The Battle of Tsushima, also known in Japan as the Battle of the Sea of Japan, was the final naval battle of the Russo-Japanese War, fought on 27–28 May 1905 in the Tsushima Strait. A devastating defeat for the Imperial Russian Navy, the battle was the only decisive engagement ever fought between modern steel battleship fleets and the first in which wireless telegraphy (radio) played a critically important role. The battle was described by contemporary Sir George Clarke as "by far the greatest and the most important naval event since Trafalgar".
Zinovy Petrovich Rozhestvensky was a Russian admiral of the Imperial Russian Navy. He was in command of the Second Pacific Squadron in the Battle of Tsushima, during the Russo-Japanese War.
The Dogger Bank incident occurred on the night of 21/22 October 1904, when the Baltic Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy mistook civilian British fishing trawlers from Kingston upon Hull in the Dogger Bank area of the North Sea for Imperial Japanese Navy torpedo boats and fired on them, also firing on each other in the chaos of the melée.
Zhenyuan was an ironclad battleship built for the Chinese Beiyang Fleet. She was the second and final member of the Dingyuan class, which included one other vessel, Dingyuan, both of which were built in Germany in the early 1880s. Delivery of the two ironclads was delayed by the Sino-French War of 1884–1885. The ships were armed with a main battery of four 12 in (305 mm) guns in a pair of gun turrets, making them the most powerful warships in East Asian waters at the time.
The Borodino-class battleships were a group of five pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Imperial Russian Navy around the end of the 19th century. Their design was based on that of the French-built Tsesarevich modified to use Russian equipment. The first four ships were finished after the start of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 and were among the ships ordered to sail from the Baltic Sea to the Far East to relieve the Pacific Squadron besieged by the Japanese in Port Arthur. Three of these ships were sunk and one was captured by the Imperial Japanese Navy at the Battle of Tsushima in 1905. The fifth and final ship, Slava, was not completed in time to participate in the war and served with the Baltic Fleet through World War I.
Itsukushima (厳島) was the lead ship in the Matsushima class of protected cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Like her sister ships, the name Itsukushima comes from one of the traditional Three Views of Japan, in this case, the Itsukushima Shrine in Hiroshima prefecture on the Seto Inland Sea, home to a famous Shinto-Buddhist shrine dedicated to the Buddhist goddess Benzaiten.
Takachiho (高千穂) was the second and last Naniwa-class protected cruiser built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) in the 1880s. As Japan lacked the industrial capacity to construct such vessels, the ship was designed and built in the United Kingdom. She participated in the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894–1895, playing a major role in the Battle of the Yalu River and lesser roles in the Battles of Port Arthur, Weihaiwei, the Pescadores Campaign and the invasion of Taiwan. Takachiho played a minor role in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 where she participated in the Battle of Chemulpo Bay, briefly helped to blockade Port Arthur at the beginning of the war, helped to sink a Russian armored cruiser during Battle off Ulsan and participated in the climatic defeat of the Imperial Russian Navy in the Battle of Tsushima.
Admiral Nakhimov, was an armoured cruiser in the Imperial Russian Navy during the Russo-Japanese War. She was named after Admiral Pavel Nakhimov.
Asahi was a pre-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) in the late 1890s. As Japan lacked the industrial capacity to build such warships itself, the ship was designed and built in the United Kingdom. Shortly after her arrival in Japan, she became flagship of the Standing Fleet, the IJN's primary combat fleet. She participated in every major naval battle of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 and was lightly damaged during the Battle of the Yellow Sea and the Battle of Tsushima. Asahi saw no combat during World War I, although the ship participated in the Siberian Intervention in 1918.
Zhemchug was the second of the two-vessel Izumrud class of protected cruisers built for the Imperial Russian Navy. She was sunk during World War I by the German light cruiser Emden in the Battle of Penang in 1914.
Oryol was a Borodino-class battleship built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. The ship was completed after the start of the Russo-Japanese War in February 1904 and was assigned to the Second Pacific Squadron sent to the Far East six months later to break the Japanese blockade of Port Arthur. The Japanese captured the port while the squadron was in transit and their destination was changed to Vladivostok. Oryol was badly damaged during the Battle of Tsushima in May 1905 and surrendered to the Japanese, who put her into service under the name of Iwami.
Novík was a protected cruiser in the Imperial Russian Navy, built by Schichau shipyards in Elbing near Danzig, Germany.
Knyaz Suvorov was one of five Borodino-class pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. Completed after the beginning of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, she became the flagship of Vice admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky, commander of the Second Pacific Squadron. The squadron was sent to the Far East a few months after her completion to break the Japanese blockade of Port Arthur. The Japanese captured the port while the squadron was in transit and their destination was changed to Vladivostok. During the Battle of Tsushima on 27 May 1905, the ship fell out of the battle line after a shell hit her bridge, killing her helmsman and wounding her captain and Rozhestvensky. Knyaz Suvorov was eventually torpedoed and sunk by Japanese torpedo boats; other than 20 wounded officers evacuated by a destroyer, there were no survivors.
Shinano Maru (信濃丸) was a 6,388 GRT merchantman operated by the Nippon Yusen K.K Shipping Company (NYK). She was built by W. Henderson Co in Glasgow, for the express purpose of serving NYK's Japan to Seattle route. NYK originally intended that she be built at the Mitsubishi Nagasaki shipyards in Japan; however, Mitsubishi had experienced problems in the completion of Hitachi Maru, which had led to considerable delays. NYK chose not to wait, and Shinano Maru was ordered to Scotland. She was completed in April 1900. During the Russo-Japanese War Shinano Maru was converted into an armed merchantman. She has the distinction of discovering the Russian Fleet near Tsushima Strait on the eve of the Battle of Tsushima. After the war Shinano Maru reverted to civilian use, being scrapped in 1951.
This is the order of battle of the Japanese and Russian fleets at the Battle of Tsushima on 27–28 May 1905. The utter destruction of Russian naval power at Tsushima was the climactic action of the Russo-Japanese War.
Vladimir Monomakh was an armoured cruiser built for the Imperial Russian Navy during the 1880s. The vessel was named after Vladimir II Monomakh, Grand Prince of Kiev. She spent most of her career in the Far East, although the ship was in the Baltic Sea when the Russo-Japanese War began in 1904. Vladimir Monomakh was assigned to the Third Pacific Squadron and participated in the Battle of Tsushima in May 1905. She was tasked to protect the Russian transports and was not heavily engaged during the daylight portion of the battle. The ship was torpedoed during the night and was scuttled the following morning by her captain to prevent her capture by the Japanese.
Oleg was the 4th and final Bogatyr-class protected cruiser built for the Imperial Russian Navy.
The Russian cruiser Svetlana was a protected cruiser of the Imperial Russian Navy. She was the flagship of the Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Russian Navy and was used as an imperial yacht in peacetime. She was sunk in combat during Battle of Tsushima in the Russo-Japanese War.
The Pacific Fleet is the Russian Navy fleet in the Pacific Ocean. Established in 1731 as part of the Imperial Russian Navy, the fleet was known as the Okhotsk Military Flotilla (1731–1856) and Siberian Military Flotilla (1856–1918), formed to defend Russian interests in the Russian Far East region along the Pacific coast. In 1918 the fleet was inherited by the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, then the Soviet Union in 1922 as part of the Soviet Navy, being reformed several times before being disbanded in 1926. In 1932 it was re-established as the Pacific Fleet, and was known as the Red Banner Pacific Fleet after World War II as it had earned the Order of the Red Banner. In the Soviet years, the fleet was also responsible for the Soviet Navy's operations in the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Red Banner Pacific Fleet was inherited by the Russian Federation as part of the Russian Navy and its current name was adopted.
The Hitachi Maru Incident was a maritime incident which occurred during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, in which three Japanese military transports were sunk in a Russian commerce raiding sortie by a Vladivostok-based armored cruiser squadron of the Imperial Russian Navy.
Russian Empire