Why did the battleship Oslyabya perish?
According to the author, there were three main reasons for the rapid demise of the battleship Oslyabya:
1. High overload, which negatively affected its unsinkability.
2. Unsuccessful maneuvering, due to which from the first minutes of the Battle of Tsushima, the Oslyabya found itself under concentrated fire from the majority of the enemy fleet.
3. Increased efficiency of Japanese artillery, which allowed the tactical advantage gained to be realized.
Let's look at these reasons in more detail...
Overloading of the battleship Oslyabya
The influence of overload on the unsinkability of the Oslyabya
As we found out in the previous article, the reason for the fatal increase in the list of the Oslyabya was the holes in the unarmored side, through which the forward compartments of the living deck received free communication with the sea.
Let's imagine the development of events if the Oslyabya had entered the battle without being overloaded...
The armor belt along 3/4 of the ship's length along the waterline would have undoubtedly withstood shell hits. Numerous holes were formed in the unarmored side at the ends.
The compartments located on the lower deck outside the citadel were separated by watertight bulkheads and had powerful water drainage facilities. Even if both the bow and stern ends were completely flooded, the ship would settle by 20 cm, the area of the cargo waterline would decrease by 9%, stability would decrease significantly, but there was no threat of capsizing.
The holes formed in the unarmored side on the living deck would remain above the surface of the sea and would not communicate with it.
If the Oslyabya had had the design draft, it would have been very difficult to sink it with artillery!
In reality, due to overload, the living deck was already at sea level by the start of the battle, and its flooding threatened a catastrophic loss of stability. The main belt armor was completely submerged. Along the 130-meter waterline, only 50 meters in the central part were covered by a weak upper belt, which from a distance of 5000 meters could withstand Japanese armor-piercing shells of 6 inches and higher caliber only due to their premature detonation or significant deviation from the normal. The 80-meter unarmored ends were especially vulnerable to Japanese high-explosive shells.
Comparison of the side protection of the battleship Oslyabya at design displacement (top) and in the Battle of Tsushima (bottom)
Possibility of reducing the overload of the Oslyabya
Given that overload became one of the main reasons for the death of the Oslyabya, the question of how to reduce it became especially important.
Possibility of reducing construction overload
In preparation for the voyage as part of the 2nd Pacific Squadron, additional equipment was installed on the Oslyabya, including a radio room, telegraph, and Spencer-Miller coal loading devices.
At the same time, it was possible to remove items that were useless in modern combat from the Oslyabya, weighing about 200 tons in total: the 6-inch bow gun, all 47-mm and 37-mm artillery, the combat topsail, mine launchers, and mine barriers.
Possibility of reducing operational coal overload
The distance from the Tsushima Strait to Vladivostok was 580 miles. According to the morning reports preserved on the Almaz, it can be calculated that on the morning of May 14, 1905, there were about 1 tons of coal on board the Oslyabya, which allowed it to travel 288 miles at 1 knots full speed or 630 miles at 18 knots average speed.
It is obvious that the overload of the Oslyabya could be significantly reduced by the coal reserve. But by how much? The answer depends on the chosen calculation method!
Calculation of coal requirements based on maximum squadron speed
The ships of the 1st Pacific Squadron, preparing to break through from Port Arthur to Vladivostok, calculated their coal requirements based on the assumption that the passage would be made by the shortest route at the maximum squadron speed of 14 knots. Possible excess coal consumption due to deviation from course or damage received could be compensated for by reducing speed.
The maximum squadron speed of the 2nd Pacific Squadron, according to Z. P. Rozhestvensky, was 12 knots. Moving in a straight line, the ships reached Vladivostok in two days. The estimated coal requirement of the Oslyabya was no more than 300 tons of coal. The speed of 12 knots was close to economical, therefore, in addition to the estimated requirement, the battleship needed a reserve supply of coal.
Combat experience. Battleship "Tsesarevich"
The battleship Tsarevich used 575 tons of coal on the 430-mile voyage from Port Arthur to Qingdao – much more than expected.
The excess coal consumption was due to two reasons.
Firstly, the night after the battle, the Tsarevich developed a speed of 16,7 knots. There is a cubic relationship between speed and coal consumption, so increasing the speed from 14 to 16,7 knots led to a 1,7-fold increase in coal consumption.
Secondly, the chimneys suffered extensive damage, and to compensate for the loss of draft, forced ventilation was turned on, which blew small, unburned coal out of the fireboxes.
Battleship "Tsesarevich". Damage to smoke stacks
The example of the breakthrough of the Tsarevich alone at full speed cannot be used to calculate the Oslyabya’s need for coal, because Z. P. Rozhestvensky planned to move to Vladivostok exclusively as part of a squadron, the speed of which was limited by slow-moving ships and could not cause a radical increase in coal consumption.
Combat experience. Armored cruiser "Rossiya"
From June 15 to 20, 1904, the cruiser Rossiya, as part of the Vladivostok detachment, made a voyage to the Korean Strait. Most of the time, its speed was 15 knots, but at the moment of contact with the detachment of H. Kamimura, it was increased to 18 knots. The average daily coal consumption was 243 tons.
From July 30 to August 3, 1904, Rossiya, as part of the Vladivostok detachment, sailed out to meet the ships of the 1st Pacific Squadron. The cruiser covered about 1100 miles and consumed about 900 tons of coal. When moving to the Korean Strait, the average speed was 11,5 knots, in battle the cruiser maintained 14-15 knots, on the way back - 14-14,5 knots. The smoke stacks were heavily damaged, but the forced ventilation was faulty and was not used. The average daily coal consumption was about 250 tons.
Armored cruiser "Rossiya". Damage to smoke stacks
Based on the experience of the cruiser Rossiya, the coal consumption during a breakthrough to Vladivostok as a result of a two-day maneuvering battle, in which the Oslyabya would have received significant damage, could be estimated at approximately 500 tons.
Estimates of coal requirements of the participants in the Battle of Tsushima
V.P. Kostenko drew up a plan for unloading the Orel, according to which, upon entering the Korean Strait, there should have been slightly less than 600 tons of coal on board.
Z. P. Rozhestvensky informed the Investigative Commission that on the morning of May 14, 1905, the battleships of the 1st detachment had no more than 600 tons of coal. The squadron commander was being disingenuous, but what is important to us is something else: he considered this reserve sufficient to reach Vladivostok.
The coal requirement calculated for the Borodino-class battleships can be considered more than sufficient for the Oslyabya, which proved to be more economical than them on the last voyage.
If 600 tons of coal had remained on board the Oslyabya, its overload would have been reduced by 688 tons.
Possibility of reducing other operational overloads
Measures to reduce other operational overloads were to be carried out during the last stop off the coast of Indochina. At a meeting on April 4, 1905, the ship's engineers raised the issue of unloading the ships to ensure unsinkability, to which the flagship engineer E. S. Politovsky responded that the corresponding measures had already been proposed to Z. P. Rozhestvensky and categorically rejected.
"Oslyabya" received supplies in the same volume as the battleships of the 1st detachment, therefore, when assessing the possibility of reducing other operational overload, one can use the available information about the battleship "Orel", from which V.P. Kostenko proposed to remove, in addition to coal, 655 tons of various cargo, including:
• Fresh water for boilers and ship needs – 250 tons
• Food – 120 tons
• Machine oil – 40 tons
• Training equipment – 25 tons
• Boats and dinghies – 100 tons
• Equipment, consumables and repair materials – 120 tons.
The total potential for reducing the overload of the Oslyabya can be estimated at 1 tons, of which:
• construction overload – 200 tons;
• operational coal handling capacity – 688 tons;
• other operational overload – 655 tons.
If the above measures had been taken, the upper edge of the main belt and the living deck of the Oslyabya would have been approximately 70-80 cm above sea level. The destruction of the unarmored side at the ends would not have had catastrophic consequences, and the ship would have safely survived the first hours of the Battle of Tsushima.
Unfortunately, in reality Z. P. Rozhestvensky ignored measures to reduce the overload of warships.
Maneuvering of the Russian squadron at the beginning of the Battle of Tsushima
The question of what formation the Russian squadron began the battle in is still a subject of debate.
Z. P. Rozhestvensky claimed that at the moment of opening fire the ships were already lined up in one wake.
Many Russian officers, on the contrary, testified that the squadron began the battle in two columns, and that Oslyabya slowed down and reformed under enemy fire.
It is now possible to put an end to the question of maneuvering at the beginning of the Battle of Tsushima thanks to the involvement of Japanese sources.
The relative positions of the 1st and 2nd armored detachments of the Russian squadron 3 minutes before the start of the battle (at 13:47) are reflected in the diagram attached to the combat report of the commander of the Mikasa.
Fragment of the diagram attached to the combat report of the commander of the battleship "Mikasa" about the Battle of Tsushima. The situation at 13:47
The combat report itself states that at the moment of opening fire, the closest enemy ship was the Oslyabya, the distance to which was 6500 m. Of the column of Borodino-class battleships, only the Knyaz Suvorov and the Emperor Alexander III managed to move forward relative to the Oslyabya.
The combat reports of the commanders of other ships of the 1st and 2nd combat detachments and the diagrams they compiled clearly indicate that the Russian squadron began the battle in two columns, and the Oslyabya turned out to be the closest enemy ship.
The distances to the target recorded by Japanese officers allowed us to establish that the Oslyabya was rapidly approaching in the first minutes of the battle and at 14:00 was 4800 meters from the Fuji and 4700 meters from the Kasuga. At that moment, nine ships concentrated their fire on it!
Scheme of the Battle of Tsushima. Position at 14:00
Then the Oslyabya began to re-form in the wake of the Orel. The most accurate time for the completion of this maneuver was apparently indicated on his diagram by the British attaché T. Jackson: 14:04 (the diagram shows Kyoto time: Russian + 18 minutes).
Fragment of the diagram attached to T. Jackson's report on the Battle of Tsushima
Thus, during the first 15 minutes of the battle, Oslyabya was the closest target for most Japanese ships and also the lead ship of the column, so it came under concentrated fire and received heavy damage.
From a tactical point of view, the squadron’s maneuvering, in which a weakly protected battleship was exposed to enemy attack, was a gross mistake by Z. P. Rozhestvensky.
The effectiveness of Japanese artillery fire
"Oslyabya" was far from the first Russian ship to come under concentrated fire from the Japanese fleet. On July 28, 1904, at least two battleships found themselves in a similar situation in the Yellow Sea.
At the very beginning of the 2nd, final phase of the battle, the Japanese fleet, catching up with the enemy, caught up with the battleship Poltava, which had fallen behind due to a broken engine, and concentrated its fire on it. The result was described by senior officer S. I. Lutonin:
The furious fire of the Japanese is almost harmless to the Poltava, all the shells fly overhead with a roar and an ominous howl, hitting the tops, but occasionally they hit the stern.
At the culmination of the 2nd phase of the battle, the battleship Retvizan selflessly rushed to attack the Japanese fleet and took fire from almost all of its ships. The ship's commander E. N. Shchensnovich noted the enemy's low accuracy:
When the Retvizan was at a distance of 22-17 cables from the enemy, shells showered it, the deck was wet from the splashes of shells falling all around, but there were almost no hits.
In both episodes described above, the Japanese fleet failed to realize its tactical advantage and inflict decisive damage on the enemy ship. Fire concentrated on one target was ineffective. Numerous splashes and thick smoke from the explosions made it impossible to distinguish the falls of friendly shells and made adjustments difficult. The Retvizan approached so close that the Japanese opened rapid fire and brought in anti-mine artillery, which only worsened visibility conditions. A thick cloud of black smoke formed from the continuous shell explosions, which completely hid the Russian battleship.
Before the Battle of Tsushima, the Japanese naval command took several important measures designed to increase the effectiveness of artillery.
Firstly, having become convinced of the high efficiency of centralized fire control, it ordered its use whenever possible.
Secondly, to improve accuracy, the desired combat distance was reduced to 5 meters (000 cables).
Thirdly, it recommended, in difficult observation conditions, to fire volleys from 6-inch guns in order to distinguish the fall of one’s own shells and adjust fire.
Fourthly, having realized the inability of existing armor-piercing shells to penetrate armor, it relied on high-explosive shells and increased their share in the ammunition load.
Fifth, it adopted a new strategy of sinking enemy battleships by causing holes above the armor belt in the bow.
Sixthly, to increase the damage caused, it was recommended to fire shots from the 12-inch turret in a salvo.
Seventh, it took care of the training of gunners and organized regular barrel firing.
The results of the work on the mistakes were not long in coming. Unlike the battle in the Yellow Sea, the participants of the Battle of Tsushima noted the very high accuracy of the Japanese artillery fire, concentrated on the Oslyaba.
O. A. Shcherbachev was in the stern turret of the battleship Orel:
Around 2 o'clock in the afternoon, the fire concentrated on the Oslyaba reached terrifying intensity and accuracy. Almost every 1/2 minute a shell hit it, mainly in the bow.
G. A. Ivkov was in the conning tower of the battleship Sisoj Veliky:
We almost ran into the Oslyabya and clearly saw how a mass of shells exploded against its side and destroyed all the superstructures.
V. N. Markov was on the top of the coastal defense battleship Admiral Senyavin:
The Japanese concentrated terrible fire on the Oslyaba; you can see how the shells are landing on the side.
Assessment of fire impact on the battleship Oslyabya[/h3
Numerous and sometimes very emotional descriptions of the shooting of the Oslyabya cannot be used as the only evidence of the unprecedented intensity of the impact of Japanese artillery. There is an opinion that concentrating the fire of a large number of ships on one target cannot be effective. Therefore, to assess the fire impact, one should operate with measurable quantities.
The memoirs of the participants in the Battle of Tsushima contain information about more than thirty Japanese shells that hit the Oslyabya, of which over ten were 12-inch.
Scheme #1. Hits on the left side of the battleship Oslyabya
Without a doubt, information has reached us not about all the hits, but only about those that were etched in the memory of the officers and sailors who left behind the memories that have reached us.
The exact number of hits on Oslyabya will never be known, but we can make a rough calculation based on several indirect indicators.
According to the author, the most correct method for assessing the fire impact on the Oslyabya is a comparison with the Peresvet using measurable criteria: damage to artillery and losses among the crew.
Scheme #1. Hits on the left side of the battleship Oslyabya
Artillery damage
The first criterion by which one can compare the damage to Peresvet and Oslyabya is the amount of artillery disabled by external impact.
According to the report of senior artillery officer V. N. Cherkasov, only one 10-inch gun on the Peresvet sustained irreparable damage; after the end of the squadron battle, a 57-mm shell fired by a destroyer left a deep dent in its barrel.
The following sustained repairable damage from shrapnel, which was repaired during the battle by ship's means, were: the bow turret and one of its guns, as well as three 6-inch guns.
Seven 75mm and five 47mm guns were permanently or temporarily damaged.
The damage to the Oslyabya artillery is described in numerous, but scattered, memoirs.
The forward turret was destroyed by two shells hitting it at the same time. One of them tore off the barrel of the left gun (hit #2 in diagram #1), and the other penetrated the roof above the embrasure and exploded inside (hit #5 in diagram #1).
The forward two-tier casemate on the left side was destroyed by several successive hits from large shells (hits #11 and #12 on diagram #1). The armor plates slid down, and both 6-inch guns ceased firing.
The 6-inch gun of the middle casemate on the left side was destroyed by the explosion of a Japanese shell that penetrated through the embrasure.
Unfortunately, full information about the damage to the 75-mm and 47-mm guns has not reached us.
Based on the available information, the most correct comparison would be between Oslyabya and Peresvet based on the number of 10-inch and 6-inch guns destroyed or irreparably damaged.
Oslyabya lost five guns, Peresvet lost only one, and that was while repelling an attack by destroyers.
Crew losses
The second criterion for comparing the fire impact on Peresvet and Oslyabya is the number of killed and wounded.
After returning to the Port Arthur roadstead, the Peresvet's logbook recorded losses: 13 killed, 15 seriously wounded, and 64 lightly wounded. Later, the data obtained hot on the trail was clarified.
The senior ship's doctor of the Peresvet, N. I. Avgustovsky, in an essay on the sanitary and medical service, published in 1909, provided a list of names of 14 people killed on the ship, 3 who died in the hospital, and 87 wounded.
The “Sanitary Report on the Fleet that Participated in the Russo-Japanese War of 1915–1904,” published in 05, already included 19 killed and 104 wounded:
The exact losses of the Oslyabya crew from the impact of Japanese artillery will never be known.
The surviving memoirs describe the death of about forty officers and sailors at combat posts. Many were killed in the 75-mm battery, on the compass platform, and even behind the armor - in the bow turret, casemates, and conning tower. The fire-hold division, working under fire, suffered enormous losses.
According to eyewitnesses, many crew members were injured by shells.
M. P. Sablin:
The wounded walked or were carried on stretchers in a continuous line.
Paramedic G.S. Savin:
Every minute they brought in the wounded and seriously wounded, since very few of the lightly wounded arrived.
According to G.S. Savin, about 80 people were treated at the dressing stations, with the ratio of those who received severe/moderate/slight wounds being 25%/50%/25%. For comparison, the same ratio, according to the medical report for the battle on July 28, 1904, was 9%/58%/33% for the Peresvet and 14%/59%/27% for the Pobeda.
In the conditions of the ongoing battle and the enormous workload on the medical personnel, those officers and sailors whose wounds did not pose a threat to life remained at their posts. Therefore, the share of those admitted to the dressing stations of "Oslyabya" with serious wounds was very high.
Many of the injured could not reach the dressing stations. Senior Battalion Officer P. Ya. Bachurihin noted that the stretcher bearers took only those wounded who were under the cover of the armor, otherwise they themselves died.
According to the medical report, the proportion of those killed without medical assistance in the total number of casualties on the Peresvet was 8% (10/123), on the Pobeda - 6,5% (3/46). A similar ratio, calculated on the basis of the information that has reached us about the losses of the Oslyabya crew, is an abnormal 33% (40/120) and indicates that the available data on the number of wounded are greatly underestimated. Consequently, the most correct criterion for comparison is only the number of those killed at combat posts without medical assistance: at least 40 people on the Oslyabya and 10 people on the Peresvet.
Total Hits Estimate
Unlike the battle in the Yellow Sea, in the Battle of Tsushima the concentration of fire from a large number of ships on one target proved to be very effective. The Japanese fleet took advantage of Z. P. Rozhestvensky's tactical error and inflicted fatal damage on the Oslyaba.
The stunning effectiveness of Japanese artillery in the Battle of Tsushima should certainly be considered one of the reasons for the rapid destruction of the Oslyabya and the answer to the question of why, of the two identical battleships, the Peresvet survived, while the Oslyabya quickly perished.
A comparison using measurable criteria demonstrated that the Oslyabya received an unprecedented fire impact, at least 4–5 times more powerful than the Peresvet.
Some readers may want to calculate the number and caliber of shells that hit the Oslyabya by multiplying the data on hits on the Peresvet by the values of measurable fire impact criteria. The author believes that such a calculation is incorrect for two reasons.
First, comparison based on measurable criteria is a very rough estimate.
Secondly, the distribution of hits by caliber for the Peresvet and the Oslyabya had completely different proportions.
On July 28, 1904, Peresvet was hit by at least 36 shells, 16 of which, according to the author's estimate, were 12-inch caliber. The Japanese battleships fired at Peresvet from a long distance and often only from their main caliber guns, so the proportion of hits by 12-inch shells was very high.
The Battle of Tsushima began at medium range, which allowed the Japanese ships to immediately bring into action not only the main guns, but also the medium caliber guns, and later the anti-mine guns. The Japanese cruisers had a longer fire impact on the Oslyabya than the battleships. Therefore, among the shells that hit it, the overwhelming majority had a caliber of 6 inches, and the share of 12-inch shells was noticeably inferior to the share of 8-10-inch shells.
Schedule of firing by ships of the Japanese fleet's battle line at the battleship Oslyabya in the Battle of Tsushima
[h3]Consequences of waterline holes for Japanese battleships
After reading the series of articles, the reader may have a question: what consequences did the holes near the waterline have for the enemy?
According to calculations by the famous Russian shipbuilder N. E. Kuteinikov, if the area of the cargo waterline of the Japanese battleship were to decrease by approximately 17%, it would lose stability and capsize.
The exclusion of a compartment area from the area of the ship's cargo waterline occurs if the water in this compartment freely communicates with the sea through an underwater or semi-submerged hole. Traditionally, the most vulnerable to such damage were the compartments located outside the citadel, which accounted for about 25% of the total area of the cargo waterline of the Japanese battleship.
Fuji had no side armour outside the citadel and could have been destroyed if she had taken a large number of hits from 6-inch or larger shells at both ends near the waterline.
"Mikasa", "Shikishima" and "Asahi" had a main belt along the entire or almost the entire length of the waterline, which in the Battle of Tsushima, even with the presence of excess coal and shell reserves, rose above the cargo waterline by 60-70 cm and did not allow holes in the unarmored side to sink into the water. The belt at the ends had a thickness of 140-99 mm and at typical combat distances could be penetrated only by 12-inch or 10-inch Russian shells. Therefore, "Mikasa", "Shikishima" and "Asahi" could have perished from loss of stability only if they found themselves in the same situation as "Oslyabya": they received a large number of hits from large shells near the waterline in a short period of time.
During the entire Battle of Tsushima, only four holes were formed on the four Japanese battleships below the level of the main deck (on a Russian navy ship it would be called the battery deck) - the same number as on one Oslyaba in 10 minutes at the beginning of the battle.
At 14:07, a 12-inch high-explosive shell hit the 148-mm upper belt of Mikasa opposite the 15th coal pit and exploded as it penetrated the armor. A rounded conical hole 55 cm wide and 70 cm high was formed in the plate, the lower edge of which was 1,6...1,7 m above the cargo waterline.
Battleship Mikasa. Scheme of sealing the hole in the 15th coal pit
The coal pit was filled to the brim with coal, which was mixed with water and coal dust. The emergency party dug a passage to the hole and installed an umbrella-shaped patch, but it did not stop the water from flowing in and was dismantled. The emergency party then installed and secured two wooden patches from the outside with hook bolts, placing wool blankets, cots and mats inside. The hole was sealed.
On the left is an umbrella-shaped patch, on the right is a wooden patch
At 14:22, a 6-inch shell hit the Mikasa's chief engineer's cabin, pierced the internal bulkhead, and exploded in the chief engineer's office. An oval hole 21 cm wide and 31 cm high was formed in the outer unarmored side, the lower edge of which almost reached the flooring of the lower (living) deck. The explosion destroyed the equipment in the office, damaged the cabin, tore a hole about 30 cm in diameter in the flooring of the lower (living) deck, and smashed the drinking water tank located below.
Battleship Mikasa. Scheme of sealing the hole in the chief engineer's cabin
The emergency crew placed a wooden patch on the outside of the hole and wool blankets, bunks and wooden supports on the inside. However, due to the proximity of the waterline (about 70 cm from the bottom edge of the hole), water still seeped in.
At 15:57, a 12-inch armor-piercing shell penetrated the 148-mm upper belt of Mikasa and exploded in the 21st coal pit. The armor plate split into several pieces, forming an elongated hole about 95 cm wide and about 40 cm high, the lower edge of which was approximately 2,1...2,2 meters above the waterline. The blast wave destroyed the flooring of the main (battery) deck, as well as the bulkheads adjacent to the 19th coal pit and the lower (living) deck compartment.
Battleship Mikasa. Scheme of sealing the hole in the 21th coal pit
The emergency team scooped out the coal and, just as they had done with the hole in the 15th coal pit, installed a wooden patch on the outside.
Significant time intervals between hits at the waterline allowed the Mikasa's emergency crews to patch them up in a timely manner. As a result, only local flooding occurred, which did not have any noticeable effect on the ship's unsinkability.
At 14:12, a 6-inch shell penetrated the unarmored side of the Shikishima on the lower (living) deck and exploded in the doctor's cabin. Shrapnel penetrated the bulkhead and damaged the adjacent cabin of the senior doctor. A hole 30 cm wide and 50 cm high formed in the outer side, the lower edge of which was approximately 80 cm above the cargo waterline.
Battleship Shikishima. Diagram of the hole in the doctor's cabin
The emergency party that arrived first tried to install an umbrella-shaped patch, but it did not hold the water at all. The rough seas did not allow the wooden patch to be installed outside. Then the emergency party closed the hole from the inside using bunks and woolen blankets and propped them up with boards. The water flow decreased, but did not stop.
Through the ventilation pipes, which had no valves where they passed through the bulkheads and decks, water penetrated into the adjacent compartments: the wardroom and officers' cabins located in the stern, as well as the food and uniform storage rooms located below.
Soon, a 15-centimeter layer of water covered the entire lower (living) deck from the stern beam to the sternpost, which had a negative impact on stability. Shikishima began to roll when the rudder was shifted, a slight list to the starboard side arose, with the water level near the hole reaching 60 cm.
Only after 18:XNUMX, when the waves had subsided, the emergency team installed a specially made patch on the outside and tightly pulled it to the side. The water flow was stopped.
A hole from even a 6-inch shell caused significant damage to the unsinkability of the Shikishima for two reasons. First, it was formed near the waterline and was of significant size, so it was repaired only when the waves subsided. Second, the poor ventilation design played a role, allowing water to spread across the lower deck and the platform located below it.
Conclusion
In conclusion of the article and the entire cycle, it is necessary to summarize the main conclusions. The tragic death of the battleship Oslyabya at the beginning of the Battle of Tsushima was not an accident, not a fatal coincidence of circumstances.
Firstly, the operational and construction overload of the battleship proved fatal.
Secondly, Z. P. Rozhestvensky’s tactical miscalculation put Oslyabya under attack from the majority of the Japanese fleet.
Thirdly, the increased skill of the Japanese gunners allowed them to exert a powerful fire impact on the Oslyabya in a short period of time, several times greater than on the Peresvet in the Yellow Sea.
Three ingrained myths about Oslyaba have not been confirmed.
The first is that the battleship had a construction overload of 1 tons.
The second is that he was killed by two 12-inch shells that made holes near the waterline.
Thirdly, the poor quality of the case's manufacture was one of the reasons for its rapid demise.
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