Jewels of the Russian Imperial Navy. "Pearls" and "Emerald". Madagascar - Tsushima
Of course, in the proposal of Z.P. Rozhdestvensky made sense - to try to lead the 2nd Pacific to Vladivostok while the Japanese were repairing the ships that had suffered at Port Arthur (that the Japanese did not suffer too much, Z.P. Rozhestvensky, of course, could not know). Nevertheless, the Naval Ministry insisted on its own: in his reasoning, there was also some logic, consisting in the fact that the forces entrusted to the command of Zinovy Petrovich were not expected to break through to Vladivostok, but to achieve victory over the Japanese fleet in a general battle, but with the forces at his disposal it was unrealistic.
Be that as it may, the squadron was to unite, and is of some interest, as Z.P. Rozhestvensky saw the organization of his cruising forces (excluding the ships of Rear Admiral NI Nebogatov). Apart from the armored cruiser “Admiral Nakhimov”, which was to be part of the 2 armored detachment, the commander divided them into 3 units, which, not counting the destroyers, included:
1. "Svetlana" and auxiliary cruisers "Kuban", "Terek" and "Ural" - reconnaissance detachment.
2. Armored "Oleg", "Aurora", "Almaz", the old armored "Dmitry Donskoy" and auxiliary "Rion" and "Dnepr" - a cruiser detachment, whose main task was to protect the detachment of transports.
3. And, finally, “Pearls” and “Emerald” did not form any detachment at all, but were ranked as the main forces.
Thus, we can say that Z.P. Rozhestvensky saw “Pearls” and “Emerald” not as scouts, and not “combat” cruisers, which can be put in line with 1-grade armored cruisers, but intended to use them as repetitive ships and to guard armored ships from mine attacks.
However, we will return to this issue in more detail later.
In Madagascar, in the 11-25 period of January 1905, the largest and most intensive artillery exercises of the 2 Pacific Squadron were held during the whole period of its march to Tsushima. “Emerald” did not participate in these exercises, because at that time “Catching up” was not connected with the main forces of the squadron - it was only 1 February 1905 that took place. As for “Pearls”, then the degree of his participation in these exercises, Unfortunately, it is unclear. The fact is that according to the memoirs of the commander of the "Pearl", PP Levitsky (testimony of the Commission of Inquiry):
The first detachment artillery drills took place on January 11, when auxiliary cruisers fired at the shields, and the Pearls, of course, did not participate. Then the squadron went into the sea on January 13, while, according to our official historiography, "all the battleships, except for Sisoy the Great" and all the cruisers, and therefore also the "Pearls", went to the teachings. Indirectly confirms this and VP. Kostenko: “After the return, the ships took their places in the raid in the new order, and the Eagle was more seaward than all the battleships. "Pearls" was ahead of the "Eagle" in the column of cruisers. " Once it has become, it means that it was shot from the anchor before, and why was it done, if not to escort the squadron? True, V.P. Kostenko does not mention "Pearls" among the ships that went to sea to the teachings: "As part of the 10 column of ships: 4 battleship of the 1 squadron, Oslyabya, Navarin and Nakhimov" from the 2 squad and Almaz, "Aurora", "Donskoy" from among the cruisers. " But “Pearls could follow outside the column, which he usually did.
Thus, it is quite possible that the cruiser did go to the teachings of 13 in January (for VP Kostenko, for some reason, this output is indicated for January in 14).
Then the squadron went into the sea to shoot 18 and 19 in January, while the official Russian historiography does not report anything about the participation or non-participation of "Pearls". But according to V.P. Kostenko both times the cruiser remained to guard the bay. And, finally, on January 24, "reporting" squadron shooting took place. Again, the participation of “Pearls” in our officialdom is overlooked by silence, but V.P. Kostenko gives a very colorful description of the cruiser maneuvers:
Of course, the memoirs of V.P. Kostenko is full of mistakes and outright frauds, but still this passage can hardly be considered to be invented by him from beginning to end. But in this case, it turns out that "Pearls" went to the shooting with the squadron not once, but twice. Could the cruiser commander forget about some of the shooting? This is doubtful, and we can only assume that on January 13, when Zhemchug was the first to accompany the squadron on firing, he did not take part in these firing. Or the commander of the cruiser, P.P. Levitsky nevertheless overcame forgetfulness, and “Pearls” did participate in the 6 shooting.
Of interest are the small "maneuvers" undertaken by the ships of the January 15 squadron, in the interval between the firing.
The armored cruiser “Svetlana” came out to sea, which was supposed to portray as much as the main forces of the 2-nd Pacific Squadron heading east. At the same time, the commander of the Svetlana was informed that “enemy” destroyers lurked somewhere in the islands, who have the task of attacking Russian battleships.
The “Japanese” were the most “real-life”, they were represented by the 2-th branch of the destroyers. The latter left Nossi-be in advance. The destroyer commanders knew that the "Russian squadron" would go to sea, but neither the time of its release, nor the exact route to them, of course, were brought. The task of the “ambush” squad, of course, was to detect and attack the “main forces” of the Russian squadron. At the same time, "Svetlana" went out to sea by no means defenseless - it was covered by "Pearls" and the 1-th branch of the destroyers, who were supposed to advance to the islands and prevent the attack of the "Japanese".
Unfortunately, it is not known how these maneuvers ended, and who won: the official historiography is limited to information that “the maneuver was executed satisfactorily” and also reports that these maneuvers caused great interest and revival in the squadron. But, unfortunately, in the future they had to be abandoned because of the deterioration of the mechanisms of the destroyers, although Z.P. Rozhestvensky planned a whole series of such exercises.
Concluding the topic of artillery exercises, we also note that Pearl and Emerald took not only an active, but also a “passive” role in them. It was done this way: during the march, when the ships were going to sea, a squadron declared combat alarm. This was done usually in the morning, after which the Aurora, Dmitry Donskoy, Zhemchug, Izumrud, Rion and Dnepr left on both sides of the building of armored ships, and went at different speeds and courses, while The 1 and 2 armored detachments worked out the determination of the distances on them and trained to install the correct sight of the guns, the last - of course, without a shot. Such exercises in the campaign were held, if not daily, then regularly, usually from 08.00 to 10.30.
When the squadron was on the Strait of Malacca, a funny incident happened: March 24 in 17.00 tentatively "Pearls" raised the signal "I see the enemy fleet on SO 30 degrees." On closer examination, the “fleet” turned out to be a strongly smoking commercial steamer, which was going to the intersection of the squadron course. However, the Japanese on the ships of the squadron at this time "saw" a lot, because the Malacca Strait is long and narrow, and it was not surprising if the Japanese tried to do some kind of sabotage there. From the "Almaz" saw a dozen destroyers, hiding behind the English steamer, from the "Oleg" - submarines, and so on. And during the passage of Singapore, a small steamer approached the squadron, on which the Russian consul, out-door councilor Rudanovsky was stationed: he reported that on March 5 the main forces of the Japanese fleet (!) Of the X. Tumbo 22 flew into Singapore, but now they had gone to about. Borneo, and only single cruisers approach the Strait of Malacca.
In general, the situation remained rather nervous. So, 29 in March and again in 17.00 "Svetlana", marching in the composition of the reconnaissance detachment ahead of the squadron, said "I see the enemy." Z.P. Rozhestvensky sent "Emerald" and "Pearl" for reconnaissance, but it soon became clear that this was a mistake, and the cruisers were returned.
Having approached 06.00 31 in March to Kamrang Bay, the Russian commander feared possible sabotage, so the squadron did not go right away, but sent the destroyers to trawl the entrance and anchor places (it is not clear how this trawling was carried out, but in the official Russian stories it is written that way). Soon the morning fog cleared, and a steamer was discovered in the bay, which immediately tried to escape. "Pearls" and "Emerald" were sent to him, but did not examine, and released after a short survey. On the night of April 1, the “Pearls” with two destroyers were sent to check another ship, which in 02.00 passed between the squadron's ships and the coast. The anxiety turned out to be false, since it was a Chinese cargo-passenger steamer, but nevertheless it was escorted, so to speak, “to avoid” for several miles, highlighting with searchlights.
Z.P. Rozhestvensky suggested that his squadron could be attacked in Cam Ranh by a Japanese fleet. In this case, he was going to take the battle, while the main task of "Pearl" and "Emerald" was to protect the flanks of the armored units from mine attacks. To do this, they were assigned a place opposite the middle of the building of the battleships on the opposite side of the enemy main forces. In addition, the Pearls and the Emerald should have put the enemy's cruiser in two fires if they tried to go around the structure of the Russian battleships and assist and cover the damaged armored ships.
After there was information about the approach of 3-Pacific squadron, "Pearl" and "Rion" were sent to Saigon. In this case, V.V. Khromov claims that “Pearls” lagged behind the “Rion”, and when trying to catch up with him, he could not develop more 18 nodes due to insufficient qualification of firemen. However, the commander of the cruiser P.P. Levitsky describes this episode in a completely different way:
Interestingly, if you take the data PP. Levitsky, saying that “Pearls” needed to add 1-6 revolutions per minute in order to raise the speed to the 7 node, it turns out that while Saigon was staying, “Pearls” could have developed the 23 node, or so.
In search of a suitable detachment of Rear Admiral N.I. Nebogatov also launched the Emerald, together with the auxiliary cruiser Dnepr. Here is how a senior cruiser officer, Patton-Fanton-de-Verrión, describes the search results:
We only note that in the second case, the Emerald departed from the main forces of the squadron by no more than 25 miles.
Later, after the connection of the 2 th and 3 of the Pacific squadrons and right up to the Tsushima battle, “Pearl” several times had the opportunity to perform “purely cruising” work. The first time it happened during the detention of "Oldgamy". In the late evening of May 5 (22.45), the cruiser “Oleg” discovered an unknown steamer, which went without lights parallel to the course of the Russian squadron. The cruiser immediately went down, lit the ship with a searchlight and gave a blank shot, and when the ship stopped, he sent an inspection party to it. It turned out to be the British steamer Oldgamy, carrying smuggled cargo of kerosene to Japan, but there was no opportunity to deal with it at night. Accordingly, an officer with three sailors was landed on his board, and an order was given to “Olgdiyu” for “Oleg,” in order to examine the British ship in detail in the morning, when the squadron was to stall.
That was done, but when the squadron stopped on 05.00 in the morning of May 6, another ship was found on S. "Pearls" was sent to inspect it: a combat alarm was sounded. But it turned out to be the Norwegian steamer "Oscar II", which was empty from Manila to Japan, despite the fact that its documents were in perfect order. Accordingly, Z.P. Rozhdestvensky had no choice but to let go of the “Norwegian”, despite the risk that the Oscar II crew could easily convey to the Japanese the location and composition of the Russian squadron.
And, again, different interpretations of this event are interesting: V.V. Khromov argues that the decision to release the PP Norwegian transport Levitsky accepted on his own, and the commander did not approve of his action, cursing him with an “iron head”. At the same time, the official Russian historiography indicates that the decision to release “Oscar II” was made by Zinovy Petrovich.
When the squadron was held near the coast of. Formosa, from "Pearl" reported that they see ... a balloon. It is difficult to say what he was confused with, but other ships of the squadron confirmed the message of the cruiser. The commander ordered Pearls to conduct reconnaissance, but no further 12 miles from the main forces, and Oleg to support Pearls if necessary. Intelligence, of course, found nothing.
9 May Z.P. Rozhestvensky built the forces “house” entrusted to him - in front of the 3-4 cables, a reconnaissance detachment was walking, followed by the main forces in the 2-y columns, one of which was the 1 armored detachment and ships N.I. Nebogatov, and the second - 2 th armored detachment, with the "Pearl" and "Emerald" were to follow the traverse of the flagship battleships "Prince Suvorov" and "Oslyabya." Now they were obliged to drive away from the squadron any ships encountered, without waiting for special orders.
12 May “Pearls” and “Emerald” departed several miles from the squadron so that the rest of the ships could verify rangefinders against them, and besides, to observe the sea, but no ships or vessels were found. The next day, the squadron, continuing the campaign, was engaged in evolution. I must say that on the last transition Z.P. Rozhestvensky tried his best to intensify combat training — artillery exercises were conducted daily, range finders were calibrated, etc.
The most tragic naval battle of all that the Russian fleet had to participate was approaching. But, before we proceed to the description of the participation of our 2-grade armored cruisers in it, let us raise one more question, which we have already dealt with several times before. Why did the commander of the Russian squadron, having at its disposal a mass of auxiliary cruisers, and the specialized cruiser reconnaissance aircraft, the Pearl and the Emerald, not undertake a long-range reconnaissance of the Korean Strait?
Zinovy Petrovich Rozhestvensky explained the refusal of long-range intelligence by saying that he could not provide any useful information sent forward by the cruisers, but their very appearance would have warned the Japanese about the imminent approach of the main forces. Interestingly, the historical commission, which formed the official history of our fleet in the Russian-Japanese war, in this part fully confirmed the validity of such a decision of the vice-admiral.
The members of the historical commission considered that, having decided to break through to Vladivostok by the Korean Strait, Z.P. Rozhestvensky simply had to make his plans on the assumption that the main forces of the United Fleet in full force would impede its passage. If, for some unclear reason, Kheyhatiro of Togo would have divided his fleet and met the 2 and 3 Pacific Squadrons with only a part of its forces, this should be perceived as an unexpected and pleasant surprise, a gift of fate.
In other words, if distant intelligence had discovered the entire Japanese fleet, she would not have told the commander anything new, and if she had only seen part of the Japanese fleet, then Z.P. Rozhdestvensky (according to members of the commission) should not have believed such data. The commander was still obliged to proceed from the fact that he confronted the entire Japanese fleet and considered that the reconnaissance was not performed well enough and its data were erroneous.
The only benefit that could be achieved by conducting long-range intelligence, in the opinion of the commission members, could have occurred only if Z.P. Rozhestvensky sent an reconnaissance detachment to the Korean Strait, while he himself would have gone on a breakthrough by some other route. Then there could still be a small chance that the Japanese would be carried away by the appeared cruisers and miss the main forces of the squadron. But at the same time, the authors of the official history of the fleet noted that the likelihood of such an outcome would be very small, and very significant forces would have to be sent to distract the enemy, which created the preconditions for the defeat of the Russian squadron in parts. In other words, the official Russian historiography fully supports Z.P. Rozhestvensky in refusal of long-range intelligence.
True, members of the commission have a completely different opinion about near intelligence, but we will talk about this in the next article of our cycle.
To be continued ...
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