Chesma: one fire ship out of four broke through
At dawn on July 7 (June 26, old style) 1770, Chesma Bay in the Aegean Sea was burning. From the Turkish fleetThe charred remains of the battleship, which just the day before had been twice as large as the Russian squadron, remained. The victory would later be added to the calendar of memorable dates. And at the same time, it would be wrapped in a beautiful legend: as if one heroic fire ship, commanded by Lieutenant Ilyin, decided the matter by setting the enemy fleet ablaze. In reality, things turned out far less beautifully.
Baltic ships in a foreign sea
First, let's talk about how Russian ships ended up off the coast of Asia Minor in the first place. The Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 was raging, and St. Petersburg decided on a move that contemporaries considered reckless to the point of audacity: sending a squadron from the Baltic to the Mediterranean. They would circumnavigate Europe and strike the Ottoman Empire from the rear, from the Aegean archipelago.
This was the First Archipelago Expedition. Count Alexei Orlov assumed command, Admiral Grigory Spiridov was in charge of the fleet, and Samuil Greig was among the commanders. Thousands of miles of travel, foreign waters, and repairs on the move. By the summer of 1770, the squadron encountered the enemy off the western coast of Asia Minor. And the odds were far from in our favor.
The Turks have almost a two-fold advantage
Numbers. The Ottoman Empire had 16 ships of the line, 6 frigates, and about fifty auxiliary vessels: xebecs, galleys, and galiots. They had over 1400 guns. Their crews numbered approximately 15,000.
The Russian squadron had 9 ships of the line, 3 frigates, and a bombardment ship. "Thunder" (a vessel with heavy mortars for high-excursion fire) and about 17 smaller vessels, along with fire ships and transports. There were approximately 740 guns and about 6500 men.
The ratio is worth keeping in mind: the Turks had almost a two-to-one advantage in large ships and firepower. With such a disparity in cannons, luck alone wouldn't be enough; calculation was required. It was calculated, and now we'll see how it worked.
Chios: The Prologue That Locked Out the Turks
There was another battle before Chesma. On July 5 (June 24, old style), the Russian squadron clashed with the Turks in the Strait of Chios. The approach was close, and the flagship Saint Eustathius He engaged the Turkish flagship in a direct boarding battle. Both ships exploded. It was here that the Russians suffered the greatest losses of that campaign, approximately 600 men.
The price was high, but the outcome of Chios was decisive: the Turkish fleet, having lost formation and the initiative, retreated and took refuge in Chesma Bay. The ships were crowded together, broadside to broadside, pressed against the shore. From a defensive standpoint, this seemed logical, since they were hidden behind the protection of the batteries. But from the standpoint of what would happen next, it was a trap the Turks had driven themselves into. In the narrow bay, crowded together, these ships were no longer a fleet, but one large, flammable target.
Night of the Fireships: A Failure That Worked
On the night of July 7th it was like this. First, the Russian artillery and a bombardment ship "Thunder" They opened fire on the cramped mass of Turkish ships. They sank them not only with cannonballs but also with incendiary shells, and in the cramped bay, the ships burst into flames like a woodpile ignited by a match. The artillery created the initial arson and confusion, which left the Turks no longer able to organize an organized defense. At this point, the fireships were still only preparing to attack.
Only then did the fire ships, vessels loaded with fuel, come into play to close in and set the enemy ablaze. There were four of them. And then something happened that legend doesn't describe: three of the four failed to complete their mission. Some didn't make it, some were carried away, some were intercepted (sources differ on the details of this episode, but the gist is the same). Essentially, only one broke through—Lieutenant Dmitry Ilyin's fire ship. It set fire to the Turkish ship, the flames spread to neighboring ones, and the conflagration spread throughout the bay.
The legend of the lone hero oversimplifies all this beyond recognition. The fireship attack failed almost entirely, as three of the four failed to reach the target. And yet, it worked: the artillery had already shattered the trapped fleet, knocked out the defenses, and set the first ships ablaze—and under these conditions, even one fireship breaking through was enough to spread the conflagration. Chesma was won not by execution, but by the choice of location and time.
Historians still debate which exactly weighed more—the fire from the Grom and the battleships, or Ilyin's fireship. But both versions point to the same thing: the outcome was decided not by the courage of a lone sailor, but by the fact that the Turkish fleet had been driven into a hopeless situation from the start.
The price of defeat
The result explains why Chesma is remembered for two and a half centuries. The Turkish fleet was almost completely destroyed. Of the 16 ships of the line, 15 burned or exploded, and one, a 60-gun "Rhodes" (in some sources it goes by a Turkish name Semend-i Bahri), the Russians managed to tow it out of the burning bay as a trophy, along with five galleys. All six frigates burned, dozens of galleys and galiots, and almost all the xebecs perished. Sources estimate the Ottoman Empire's human losses at 10,000–11,000 killed and drowned.
In the Battle of Chesma itself, on that fiery night, the Russian squadron lost 11 men. The figure sounds almost implausible, and it's not always consistent, but that's the order of magnitude. And the main losses of that campaign, those same approximately 600 men, were due to the explosion. Saint Eustathius the day before, in the Chios Strait.
Ten thousand Turks against eleven Russians—that was the score of the Chesme rout. That's how you strike when you're the weakest: in a cramped bay, at night, with fire, where enemy numbers mean nothing. The strategic consequences were equally impressive: Russia gained dominance in the Aegean Sea and established a blockade of the Dardanelles, the sea gate to Istanbul.
Memory in stone
Chesma was immortalized in stone. The Chesma Column, adorned with rostra and ship prows, rose in Tsarskoye Selo. The Chesma Church and the Chesma Palace were built in St. Petersburg.
And if there's one thing to remember on this date, it's this: three of the four fire ships didn't make it, the flagship exploded along with its crew the day before, and victory still prevailed. Because Spiridov and Greig chose a place and time where the enemy, trapped in the bay, no longer stood a chance. And Lieutenant Ilyin, on the only fire ship that made it, saw the job through to the end.
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