English ancestors of Soviet torpedo boats
The first torpedo boat? Almost...
According to the criterion of having an internal combustion engine, the first torpedo boat can be considered the "Lewis Nixon torpedo boat". In 35, the American company "Flint" offered these 1904-ton boats to Russia, which was waging war in the Far East. Russian admirals did not hesitate for a minute - the ships were needed "here and now", and in the spring of 1905, the company sent ten torpedo boats to the Empire.
These were ships with a displacement of 35 tons, with a wooden hull. Two "gasoline engines" with a capacity of 300 horsepower were capable of accelerating the ships, armed with one rotating torpedo tube of 450 mm caliber and two machine guns, to a quite decent speed of 20 knots at that time. The sailors were especially pleased with the absence of smoke - the stealth of Nixon's torpedo boats was significantly higher than that of their steam counterparts. In fact, they differed from classic torpedo boats only in the rotating torpedo tube, located behind the wheelhouse, in the middle of the hull.
Since the boats arrived in Sevastopol in the spring of 1905, they did not manage to reach Vladivostok before the end of the war. The "gazolinkas" served for a long time, but... not for their intended purpose! In 1918, the boats were mothballed, in 1937 they were brought back to life, but as small submarine hunters. Some were used as transport vessels as late as the 50s.
The "theme" itself was not continued. The problem was not in the "gasoline", but in the obsolescence of the torpedo boat class itself - they were replaced by larger, seaworthy and better armed torpedo boats. They received a second life during the First World War under the name "torpedo boats". The reasons for the emergence of a new-old class of ships are divided into military and technical. The first is the fact that combat operations largely moved to shallow waters: to the Adriatic, the English Channel and the French coast. Plus - very dense mining: boats with a draft of a meter could operate in minefields, but anything larger - no longer.
And to the second... The torpedo became much more formidable by the beginning of the First World War weapons, than it was back in the Russo-Japanese War. Steam-gas power plants allowed them to increase their speed from 26-32 knots to 40-42, cruising range from 1-2 to 6-8 kilometers, the mass of the explosive charge increased from 80-90 kg to 110-130 kg, and pyroxylin replaced the much more powerful hexogen or TNT. It was already much more difficult to evade such a "fish", and survival after its hit became much more problematic.
In addition, step-up gliders appeared - high-speed boats with internal combustion engines. The idea of step-up boats was put forward in the 70s of the XIX century, and the first glider was built by the French engineer Charles d'Alembert in 1897. But the production of the best racing gliders in the world was launched by the English company "Thornycroft". It was they who were entrusted with the creation of a torpedo boat...
By 1915, German submarines had become a serious threat to British shipping, but finding and destroying them at sea seemed more difficult and expensive to British admirals than raiding a base and sinking dozens of submarines at a time. The problem was that the approaches to the submarine bases were heavily mined, and the nearby waters were controlled by shore batteries. The solution was suggested by young officers Bremner, Hampden and Anson: an attack with torpedo boats!
Miranda-4 racing glider - the prototype of the English torpedo boats
Having received an order for "coastal motor boats" (CMB), John Thornycroft decided to use as a model his own step-up glider "Miranda-4", which developed a speed of 35 knots. Perhaps that is why his shipyard produced not just torpedo boats with a wooden hull, but torpedo boats with a hull made of mahogany - the expensive kind!
40ft Torpedo Boat by Thornycroft
The first batch were the "40-foot" CMBs. These were small boats with a displacement of only 5 tons! An engine with a capacity of 250-275 horsepower accelerated them to a speed of 30 knots with a full load. Of course, with such a displacement, this load could not be large: at the stern of the boat in a tray lay one 456-mm torpedo. The launch was carried out with the help of a piston, which, under the action of a charge of two kilograms of black powder, pushed the torpedo behind the stern with the screws forward. After which the boat commander had to sharply turn away, so as not to get his own "fish" in the stern. In addition to the torpedo, the boat had a twin 7,62 mm machine gun. The crew of the boat consisted of 4-5 people. Seaworthiness... The words "so-so" would be quite appropriate to describe it: the boat's crew worked wet from head to toe - the boat was often hidden behind a curtain of water raised by itself. The Admiralty's first order was for 12 boats, but soon the order was expanded, and a total of 39 40-foot SMVs were in service with the Royal Navy.
The size of the 40-foot boats was not chosen by chance: it was believed that they could be placed on cruisers' davits and thus have a range limited by the range of the carrier. But Thornycroft understood that one torpedo for a boat is not much, but the main thing is that poor seaworthiness significantly reduces its combat value. It was impossible to lift it with the given displacement, so he decided to build an enlarged model.
It should be said that by this time the 40-foot SMVs had already received their baptism of fire. On April 8, 1917, German destroyers shelled Dunkirk. Since the port facilities had been heavily damaged by previous shelling, only torpedo boats were able to engage the enemy ships. Four SMVs left the harbor and attacked the German destroyers, sinking one and damaging two more.
55ft CMV from Thornycroft
Thorneycroft decided that a torpedo boat did not necessarily need to be able to rise on davits - it could be used from a base, successfully protecting its own coast from enemy ships. And that meant it was possible to design seaworthy boats! And so the 55-foot SMB appeared. They had a displacement of 11 tons, 2 gasoline engines of 375-450 horsepower each gave a speed of 40-42 knots, but most importantly, two 456 mm torpedoes were stored in troughs at the stern. The hull, still made of mahogany, had a convex deck, which significantly improved its aerodynamic characteristics. However, Thorneycroft never managed to achieve acceptable seaworthiness...
English "yachts" in Terryock
The 55-foot SMV was designed to combat the German fleet, but its first serious victims were Soviet ships. In May 1919, a detachment of seven 55-foot and one 40-foot boats arrived in the Finnish port of Terryoki (Zelenogorsk), the former base of the Imperial Yacht Club, in an atmosphere of strict secrecy. The crews arrived in civilian clothes and pretended to be yachtsmen and racers. During the first few weeks in Finland, the British carried out 13 reconnaissance raids, and then... In June, the White Guards rebelled at the Kronstadt forts of Krasnaya Gorka and Seraya Loshad, and the Red Baltic Fleet went out to shell the rebellious forts. The British decided to attack.
The armored cruiser "Oleg" is the first victim of the English "yachtsmen"
The target of the attack was the battleship Petropavlovsk, but the Baltic sailors were no pushovers — the battleship was constantly changing its location, and the English scouts were unable to track the ship. The first attempt at an attack failed due to a broken propeller on the 40-foot boat. Therefore, on June 16, 1919, one 55-foot boat — SMV-4 of Lieutenant A. Egar — was sent out on reconnaissance. Near the Tolbukhin lighthouse, the boat's commander spotted the armored cruiser Oleg and decided that a titmouse (Oleg) in the hand was worth two in the bush, after which he attacked. SMV-4 managed to pass by the escort ships unnoticed and fired a torpedo from a distance of 2,5-3 cables into the left side of the cruiser. The explosion occurred in the boiler room area, and the Oleg sank 12 minutes after the torpedo hit.
The most interesting thing is that the boat was spotted by the upper watch (15-20 seconds after the torpedo was launched), but was mistaken for the submarine's conning tower. In principle, this situation can be considered standard: in the dark, torpedo boats were regularly mistaken for submarines or airplanes (the engines sound similar!). The successful attack by the Oleg became a pretext for the British to organize a raid on the Kronstadt roadstead and an attack on the Red Navy ships stationed there. I will immediately note that the descriptions of subsequent events by various participants (including the British side) look different, but this is normal: in the heat of battle, everyone remembers their own, it would be strange if they were completely identical.
The diagram of the British SMV raid on Kronstadt, made from a photo taken from a British seaplane
At dawn on August 18, 1919, seven 55-foot torpedo boats, one 40-foot torpedo boat and eight seaplanes from the Vinidiktive aircraft carrier attacked the Kronstadt roadstead. It must be said that the British had prepared thoroughly: throughout July, the British seaplanes not only bombed Kronstadt, but also conducted reconnaissance. Photographs of the Kronstadt harbor were taken, and targets were identified: the battleships Andrei Pervozvanny and Petropavlovsk, the heavy cruiser Rurik and the submarine base Pamyat Azova. However, the attacks were only from the air, so all the attention of the Baltic sailors was diverted to repelling air raids, and they missed the torpedo boats, mistaking the sound of their engines for airplane engines.
The "Memory of Azov" sunk during the Kronstadt reveille
The bombing began at 3:45. An air raid alert was immediately sounded on the Baltic Fleet ships, while the torpedo boats were already approaching the entrance to the roadstead. One boat under the command of Egar was left on the outer roadstead, and the rest of Claude Dobson's detachment entered the harbor in a wedge formation.
We must give credit to the training of the "brothers", at 4:20 the boats were discovered by the destroyer "Gavriil": it was attacked by one of the boats, but the torpedo missed, the destroyer sank the boat with return fire. Three boats broke through to the inner harbor, their machine guns poured water on the decks of the ships moored there, causing panic among the crews that had been suddenly attacked.
Lieutenant Bremner's SMV-79 managed to torpedo a submarine base, the old armored cruiser Pamyat Azova. Lieutenant McBean's SMV-31 launched two torpedoes at the battleship Andrei Pervozvanny, after which it fled, but came under fire from the Kronstadt forts and was damaged.
SMV-88 was illuminated by a searchlight and machine-gunned, killing its commander, Lieutenant Dagnel-Reed, and two sailors. Lieutenant Gordon Steele, who took command, managed to launch both torpedoes on his own and, according to him, hit the Andrei Pervozvanny and Petropavlovsk.
Lieutenant Bodley's SMV-72 was unable to fire a torpedo at the dry dock, but took Dobson's damaged boat (according to other sources, Lieutenant Howard's SMV-86) in tow and took it out from under fire (the boat had to be blown up in the outer roadstead).
Lieutenant Braid's SMV-62 collided with Bremner's boat at the entrance to the harbor, which had just attacked Russian ships, as a result of which two sailors died on it, and SMV-79 began to sink. The boat, commanded by the restless Lieutenant Bremner, tried to attack the Gavriil with torpedoes, but missed. But the destroyer's gunners did not, and the boat was sunk, Braid died, and the wounded Bremner was captured.
The seventh boat launched torpedoes "into that steppe" and left the harbor. At 4:35 the battle, which had lasted a quarter of an hour, was over.
The location of the hole on the battleship Andrey Pervozvanny
The results of the "Kronstadt reveille" were mixed. The British lost six boats out of eight: three were destroyed by fire from the destroyer "Gavriil", one sank after being rammed, and two more had their engines catch fire while retreating (most likely damaged by fire, like on Dobson's boat) and had to be blown up. Losses were 75 percent! But... The Red Navy had to pay for the six destroyed boats by sinking the cruiser "Pamiat Azova" (yes, it was old, but for the Red Navy at that time any floating pyrotechnic craft was worth its weight in gold) and damaging the "Andrei Pervozvanny" - one of the most powerful ships of the Baltic Fleet (the British reported that they had hit the "Petropavlovsk" as well, but according to Soviet documents, the battleship was not hit).
SMV-62, sunk by the destroyer Gavriil and raised on September 13, 1919
And one of the sunken boats was raised and carefully studied by naval specialists. After that, at the request of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Baltic Fleet, work began on creating our own torpedo boats. Moreover, the "Kronstadt Wake-up Call" played a negative role in the development of the USSR Navy: torpedo boats were greatly overestimated, and in the 30s the Soviet fleet began to develop... unbalanced, with a large bias towards boats.
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