Bobr (1906)

Bobr

Ship data flag  Russian Empire Estonia   Ship type Gunboat class Giljak class Shipyard Nevsky Shipyard, Saint Petersburg Keel laying June 12, 1906 Launch June 12, 1907 Commissioning August 6, 1908 Whereabouts Wrecked in Estonia in 1927 .

Ship dimensions and crew length 65.6 m ( Lüa ) width 10.97 m Draft Max. 3.22 m displacement Construction: 858 t Maximum: 990 t   crew 10 officers 138 men

Machine system machine 4 Belville boilers 2 standing compound machines Machine performance 868 hp (638 kW) Top speed 12.5 kn (23 km / h) propeller 2 ∅ 1.82 m

Armament 2 * 12 cm L / 45 - Sk 4 * 7.5 cm system Canet Sk 3 * 7.62mm MG up to 60 sea mines Armor Command post: 20 mm

The Bobr ( Russian Бобр ) was a gunboat of the Imperial Russian Navy . It was launched in 1906 as the second boat in the Giljak class . After an eventful history, it was decommissioned from the Estonian fleet in 1927 . In the literature, the boat is sometimes referred to as Bobr II ( Бобр II ) to distinguish it, but the drawings for the project do not give such a name.

background

The construction of the Gilyak- class boats can be traced back to a request from the commander of the Pacific Squadron, Rear Admiral Pavel Petrovich Tyrtov ( Павел Петрович Тыртов ). In 1892 Tyrtow requested a boat for use in Far Eastern waters. The gunboat should be usable both on the open sea, but also on the large Russian and Chinese rivers such as the Amur . The main task should not be the fight against enemy ships, but the fight against fortifications and enemy troops as well as the support of own forces on land. The draft should not be more than 2.7 m, the maximum speed not less than 12  kn , the displacement at around 750 t. Armor and armament should be geared towards the main purpose, the fight against land forces. Tyrtow demanded four 12 cm cannons, four 4.7 or 3.7 cm cannons and a landing cannon with a caliber of 6.5 cm. He saw the armor as insignificant. A rig was dispensed with from the start, instead a steel mast with a Mars was provided, from which the river and bank could be observed. With the Giljak , the Russian Navy put a boat into service in 1898, the design of which essentially followed Tyrtov's ideas, and used it in the Far East. However, the Giljak remained a unique piece for the time being. Another boat was planned in the 1898 fleet armament program, but it was not built. The basic requirement for such a gunboat remained, however. The commander of the Amur military district, General of the Infantry Nikolai Grodekow , demanded in his 1900 annual report:

«Для наведения порядка и обеспечения безопасности на реках Амур и Уссури приобресйти приобресй приобресйти сожекеальноылыхойспециальноылых сожетиальноылых сожеаль ноылых кужекальноылых кусециальноыхойспециальноылых кусециальноылых сожесеальноыхой специальноыхой специаль.

"To maintain order and guarantee security on the Amur and Ussuri rivers, the provision of special steamships for police tasks"

- Nikolai Grodekov

In 1904 the Chiwinez was laid down. This boat also remained a one-off.

Although the need for such a gunboat was recognized in principle, the preparatory work dragged on for a long time. For the design of the boat, for example, it was necessary to determine the diving depths to be expected in the operational area . On September 21, 1904, at the meeting of the committee, the project of a "gunboat with a shallow draft for use on the Amur and a water displacement of 858 t" was finally confirmed. Since the capacities of the Russian state shipbuilding industry were generally insufficient, the construction of the four boats of the class was divided between a total of three shipyards in Saint Petersburg . The Bobr was laid on June 12, 1906 at the private Nevsky shipyard (Невский судостроительый и механический завод). Due to manufacturing problems, but above all due to the changed requirements as a result of the lost Russian-Japanese war , the construction of the boat took a long time. The launch took place on June 12, 1907, the commissioning on August 6, 1908.

construction

The boats of the Giljak class represent a further development of the Chiwinez design . With a construction displacement of 858 t, the boats were just over 63 m long and almost 11 m wide. The draft was originally supposed to be 2.13 m. In order to improve the sea behavior, however, the boats were given false and bilge keels, which increased the draft. Two vertical three-cylinder, triple composite steam engines with a continuous output of 800  PSi were used as the drive engine for each boat . The boats were driven by two bronze propellers each with a diameter of 1.82 m, the left screw turning counterclockwise and the right screw clockwise. The boiler system consisted of four Belville water tube boilers each . The boilers were set up in pairs in two separate compartments, with each pair having its own chimney. The weight of the entire boiler system was 56 t, plus 10 t of boiler feed water.

Two 12 cm cannons, four 7.5 cm cannons and two to three machine guns were provided for each boat. The boats did not have a torpedo armament, but could carry up to 60 mines. The command post consisted of armor steel with a thickness of 20 mm, the floor and ceiling of weakly magnetic steel with a thickness of 12 mm. All other parts of the boat were not armored.

The shipyard deviated from the project specifications when building the Bobr . The hull contour was fuller, which required a redesign of the stern tubes, which were made from the same steel as the hull and not from a bronze alloy as intended. Furthermore, a heavier capstan with an output of 24 hp was installed on a high foundation. Fourteen pumps with a capacity of 75 t / h were used for the bilge system. In contrast to the project, the bridge superstructures, the ammunition lift for the 12 cm cannons and the division of the inner rooms were also carried out, which later led to difficulties in accommodating the crew.

commitment

Gunboat Bobr

All four boats in the class were to be used in Far Eastern waters. On November 30, 1908, the Bobr set sail with the sister boat Siwutsch from Reval in the direction of the Far East, after the two other boats of the class, the Giljak and the Korejez , had already started the crossing at the end of October 1908. During the crossing it became clear that the machinery was too weak overall and that the sea behavior was inadequate. The Amur flotilla also received ten new river cannon boats. Three of them belonged to the Buryat class (Бурят), seven more were modernized and armored boats of the Bogul class ( Вогул ). The completion of eight boats of the Shkwal class, which were heavily armed and equipped with diesel engines , was expected in the summer of 1909 . The boats of the Giljak class were comparatively weakly armed. Therefore, the commander of the United Baltic Sea Squadron, Rear Admiral Nikolai von Essen, suggested that the Giljak- class boats be formed into an independent department for the defense of the Finnish archipelago . The Bobr and the Siwutsch , which were still in Libau , were therefore transferred to the reserve fleet of the Baltic Sea on January 1, 1909, the Giljak and the Korejez were recalled from the Mediterranean. In 1909 the Bobr was transferred to the Artillery Training Department of the Baltic Fleet . From 1910 she was part of the 2nd Mining Division and was stationed in Sveaborg .

Gunboat Lembit of the Estonian Naval Forces

At the beginning of the First World War , the Bobr was assigned to the naval forces of the sea ​​fortress of Emperor Peter the Great in the Riga Bay . The boat intervened in the fighting in the Baltic Sea region and provided mainly fire support for the troops of the Russian Army operating on land. 1917 moved the Bobr to Abo . There the boat fell into the hands of the advancing German and Finnish troops in April 1918 after the Russian crew abandoned the boat. The German troops transferred the Bobr to Estonia and put it into service as a floating workshop under the name of Biber .

After the November Revolution, the German troops left the boat to the Estonian armed forces in an incapable and useless condition - for example, the locks on the weapons were missing. Under the name Lembit , the boat was one of the first Estonian warships. These used the Lembit in the battles against the Red Army . The boat dropped Estonian troops several times behind the Soviet Russian army and gave them fire support.

The Lembit remained in the Estonian fleet until 1927, when it was decommissioned and scrapped.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} see Skworzow

Web links

Commons : Bobr  - collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

• А. В. Скворцов: Канонерские лодки Балтийского флота “Гиляк”, “Кореец”, “Бобр”, “Сивуч”, (AW Skworzow: The gunboats of the Baltic fleet )
• А. Тарас: Корабли Российского императорского флота 1892-1917 гг. , Харвест, 2000 (A. Taras: The Ships of the Imperial Russian Navy 1892-1917 , Harvest, 2000) ISBN 9854338886 (Russian)