Elphinstone left in Rupia and which, in an attempt to find and engage the Ottomans, he refused to take, contrary to the received orders.
In a meantime, on the land, some Greek volunteers had been raised and there were even some initial successes, which however soon enough turned into the defeats. The Greeks, brave (and very cruel to the prisoners) against the small Ottoman detachments, fled and abandoned their Russian “liberators” when the Turks appeared in the bigger nunbers and it finally downed upon Orlov that the initial plan had to be abandoned to concentrate upon the realistic component. It was not even possible to hold Navarin so far the main Russian base. As Orlov reported to Catherine, “all hope to achieve success on the land is lost.” Orlov blew the Navarin fortress and sailed to join the the 1st and2nd squadrons, which finally got together to find out that “Commanders are in a great quarrel, and sub-commanders in despondency and displeasure.” To stop disputes between the commanders, because Elphinston did not want to obey Spiridov, Orlov, not being a sailor, accepted the command of the fleet himself with both admirals being his deputies.
On June 15 (26), the Russian fleet stocked up on water on the island of Paros, where the commanders learned that the Turkish fleet had left Paros 3 days before the arrival of the Russians. The Paros reported that the Turkish fleet had left the island to the north. At the general military council, it was decided to go to the island of Chios, and if there is no Turkish fleet, then to the island of Tenedos to block the Dardanelles. On June 23 (July 4) near the island of Chios, sentinels on the vanguard ship "Rostislav" found a Turkish fleet in the strait between the island and the coast of Asia Minor.
Battle at Chios. June 24 (July 5)
The Turkish squadron consisted of 16 ships of the line (of which 5 80 guns each, 10 60-70 guns), 6 frigates, and up to 50 smaller vessels. Russian squadron - 9 ships of the line, 3 frigates, 1 bomber ship, 1 packet boat, and 16 smaller vessels. Turkish ships lined up in two parallel lines, adhering the left flank to a small island and the right flank near the city of Chesma. The Russian fleet was built in three lines of battle - vanguard, cordebatalia (main force) and rearguard. Admiral Spiridov was in the vanguard, carrying his flag on the ship "Saint Eustathius" with the ships of the line "Europe" and "Three Saints" and the frigate "Saint Nicholas". Cordebatalia, under command of Greig, included 3 ships of the line: "Three Hierarchs" (of which Greig was a captain and on which Alexey Orlov was present), "Rostislav", "Saint Ianuarius" and two frigates "Hope of Well-Being" and "Africa". In the rearguard - three ships of the line "Do not touch me" (the flagship of Elphinstone), "Saratov", "Svyatoslav", and several small vessels.
At 4 a.m. on the "Three Hierarchs" Greig raised the signal "Chase the enemy" and the Russian squadron moved towards the Turks to the Strait of Chios. The progress of the ships was quite slow and only by 9 a.m. almost the entire Russian fleet was very close to the Turks. At 11 a.m., after meeting with the commanders of the ships of the line, Orlov gave order to attack. To strike a decisive blow, the Russians launched an attack in a line perpendicular to the enemy, which was rather risky unless they approach enemy really fast. At 11:30 a.m., the “Europa”, forward ship, approached 3 cables (560 meters) to the center of the Turkish line, and the Turks opened fire from all the guns. Their guns were mainly hit on the mast and rigging to make it difficult for the attackers to maneuver. The Russian ships did not respond until they approached at a “pistol shot” distance, then from a distance of 80 sazhens (about 170 meters) they fired three volleys one after another, forcing the advanced Turkish ships to weaken the fire. The advanced ship "Europe" made a turn and went out of the formation [1]. Having described the arc, he found himself behind the ship of the Kordebatalia "Rostislav" and re-entered the battle. As a result, Spiridov’s “Saint Eustathius" became the 1st ship of the Rusian line. "Saint Eustace" concentrated fire on the flagship of the Turkish fleet, the 80-gun battleship "Burj-u-Zafer", approached this ship and began to throw it with brandkugels [2] . There was a fire on the Burj-u Zafer, the team rushed into the sea in panic to swim to the shore. "Saint Eustace" by this time had already lost control due to damage to the rigging from the shelling of Turkish ships and was carried directly to the "Burj-u-Zafer" by the current. To tow St. Eustace, the captain ordered the rowing vessels to be lowered, but they could not overcome the current. The two ships collided and got entangled. The Russians boarded the Turkish ship and after the hand to hand fight the remained Turks jumped into the sea. But the attempts to extinguish fire on Burj-u Zafer failed, the sparks flew to the open gunpowder magazine of St.Eustash and both ships exploded. In accordance with the charter, Admiral Spiridov left the ship a few minutes before the explosion. Together with the brother of Commander-in-Chief Fyodor Orlov, they switched to the "Postman" package, and then Spiridov transferred his flag to the "Three Saints". 620 people perished and only 58 had been saved, including the captain. The closest to St.Eustash ship, Three Saints, also suffered serious damage. Of all Russian fleet, the most effective actions were carried out by the "Three Hierarchs" ship, on which Alexei Orlov and Samuel Greig were located. The ships "Rostislav" and "Saint Januarius" were near the "Three Hierarchs" and also operated successfully. Elphinstone’s rearguard, until very end of the battle had been shooting from a long distance causing no damage to the Turks. After the explosion of their flagship at about 14.00, the Turkish ships hastily left the battlefield and took refuge in Chesme Bay, protected by several batteries. Russian ships blocked the exit from it and began to prepare to continue the battle later.
Chesma. 26 June (July 7)
On the night after the Battle of Chios, the commanders of the Russian fleet arranged a military council. At the council, at the suggestion of Samuel Greig, it was decided to attack the Turkish fleet in the Gulf of Chesma and burn it. For this purpose 4 branders (fireships) had been prepared. The attack was scheduled to start at Midnight on June 26 (July 7) with the branders followed by 4 ships of the line, 2 frigates and bomber ship. Greig wrote an explicit plan of the attack which worked out but only up to a certain point.
The ships of the line did penetrate the bay and opened an effective fire under cover of which the branders had been sent. And here the plan did not survive contact with a reality. Out of 4 branders 3 was set on fire too early and only the 4th one, under command of lieutenant Ilyin, did what was expected. However, the results were unexpected. The Turkish ship immediately caught fire, the fire spread to the rest of the Turkish ships. A few minutes after Ilyin’s fireship clung to the Turkish ship, it exploded. After the explosion of the first Turkish ship, the burning wreckage from it fell on neighboring Turkish ships, which also caught fire from this wreckage. At 4.30 a.m., almost all Turkish ships in the Chesma Bay caught fire and the Russians managed to capture only one 66-guns ships of the line and 5 galleys. The rest of the Ottoman fleet ceased to exist.
Orlov in his report to Catherine was quite calm and modest. “I'm sorry that I can no longer have hope to congratulate Your Majesty with a victory on a land, equal to the sea victory; if I was so fortunate, my wishes would be completely satisfied, I could then hope to deserve your favor. Now I have no other choice but to try to block the transportation to Tsargrad and try, if possible, to return to the state the costs used for this expedition.”
But effect in St. Petersburg was overwhelming. After the reports about the bad conditions of the Russian fleet, from which nobody expected any successful independent action, after the news about failure in Morea expedition, in which the fleet was expected to play an auxiliary role, the news about a great triumph of that fleet had been an absolutely exciting demonstration of a new aspect of the Russian power.
Catherine to Orlov: “…Our fleet, under your reasonable and courageous leadership, this time dealt a most sensitive blow to Ottoman pride. All the world will give you justice, that this victory has gained you great glory and honor; you are covered with laurels; the whole squadron that is with you is covered with laurels.”
Orlov was granted a military order (St. George) of the first class and the right to keep the Kaiser flag for life to put it in his coat of arms; Spiridov - St. Andrew's Order and villages; Rear Admiral Greig, who was especially recommended by Count Alexei Orlov, a military order of the second class. A commemorative medal had been minted with depiction of the Ottoman navy and a single word “was” (“былъ”).
The victories on the land and sea were important steps toward accomplishing the most important thing in that war and it was not going to be easy…
_________
[1] Presumably, to avoid the underwater rocks.
[2] Firebombs used by the Russian navy. In the encounters with the western (Swedish) opponents rarely used because, just as the heated cannonballs, considered “uncivilized” weapon capable of easily sink the ship. Which was, of course, not the right thing to do: the proper way was to spend hours punching each other with the “conventional” cannonballs. Where is the fun in putting the enemy on fire within few minutes. As an idle thought, I wonder would the Brits as pissed off as in OTL if it took “Bismarck” a couple hours to sunk “Hood”? 😉
“They'll be smarter from now on. Nothing in the world will do so much good to our fleet as this campaign. Everything bad and rotten comes out, and it will eventually be in a perfect shape.”
Catherine II to Alexey Orlov
“The Turkish fleet was attacked, smashed, broken, burned, blown into the sky, sunk and turned into ashes.”
Admiral Spiridov to I.Chernishov after Chesma
“- Get me best of the best!
- Best of the best are licking their wounds!
- Then get me best of the worst!”
‘Dog in the boots’
“Out of the whole regiment only the lieutenant marches in step.”
Military report
Catherine II to Alexey Orlov
“The Turkish fleet was attacked, smashed, broken, burned, blown into the sky, sunk and turned into ashes.”
Admiral Spiridov to I.Chernishov after Chesma
“- Get me best of the best!
- Best of the best are licking their wounds!
- Then get me best of the worst!”
‘Dog in the boots’
“Out of the whole regiment only the lieutenant marches in step.”
Military report
Archipelago Expedition
A little bit of a historic background. In 1763, with the publication of a rescript, which contained an invitation to foreigners to settle in Russia, a campaign began to recruit not only Western colonists, but also sailors. The invitation forms were carried by Lieutenant General Roman Fullerton, who was sent from Russia to Britain in the spring of 1763 with state money and instructions for inviting venerable officers of different ranks to serve in the Russian Navy. Besides a purely formal side (search and negotiations had to be kept secret and permission to enter the Russian service had to be requested by the Russian diplomatic representatives, not directly by the officers; Fullerton, who was born in Britain, used as a coverup for his mission visit to the reltives), the task, however, was complicated by the fact that in Russia they demanded that these officers (especially flag officers, admiral officers) have a "good" reputation, were knowledgeable in "marine architecture" and "ship economy", spoke not only their native language, but also in French or German and were able to benefit the Admiralty ("could be worthy members in the management of our Admiralty").It is no coincidence that Fullerton never managed to persuade high-ranking sailors to go to Russia. A British admiral Gordon (?) with whom Fullerton got friendly explained to him that the British admirals became so rich in the Seven Years' War that they could not be seduced to Russian service with any salary or pension (and those flag officers who could agree were hardly suitable for service). Gordon advised Russian agents to focus on inviting captains, as among them were talented sailors who did not count on promotion in Britain, but were quite suitable to get admiral ranks in Russia. Elphinstone, recruited by I.G. Chernyshov (at that time ambassdor to Britain), was one of these captains. Circumstances of his hiring, beyond Chernyshov’s assurance that he “has a good recommendation” never were quite clear. One of the few known things is that, besides upgrade of a rank, he asked for and got the prize money according to the English formula, and in his contract, when switching to the Russian service, it was stated that he would receive 1/8 of all prizes that he and his squadron would capture. Upon the arrival he expected to find an ally in Samuel Greig, who was serving in the Russian navy since 1764 but this did not work out. A total number of the British sailors in the Archipelago Expedition is not known but a minimal assessment was 40 of all ranks.
To make certain behavioral patterns clear, Elphinstone seemingly quite sincerely despised the leaders of expedition, Orlov and Spiridov both for them being inferior to him both by pedigree and experience. Basically, his attitude to the Russian sailors, and naval organization in general, was rather negative (often not without a reason). Taking into an account his rather explosive temper, it is small wonder that, unlike Greig, his career in the Russian navy was rather tumultuous and short. To be fair, he was instrumental in introducing some new equipment which proved to be quite useful and probably was one of the “triggers” (admiral Charles Knowles being more prominent one), which initiated the big reforms in the Russian Admiralty.
Grand Strategy and reality. The initial plan of the expedition was excessively ambitious being a combination of Catherine’s “grand vision”, rather adventurous personality of Alexey Orlov and faulty intelligence. This plan assumed a capture of at least Morea (with at least one port on the peninsula or islands going to Russia permanently), for which purpose the small Russian contingent will serve as a nucleus for creation a big army of the Greek volunteers, supporting unrests in various coastal areas of the Ottoman Empire, destruction of the Ottoman fleet, blockade of the Dardanelles and, as a cherry on a cake, penetration of the Dardanelles and direct attack of the Constantinople. Besides this plan being quite unrealistic in the terms of the allocated resources, Catherine, in her usual style, threw a big monkey wrench into its implementation. In her long instruction to the commander of the 2nd Squadron, rear-admiral Elphinstone, she provided a lot of the details regarding his expected route, details of behavior in various ports, and numerous geopolitical considerations, defined his task was two-fold:
- To land the troops in the places pointed out by Alexey Orlov.
- “The main subject of your expedition should be to prevent and suppress the entire supply of grain food to Tsar Grad from Egypt and other Turkish places, as well as all your own Turkish and under the Turkish flag of navigation and maritime trade on the aisles where you will be.”
On May 9 (20), 1770, Elphinstone's squadron arrived on the shores of the Morea, in the Gulf of Kolofinca (eastern shore of the Peloponnese peninsula). On May 11 (22), Elphinstone landed troops at Rupina and decided the next day after his arrival to go in search of the Turkish fleet, which he learned from the Greeks, just moored.
On May 12 (23), he anchored and went to the Gulf of Napoli di Romagna, where the entire Turkish fleet was located. The Turkish squadron was just about to leave the Gulf of Napoli de Romagna. On May 16 (27), Elphinstone met and was not afraid to immediately attack the Turks, although for the first strike he had only 3 ships of the line and 2 frigates, and the Turks, commanded by the highest commander of the Ottoman fleet, the Kapudan Pasha, had 10 ships of the line, 6 frigates and caravels and several rowing galleys and vessels. The Russians opened fire, but the Turks did not accept the fight and hurried to take refuge in Napoli di Romagna under the cover of coastal batteries. The fight lasted about an hour. The losses suffered by Russian ships were negligible: in the hull of "Saratov" and "Do not touch me" there were only four hits of cannonballs, and on one of these ships the mast was slightly damaged; losses in personnel were only on "Do not touch me": 1 killed and 6 wounded. The escape of the Turkish fleet was possible because suddenly calm came, and the Russian ships were completely unable to advance, and the Turkish ships were towed by rowing vessels to the depths of the bay, to the shore. The Russians didn't have any rowing vessels at that time. Only in the afternoon of May 17 (28) a light wind blew out and Elphinstone again decided to attack the enemy, and at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon the Russian ships opened fire. The battle lasted about 3 hours, then the Turks took refuge under the walls of Napoli de Romagna, believing that they were fighting with the stretched Russian fleet. The battle ended without losses for the Russian fleet, the bowsprit was damaged on the Turkish flagship. Elphinstone first tried to block the Turkish fleet in this bay, but then he changed his mind and withdrew due to the overwhelming superiority of the Turkish forces. At this time, Spiridov with the main part of his squadron left the Navarin Bay, took the troops landed by Elphinston at Rupina, and moved to join the second squadron. On May 22 (June 2), Elphinstone's second squadron met with Spiridov's squadron. The united Russian squadron returned to Napoli di Romagna, but the Turks were no longer caught: the commander of the Turkish fleet Hasan Bey and his fleet fled towards Chios. Spiridov was accusing Elphinstone in a rash attack with a small force, which allowed the Turks to escape while Elphinstone was blaming Spiritov for being too slow to arrive ignoring the fact that he had to stop for picking up the landed force which Elphinstone left in Rupia and which, in an attempt to find and engage the Ottomans, he refused to take, contrary to the received orders.
In a meantime, on the land, some Greek volunteers had been raised and there were even some initial successes, which however soon enough turned into the defeats. The Greeks, brave (and very cruel to the prisoners) against the small Ottoman detachments, fled and abandoned their Russian “liberators” when the Turks appeared in the bigger nunbers and it finally downed upon Orlov that the initial plan had to be abandoned to concentrate upon the realistic component. It was not even possible to hold Navarin so far the main Russian base. As Orlov reported to Catherine, “all hope to achieve success on the land is lost.” Orlov blew the Navarin fortress and sailed to join the the 1st and2nd squadrons, which finally got together to find out that “Commanders are in a great quarrel, and sub-commanders in despondency and displeasure.” To stop disputes between the commanders, because Elphinston did not want to obey Spiridov, Orlov, not being a sailor, accepted the command of the fleet himself with both admirals being his deputies.
On June 15 (26), the Russian fleet stocked up on water on the island of Paros, where the commanders learned that the Turkish fleet had left Paros 3 days before the arrival of the Russians. The Paros reported that the Turkish fleet had left the island to the north. At the general military council, it was decided to go to the island of Chios, and if there is no Turkish fleet, then to the island of Tenedos to block the Dardanelles. On June 23 (July 4) near the island of Chios, sentinels on the vanguard ship "Rostislav" found a Turkish fleet in the strait between the island and the coast of Asia Minor.
Battle at Chios. June 24 (July 5)
The Turkish squadron consisted of 16 ships of the line (of which 5 80 guns each, 10 60-70 guns), 6 frigates, and up to 50 smaller vessels. Russian squadron - 9 ships of the line, 3 frigates, 1 bomber ship, 1 packet boat, and 16 smaller vessels. Turkish ships lined up in two parallel lines, adhering the left flank to a small island and the right flank near the city of Chesma. The Russian fleet was built in three lines of battle - vanguard, cordebatalia (main force) and rearguard. Admiral Spiridov was in the vanguard, carrying his flag on the ship "Saint Eustathius" with the ships of the line "Europe" and "Three Saints" and the frigate "Saint Nicholas". Cordebatalia, under command of Greig, included 3 ships of the line: "Three Hierarchs" (of which Greig was a captain and on which Alexey Orlov was present), "Rostislav", "Saint Ianuarius" and two frigates "Hope of Well-Being" and "Africa". In the rearguard - three ships of the line "Do not touch me" (the flagship of Elphinstone), "Saratov", "Svyatoslav", and several small vessels.
At 4 a.m. on the "Three Hierarchs" Greig raised the signal "Chase the enemy" and the Russian squadron moved towards the Turks to the Strait of Chios. The progress of the ships was quite slow and only by 9 a.m. almost the entire Russian fleet was very close to the Turks. At 11 a.m., after meeting with the commanders of the ships of the line, Orlov gave order to attack. To strike a decisive blow, the Russians launched an attack in a line perpendicular to the enemy, which was rather risky unless they approach enemy really fast. At 11:30 a.m., the “Europa”, forward ship, approached 3 cables (560 meters) to the center of the Turkish line, and the Turks opened fire from all the guns. Their guns were mainly hit on the mast and rigging to make it difficult for the attackers to maneuver. The Russian ships did not respond until they approached at a “pistol shot” distance, then from a distance of 80 sazhens (about 170 meters) they fired three volleys one after another, forcing the advanced Turkish ships to weaken the fire. The advanced ship "Europe" made a turn and went out of the formation [1]. Having described the arc, he found himself behind the ship of the Kordebatalia "Rostislav" and re-entered the battle. As a result, Spiridov’s “Saint Eustathius" became the 1st ship of the Rusian line. "Saint Eustace" concentrated fire on the flagship of the Turkish fleet, the 80-gun battleship "Burj-u-Zafer", approached this ship and began to throw it with brandkugels [2] . There was a fire on the Burj-u Zafer, the team rushed into the sea in panic to swim to the shore. "Saint Eustace" by this time had already lost control due to damage to the rigging from the shelling of Turkish ships and was carried directly to the "Burj-u-Zafer" by the current. To tow St. Eustace, the captain ordered the rowing vessels to be lowered, but they could not overcome the current. The two ships collided and got entangled. The Russians boarded the Turkish ship and after the hand to hand fight the remained Turks jumped into the sea. But the attempts to extinguish fire on Burj-u Zafer failed, the sparks flew to the open gunpowder magazine of St.Eustash and both ships exploded. In accordance with the charter, Admiral Spiridov left the ship a few minutes before the explosion. Together with the brother of Commander-in-Chief Fyodor Orlov, they switched to the "Postman" package, and then Spiridov transferred his flag to the "Three Saints". 620 people perished and only 58 had been saved, including the captain. The closest to St.Eustash ship, Three Saints, also suffered serious damage. Of all Russian fleet, the most effective actions were carried out by the "Three Hierarchs" ship, on which Alexei Orlov and Samuel Greig were located. The ships "Rostislav" and "Saint Januarius" were near the "Three Hierarchs" and also operated successfully. Elphinstone’s rearguard, until very end of the battle had been shooting from a long distance causing no damage to the Turks. After the explosion of their flagship at about 14.00, the Turkish ships hastily left the battlefield and took refuge in Chesme Bay, protected by several batteries. Russian ships blocked the exit from it and began to prepare to continue the battle later.
Chesma. 26 June (July 7)
On the night after the Battle of Chios, the commanders of the Russian fleet arranged a military council. At the council, at the suggestion of Samuel Greig, it was decided to attack the Turkish fleet in the Gulf of Chesma and burn it. For this purpose 4 branders (fireships) had been prepared. The attack was scheduled to start at Midnight on June 26 (July 7) with the branders followed by 4 ships of the line, 2 frigates and bomber ship. Greig wrote an explicit plan of the attack which worked out but only up to a certain point.
The ships of the line did penetrate the bay and opened an effective fire under cover of which the branders had been sent. And here the plan did not survive contact with a reality. Out of 4 branders 3 was set on fire too early and only the 4th one, under command of lieutenant Ilyin, did what was expected. However, the results were unexpected. The Turkish ship immediately caught fire, the fire spread to the rest of the Turkish ships. A few minutes after Ilyin’s fireship clung to the Turkish ship, it exploded. After the explosion of the first Turkish ship, the burning wreckage from it fell on neighboring Turkish ships, which also caught fire from this wreckage. At 4.30 a.m., almost all Turkish ships in the Chesma Bay caught fire and the Russians managed to capture only one 66-guns ships of the line and 5 galleys. The rest of the Ottoman fleet ceased to exist.
Orlov in his report to Catherine was quite calm and modest. “I'm sorry that I can no longer have hope to congratulate Your Majesty with a victory on a land, equal to the sea victory; if I was so fortunate, my wishes would be completely satisfied, I could then hope to deserve your favor. Now I have no other choice but to try to block the transportation to Tsargrad and try, if possible, to return to the state the costs used for this expedition.”
But effect in St. Petersburg was overwhelming. After the reports about the bad conditions of the Russian fleet, from which nobody expected any successful independent action, after the news about failure in Morea expedition, in which the fleet was expected to play an auxiliary role, the news about a great triumph of that fleet had been an absolutely exciting demonstration of a new aspect of the Russian power.
Catherine to Orlov: “…Our fleet, under your reasonable and courageous leadership, this time dealt a most sensitive blow to Ottoman pride. All the world will give you justice, that this victory has gained you great glory and honor; you are covered with laurels; the whole squadron that is with you is covered with laurels.”
Orlov was granted a military order (St. George) of the first class and the right to keep the Kaiser flag for life to put it in his coat of arms; Spiridov - St. Andrew's Order and villages; Rear Admiral Greig, who was especially recommended by Count Alexei Orlov, a military order of the second class. A commemorative medal had been minted with depiction of the Ottoman navy and a single word “was” (“былъ”).
The victories on the land and sea were important steps toward accomplishing the most important thing in that war and it was not going to be easy…
_________
[1] Presumably, to avoid the underwater rocks.
[2] Firebombs used by the Russian navy. In the encounters with the western (Swedish) opponents rarely used because, just as the heated cannonballs, considered “uncivilized” weapon capable of easily sink the ship. Which was, of course, not the right thing to do: the proper way was to spend hours punching each other with the “conventional” cannonballs. Where is the fun in putting the enemy on fire within few minutes. As an idle thought, I wonder would the Brits as pissed off as in OTL if it took “Bismarck” a couple hours to sunk “Hood”? 😉
I'll never think of the exploding barrels in videogames as unrealistic again. 🤣
The victory was already pretty much assured: the arrangements were correct, the Ottoman fleet was crowded beyond the redemption and shelling from the Russian ships of the line and bombard ship already produced some fires. But the fleet being exterminated by a single fireship surely was unexpected. So I’d say that there was not a blunder but a law of the unexpected consequences. 😂😂
Just as in some more modern cases, they kept the access to a powder magazine open for maintaining the fast rate of fire. The method seemingly had its drawbacks. 😉 But occasions like this one were not unique.
Brb writing a list of the top 10 most genius commanders in all of human history
1. Panin
2. панин
3. パニン
4. بانين
5. 파닌
6. पैनिन
7. πανιν
8. Alexander the Great
9. The Kamchatka (second pacific squadron)
10. Brusilov
(its all Panin? Always has been)
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Now, you finally managed to get me thoroughly confused, starting from “brb” (what the Hell is it?) and, well, pretty much everything else. Which “Panin” are you talking about? Nikita, Peter, panini/panino, or “Panini bread”? 😜
And what the 2nd Pacific Squadron had to do with Kamchatka? 🤔
OTOH, can’t say anything against the ##3 - 6. 😜
To be as blunt as a German (not that CII would know anything about Germany) for a second, I took my mobile keyboard translator and put "Panin" in as many different scripts as I could come up with at the moment, to hide the fact it was all references to the same person, the close associate of CII. This is what it spit out.
#9 is a reference to the Kamchatka, the ship. I've always found its tale very funny.
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I got through the part of that exercise while trying to digest the infinite wisdom of your list and got similar result but these findings tend to point to the wrong Panin: a diplomat instead of a general. Actually, the general was not that bad. He introduced the sharphooters (jagers) units in the Russian army and was not the only one suffering huge losses storming the fortresses: check Suvorov at Izmail.
Well, it is better to be too diligent (especially when drunk) that not diligent enough (see Japanese attacks on Port Arthur and Pearl Harbor). Perhaps not always. 😂