The history of the creation of the battleship "Azov"
The 74-gun sailing battleship "Azov" was laid down in October 1825 at the Solombala shipyard in Arkhangelsk. Its creator was the famous Russian shipbuilder A. M. Kurochkin, who built more than 30 battleships and frigates at the Arkhangelsk shipyards over several decades of his activity! Kurochkin was assisted by the shipbuilder V. A. Ershov, and the construction was supervised by the captain of the second rank M. P. Lazarev appointed by the commander of the ship under construction.
On account of this outstanding sailor there were already both round-the-world voyages and participation in the expedition (as the commander of one of her two sloops, which bore the name "Mirny"), during which our sailors discovered Antarctica. And it should be noted that Lazarev was able to make many improvements that made the new ship one of the most advanced in the Russian Navy. It was Mikhail Petrovich who insisted on plating the underwater part with copper, and made changes to the composition of weapons.
Armament of the Azov ship
Here it is necessary to clarify. The fact is that the concept of "74 gun ship" did not mean that exactly 74 guns were on board this particular sailing battleship. This is how the rank of the ship was designated, although in fact the weapons could differ significantly. It is known that initially "Azov" carried 80 guns, although the numbers are different. For example, there is an indication that his armament consisted of 60 36 pound cannons and 20 24 pound carronades - but options are also possible. There is no clarity (and, probably, will never appear) and with the installation of unicorns on the Azov. At least for the ships participating in the Mediterranean expedition, the order to install these guns existed, but there is no exact data whether it was executed.
Launching
Promotional video:
"Azov" was solemnly launched in May 1826, and in August the battleship headed for Kronstadt. There were tests of "Azov", according to the results of which the selection committee noted that on the battleship "a lot of finished really excellent, with excellent convenience and benefit for the fleet." The merits of Lazarev were also noted: “As all that arrangement on the ship was made by the prudent order of the captain of the 2nd rank MP. Lazarev, then I [chairman of the selection committee, Vice-Admiral SA Pustoshkin], as the leader in the commission, and I fully attribute all this to my own honor and zeal for the good of Lazarev's service."
Description of the Azov ship
"Azov" was a three-masted two-deck (that is, with two closed battery decks) ship, decorated with a skillfully made bow figure and beautiful stern decor. Tactical and technical characteristics of "Azov": equipment - ship, rank - 74 gun ship of the line; length - 54 m, width - 14.6 m, draft - 6.1 m. Such combat units in fairly large numbers were built in many countries. Glory to "Azov" was brought not by technical excellence, but by the heroism of its crew and the skill of the commander, shown during the Navarino battle.
First commander of the ship "Azov" M. P. Lazarev
Service history
1821 - in Greece, which was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire, the national liberation war began. Turkish troops could not defeat the rebels on the battlefields, but "distinguished themselves" by massacres of the civilian population. Discontent with Turkey's policies grew among the leading powers of Europe, and in 1827 Great Britain, Russia and France signed the London Convention demanding the granting of autonomy to Greece. But the sultan's government refused to accept the proposed conditions, and then the allies decided to put pressure on Turkey, for which the three great powers sent their squadrons to the Greek shores.
Navarino battle of 1827
On October 13 (according to the new style, the old style adopted at that time in the Russian Empire differed from it by 12 days) allied squadrons united near the island of Zante. The British forces, under Vice Admiral Edward Codrington, were the most numerous. They consisted of 3 ships of the line, 4 frigates, a corvette and 4 brigs. The Russian squadron under the command of Rear Admiral Login Petrovich Heyden had 4 battleships and a frigate each. France was represented by the ships of Rear Admiral Henri de Rigny - 3 battleships and 2 frigates and a corvette. In total, the combined forces had 1,298 guns. The command of the allied squadron took over as senior in rank E. Codrington.
The opposing Turkish (more precisely, Turkish-Egyptian; Egypt was then a vassal of the Ottoman Empire), the fleet was in Navarino Bay, on the southwestern coast of the Greek Peloponnese peninsula. In the bay under the protection of coastal batteries along the coast of the "horseshoe" there are significant forces, the exact composition of which is still impossible to determine. Even with respect to large units, there are discrepancies - the number of even battleships "walks" from 3 to 7.
The "Military Encyclopedia" provides the following information: 5 battleships, 15 frigates, 26 corvettes, 11 brigs, 8 fire-ships. Plus, there are about 50 transport ships. This armada was armed with - again according to various sources - from 1,950 to more than 2,300 guns. The general command of all sea and land forces was carried out by the Egyptian Ibrahim Pasha, the actual fleet was headed by Moharem Bey.
On October 16, the allies approached Navarin, and the next day Codrington sent Ibrahim Pasha an ultimatum demanding an immediate and complete cessation of hostilities against the Greeks. But the Turkish command, under the pretext of the absence of the commander-in-chief in Navarin, refused to accept the ultimatum. Then the allied admirals at the council of war decided to enter the bay and, anchored against the Turkish fleet, with the immediate threat of the use of force to force the Turks and Egyptians to accept the ultimatum.
However, it was not possible to resolve the issue without bloodshed. On October 20, the allied fleet began to enter the bay in two columns: the right one was made up of the British and the French, the left one - the Russians, while its flagship LP Heyden “Azov” was at the head. The Allies sent an envoy to the Turks with a demand to remove the fire-ships in the depths of the bay, but the boat was fired upon from one of the fire-ships, and the envoy died. Following this, one of the Turkish ships opened fire on the French frigate, and then the artillery of the entire Turkish squadron and coastal batteries spoke up.
The ship "Azov" in the painting by Aivazovsky "Battle of Navarino"
The shelling and the threat of fire-ship attacks led to the fact that not all Allied ships were able to take places according to the disposition. But some of them had a chance to withstand the greatest severity of the battle. Among the British, the battleship "Eisha" ("Asia"), in particular, distinguished itself among the Russians, "Azov". Under the command of the captain of the first rank Lazarev, his crew, fighting five enemy ships, was able to destroy them all: 2 frigates and a corvette were sunk, the frigate under the admiral's flag of Takhir Pasha burned down, and the battleship threw ashore, where it caught fire and exploded. In addition, the Russian sailors were able to support the British flagship with fire, assisting him in the destruction of the Turkish battleship on which the Moharem Bey flag was held.
The Turks and the Egyptians fought fiercely, and they fired well. Then lieutenant PS Nakhimov, who commanded the guns on the tank, wrote: “It seemed like all hell was unfolding in front of us. There was no place where knipples, cannonballs and buckshot would not fall. " In total, "Azov" received 153 hits, but in reality happily avoided serious damage, and the resulting fires (deadly for a wooden ship) were quickly extinguished by Russian sailors.
Lieutenants P. S. Nakhimov and I. P. Butenev, warrant officer V. A. Kornilov, midshipman V. I. Istomin distinguished themselves in the battle. Relatively little time will pass, and during the Crimean War admirals Nakhimov, Kornilov and Istomin will become the leaders of the defense of Sevastopol against the Anglo-French-Turkish troops and perish defending the Russian Black Sea fortress …
After the Battle of Navarino
The allies won a complete victory, and considerable merits of the Azov and its heroic crew in the Battle of Navarino were awarded the highest award of the Russian Empire. The Azov ship received "the stern flag with the banner of St. George in memory of the honorable deeds of the chiefs, the courage and fearlessness of the lower ranks." The battleship itself remained in the squadron during the Russian-Turkish war of 1828-1829. served in the Mediterranean, taking part in the blockade of the Dardanelles. After the victorious end of the war for Russia, he, together with most of the squadron, returned to the Baltic.
Unfortunately, despite a completely perfect design, the Azov ship was not built very soundly. More precisely, from a not very high quality forest. This problem in general was a real nightmare for the Russian sailing fleet: our ships served much less than their foreign peers. And although they tried to take measures to eliminate such a deplorable state of affairs (there was even a decree according to which officers were assigned to ships under construction - “So that the headquarters and chief officers … were certainly with the ship to which they were assigned, and had during construction monitoring the performance of work and the quality of the forest used”), it was not possible to change the situation.
Therefore, when in 1831 the Azov, returning from the Mediterranean Sea, was subjected to a thorough examination, they found out that it was literally crumbling from decay! Many parts of the ship literally rotted away and even major repairs (timbering) are not able to restore the heroic battleship's ability to plow the seas without the threat of crumbling during the next storm.
The sailing ship "Azov" has long ceased to exist, and the ships named after him, which bore the name "Memory of Azov", have served their due date. But in the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg there is a stern St. George flag, which "Azov" was awarded by the decree of Emperor Nicholas I for the outstanding feat of his crew in the Navarino battle.
N. Kuznetsov
