Emperor Alexander III (1901)
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|---|---|
 Ship of the line Imperator Alexander III. 1904 in Kronstadt |
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| Overview | |
| Type | Ship of the line |
| units | 5 |
| Shipyard | |
| Keel laying | July 1899 |
| Launch | November 1901 |
| delivery | August 1903 |
| Namesake | the emperor Alexander III. |
| period of service |
1903-1905 |
| Whereabouts | May 27, 1905 sunk near Tsushima |
| Technical specifications | |
| displacement |
13,516 ts construction; |
| length |
121 m |
| width |
23.3 m |
| Draft |
8.00 m |
| crew |
782 men |
| drive |
12 Belleville boilers , |
| speed |
17.5 kn |
| Range |
2,590 nm at 10 kn |
| Armament |
|
| Coal supply |
1,545 ts of coal |
| Armor |
|
| Sister ships |
Borodino ; Oryol ; Knyaz Suvorov ; Slava |
The Emperor Alexander III. was a ship of the line of the Imperial Russian Navy , the second of five ships of the Borodino class . She was named after Tsar Alexander III. named by his son Tsar Nicholas II . After a march of over 18,000 nm, the ship was sunk with two sister ships on May 27, 1905 in the naval battle of Tsushima .
The Borodino class
The Borodino class was based on the plans of the Zessarevich, built in France 1899–1901 . When the construction contract was signed, the Russian naval command insisted that five more ships of the same type be built in Russia and modified if necessary so that they would meet the requirements of the Russian navy. Accordingly, from 1899 to 1905, the ships of the Borodino class were built in Russian shipyards: Borodino , Emperor Alexander III. , Oryol , Knjas Suvorov and Slava .
Like the Zessarewitsch , these ships also suffered from the fact that their center of gravity was too high, the hull walls in the so-called tumble home design showed inwards above the waterline, the longitudinal bulkhead running in the middle of the hull caused the danger of capsizing, and the low belt armor was pushed underwater with a full combat load. The casemate guns were so low that they were unusable in rough seas. In addition, the ships, despite their greater weight, had weaker engines than the Zessarewitsch . All three ships of the class sunk at Tsushima capsized before sinking. The ships are therefore considered by some shipbuilding experts as the worst battleships ever built.
history
Tsushima
The Emperor Alexander III. was laid down at the Baltic shipyard in St. Petersburg in 1899 . It was launched in November 1901 and was completed in August 1903, put into service on September 1, 1904 and assigned to the Second Pacific Squadron under Vice Admiral Roschestvensky with her sisters (except for the not yet completed Slava ) . On October 15, 1904, Roschestvensky's fleet embarked on an eight-month voyage over 18,000 nautical miles to East Asia.
The Emperor Alexander III. , under the command of Kpt. Buchwostow, was very quickly and severely damaged in the naval battle of Tsushima on May 27, 1905, as she was the second ship in the battle line. In the battle line she continuously received significant hits from the Japanese battle fleet.
Badly hit, she eventually pulled out of the battle line, capsized, and sank. No member of the crew survived the sinking.
literature
- Burt, RA: Japanese Battleships, 1897-1945
- Corbett, Sir Julian: Maritime Operations in The Russo-Japanese War 1904–1905 , 1994 ISBN 1-55750-129-7
- Gibbons, Tony: The Complete Encyclopedia of Battleships , Crescent Books, New York, 1983 ISBN 0-517-37810-8
- Hough, Richard A .: The Fleet That Had To Die , Ballantine Books, New York 1960
- Lyon, Hugh: The Encyclopedia of the World's Warships , Chartwell Books, 1985 ISBN 0-89009-780-1
- McLaughlin, S .: "Aboard the Orel at Tsushima", in Warship 2005 , Conways Maritime Press 2005
- Novikoff-Priboy, A .: Tsushima , George Allen & Unwin Ltd., London 1936
- Pleshakov, Constantine : The Tsar's Last Armada: Epic Voyage to the Battle of Tsushima , 2002 ISBN 0-465-05792-6
- Preston, Antony: World's Worst Warships , Conways Maritime Press 2002
- John Roberts, HC Timewell, Roger Chesneau (ed.), Eugene M. Kolesnik (ed.): Warships of the World 1860 to 1905 - Volume 2: USA, Japan and Russia , Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Koblenz, 1983, ISBN 3- 7637-5403-2
- Tomitch, VM: Warships of the Imperial Russian Navy, Vol. 1: Battleships , 1968
- Warner, Denis and Peggy: The Tide at Sunrise, A History of the Russo-Japanese War 1904-1905 , 1975 ISBN 0-7146-5256-3
Individual evidence
- ^ Preston, Antony: World's Worst Warships . Conways Maritime Press 2002
