Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1921.djvu/1285

 DEFENCE

1233

There were four Dreadnoughts, Gangut, Poltava, Sevastopol, and Petropav- Urvsk, the last-named seriously damaged by a British torpedo durii Walter Cowan's operations. Their present situation is unknown. In addition were three older battleships, 5 armoured cruisers, 8 light cruisers, and about 90 destroyers, 30 of them built since 1914. Of the pre-war submarines only 5 remain, but 14 were built between 1914 and 1917.

In the Black Sea General Denikin began some naval reorganisation, aad General Wrangel controlled the forces at Sevastopol, but in April, 1919, by the action of secret hostile agents the main machinery was wrecked by explosive means in five of the battleships. Big guns were dismounted from the ships for the landward defences, and probably 2 battleships and 6 light cruisers remain effective, with 16 destrovers and 2 pre-war submarines, to which 6 have recently been added. Three of these were controlled by General Wrangel. The Soviet ships which fought in the Caspian were mostly armed merchantmen. At Vladivostok are about 4 destroyers.

The Caspian flotilla of 15 vessels surrendered and was interned by the Persians at.Enzeli. In the early summer of 1920, Raskoluikov, commander of the Soviet Caspian Fleet, raided the port and seized the flotilla.

State dockyards were at Nevsky, New Admiralty and Galernyi Ostrov, Petrograd ; Kronstadt, Sevastopol, and Vladivostok. A semi-private yard existed at the Baltic works (Petrograd). Guns were made at the Pntiloff steel works.

The following table gives the ships recently remaining so far as is known, of the armour-clad fleet and principal cruisers of the Baltic and the Black Sea fleets, the new names, where known, being inserted.

Baltic Fleet.

Date of

Launch

Name

Displace- Horse- ment power

Speed

Officers i a:. ; >k:,

Main armament

Dreadnoughts.

/Sevastopol .\\ I Poltava. .1!

Gansfut. . - 3 ' 000 \Petropavlovsk J

Demokratiya. | 27,300

U.OO0

29,200

59—1,060

12 12in.; 16 4'8in.

12 12 in.; 20 tin.

Two of the Sevastopol class were stated to have been destroyed and the other* to be in a state of complete disrepair.

Battle Cruisers.

66,000 27 — 12 H:n. ; 21 5-lin.

I These ship* have not been and are not likely to be completed.

(Borodino I Savarin iUmail

I 32,290

Pre- Dreadnoughts

1907 Repnblika 17,400 17,600 18 33-900 4 12in. ; Mbin. 124'8in

1901 i Grazhdanin I 12,912 | 15,300 | 18 ..•— 74o | * 12in. ; 20 bin.