The Peresvet class was a group of three pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Imperial Russian Navy around the end of the 19th century. and were transferred to the Pacific Squadron upon completion and based at Port Arthur from 1901 and 1903, respectively. All three ships were lost by the Russians in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05; Peresvet and Pobeda participated in the Battles of Port Arthur and the Yellow Sea and were sunk during the siege of Port Arthur. Oslyabya, the third ship, sailed to the Far East with the Second Pacific Squadron to relieve the Russian forces blockaded in Port Arthur and was sunk at the Battle of Tsushima with the loss of over half her crew.
Peresvet and Pobeda were salvaged after the Japanese captured Port Arthur and incorporated into the Imperial Japanese Navy. Peresvet was sold back to the Russians during World War I, as the two countries were by now allies, and sank after hitting German mines in the Mediterranean in early 1917 while Pobeda, renamed Suwo, remained instead in Japanese service and participated in the Battle of Tsingtao in late 1914. She became a gunnery training ship in 1917. The ship was disarmed in 1922 to comply with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty and probably scrapped around that time.
Design and description
After the humiliating Russian defeat during the Crimean War of 1854–55, General Admiral Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich understood that Russia would never be able to outbuild Britain or France, but still needed a maritime strategy that could defend Russia, give the fleet a useful role in peacetime and act as a deterrent. He decided that a guerre de course (commerce-raiding) strategy was Russia's only effective means of attacking the British Empire or France if war broke out and built a series of fast, long-range, armored cruisers like and to implement his strategy.McLaughlin 1999, pp. 44–45 The British responded by building the second-class battleships of the to defeat the cruisers and the Russians countered with the three ships of the Peresvet class that were designed to support their armored cruisers. This role placed a premium on high speed and long range at the expense of heavy armament and armor.McLaughlin 2003, p. 108
As was common with Russian ships of the time, changes were made while the ships were under construction. The most important was the revision of the secondary armament from eight and five guns to eleven 6-inch guns and additional light guns. Only two ships were originally planned, but a third was ordered to keep the Baltic Works shipyard busy until a new design could be prepared. Ironically, it was completed before the second ship, despite having been laid down over three years later.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 107, 109–110
The Peresvet-class ships were long overall, with a beam of and a draft of . Designed to displace , they were overweight and actually displaced . To reduce biofouling, the hulls of the first two ships were sheathed with wood and copper, but this was eliminated in Pobeda to reduce weight. The vessels had a partial double bottom and the hull was divided by 10 watertight transverse bulkheads; a centerline bulkhead divided the forward engine rooms. Each crew consisted of 27 officers and 744 enlisted men.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 107–110
The ships were powered by three vertical triple-expansion steam engines, each driving one propeller shaft, using steam generated by 30 Belleville boilers. The engines were rated at , using forced draft, and designed to reach a top speed of . All three ships slightly exceeded their specifications and reached top speeds of from during their sea trials. They carried a maximum of of coal which allowed them to steam for at a speed of . Their electrical equipment consisted of four steam-driven dynamos with a total capacity of .McLaughlin 2003, pp. 107–108, 114
Armament
The ships' main battery consisted of four 45-caliber, guns mounted in electrically powered twin-gun turrets, one forward and one aft of the superstructure. These guns had major development problems as they proved to be too weak to use a full-strength charge of propellant and had to be reworked and the charge reduced. The guns in Peresvet and Oslyabya were the original model and could be elevated to a maximum of +35°, while the reinforced guns used in Pobeda could only elevate to a maximum of +25°. The guns were designed to fire once every 40 seconds, but in service they fired at half that rate. The ships carried 75 rounds for each gun.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 107, 112 The older guns fired a shell at a muzzle velocity of while Pobedas newer ones may have reached a muzzle velocity of . At an elevation of +6°, the gun had a range of .Friedman, pp. 256–257 The secondary armament of the Peresvet-class ships consisted of eleven 45-caliber, 6-inch Canet Model 1891 quick-firing (QF) guns, 10 mounted in casemates on the sides of the hull and one underneath the forecastle as a bow chaser. Each gun was provided with 220 rounds. They fired shells that weighed with a muzzle velocity of . They had a range of when fired at an elevation of +20°.Friedman, p. 260
Smaller guns were carried for close-range defense against torpedo boats. These included 20 quick-firing (QF) Canet Model 1891 guns. Of these guns, eight were mounted in embrasures in the hull, four on the main deck, four on the battery deck and the last four at the corners of the superstructure on the forecastle deck. The ships carried 300 rounds for each gun. The gun had a muzzle velocity of with its shells. It had a range of about at an elevation of +20°.Friedman, p. 264 The smaller guns included twenty QF Hotchkiss guns in hull embrasures and on the superstructure. Each gun had 810 rounds provided.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 112–113 They fired a shell.Friedman, p. 118 Eight Hotchkiss guns were positioned between the 47-millimeter guns on the forecastle deck.McLaughlin 2003, p. 113 They fired a shell at a muzzle velocity of .Friedman, p. 120
The Peresvet class had five torpedo tubes, three of which were above water, one in the bow and one pair of broadside tubes, and two broadside underwater tubes. The ships carried a total of 12 torpedoes. They also carried 45 mines to be laid to protect their anchorage in remote areas.
The ships were fitted with Liuzhol stadiametric rangefinders that used the angle between two vertical points on an enemy ship, usually the waterline and the crow's nest, to estimate the range. The gunnery officer consulted his references to get the range and calculated the proper elevation and deflection required to hit the target. He transmitted his commands via a Geisler electro-mechanical fire-control transmission system to each gun or turret. Oslyabya and the rest of the Second Pacific Squadron were also fitted with Perepelkin telescopic sights for their guns, but their crews were not trained in how to use them.Forczyk, pp. 27–28, 57
Protection The first two ships used Harvey armor for most of their armored vertical surfaces except for the gun turrets and their support tubes, which were made from Krupp armor. Pobeda, however, used Krupp armor for all of her heavy vertical armor. Over the machinery spaces, the maximum thickness of their waterline armor belt was which reduced to abreast the magazines. The belt tapered to a thickness of over the machinery spaces and over the magazines. The belt covered of the ships' length and was high, of which the upper was intended to be above the waterline, but the ships were significantly overweight. So much of the belt was submerged that Peresvet only had of armor exposed at normal load; at full load the effect was even greater and the belt was completely submerged. Oslyabya was even more overweight and only had of her belt armor showing at normal load. The belt in both ships terminated in 7-inch transverse bulkheads, leaving the ends of the ships unprotected. The transverse bulkheads of the waterline belt in Pobeda were eliminated as the belt was extended to the ends of the ship with 4-inch armor plates. Above the waterline belt in all three ships was a shorter strake of armor that protected the middle of the ships. It was long and 4 inches thick. The ends of the upper belt were closed off by 4-inch angled transverse bulkheads.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 113–114
The sides of the gun turrets were 9 inches thick and of armor protected their roofs; their supporting tubes were thick. The face of the casemates for the 6-inch guns was five inches thick and their rears were protected by armor plates. The casemates at each end of the ships were protected by 5-inch transverse bulkheads. Bulkheads thick separated the 75-millimeter gun positions. Peresvet had two conning towers, each with sides 6 inches thick, but the other two ships only had a forward conning tower with 9-inch sides. A communications tube 3 inches thick connected each conning tower to the armored deck in all three ships. The flat part of the deck in the central armored citadel consisted of a plate over the normal 0.75-inch structural steel deck plate; the sloped portion connected to the lower edge of the waterline belt and was 2.5 inches thick. Outside the citadel the armored deck consisted of plates laid over the deck plating. On the first two ships the deck armor consisted of mild steel; in Pobeda it was a chrome-nickel steel alloy.
Ships + Construction dataShipBuilderMcLaughlin 2003, p. 107Laid downLaunched Entered serviceCostMcLaughlin 2003, p. 112 (Пересвет)Baltic Works, Saint Petersburg21 November 1895All dates used in this article are New Style19 May 1898190110,540,000 rubles (Ослябя)New Admiralty Shipyard, Saint Petersburg21 November 18958 December 1898190311,340,000 rubles (Победа)Baltic Works, Saint Petersburg21 February 189910 May 1900190210,050,000 rubles
Careers
Peresvet, named after Alexander Peresvet, a Russian monk who fought against the Golden Horde at the Battle of Kulikovo in 1380, and Pobeda (the Russian word pobeda means "victory") steamed to the Far East almost immediately after entering service in 1901 and 1902 respectively. Upon her arrival, Peresvet became the flagship of the squadron's second-in-command, Rear Admiral Prince Pavel Ukhtomsky.McLaughlin 2003, p. 115 During the Battle of Port Arthur (February 1904) on the second day of the war, Peresvet was not hit, but Pobeda was hit once amidships, sustaining little damage but losing two men killed and four wounded.Forczyk, p. 43 Pobeda struck a mine during the squadron's sortie on 13 April and remained under repair for almost two months. Both ships had some of their anti-torpedoboat guns and secondary armament removed during the summer to bolster the defenses of the port. They participated in the Battle of the Yellow Sea on 10 August 1904; Pobeda was only lightly damaged by 11 large-caliber hits, but Peresvet, hit 39 times, suffered a considerable amount of flooding. More guns were landed after the squadron's return to Port Arthur, but the Imperial Japanese Army captured the hills overlooking the harbor in November, and this allowed Japanese siege guns to fire directly at the Russian ships. Pobeda and Peresvet were hit many times, and Pobeda sank on 7 December 1904 from the accumulated damage. Peresvet was scuttled in shallow water on the same day.McLaughlin 2003, pp. 115, 163–164