Black Sea Fleet

“ For the purposes of this Agreement, the following terms mean: 1. "Military formations" - the military units Russian Black Sea Fleet stationed in territory of Ukraine. 2. "Companies, organizations and institutions of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation "- stationed on the territory of Ukraine objects of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation, staffed by military personnel and civilians, and engaged in production and business, medical recreational or other similar activities the interests of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation. 3. ”

“ Russia's main naval strength in the East consisted of 7 battleships and 3 armored cruisers, presenting a combined broadside of 100 guns against Japan's 124. The support of the Black Sea fleet was denied by the attitude of England, which would prevent violation of the agreement restricting it from passing the Dardanelles. The Baltic fleet, however, was an important though distant reserve force, a detachment from which was actually in the Red Sea on its way east at the outbreak of war. ”

“ The naval force of the czar in the Black Sea was estimated very differently by various writers. A number of statements were put forth, all professing to be authentic. We select two, and our readers will be able to judge for themselves the probable statistics. Haxthausen represents the Black Sea fleet as consisting of three divisions, each of which comprised ordinarily 1 three-decker, 2 two-deckers (among the last two ships mounting each 84 guns) , 6 frigates, 1 corvette, and 4 smaller vessels. Mr. ”

“ Now it will be obvious that the difficulty of bringing a fleet of sailing ships from the Nore to the North Sea through all these obstructions to navigation is great, and that the difficulty may grow into a very serious danger if there is an enemy waiting outside. To carry the ships out in one tide from the Warp through the Swin or Barrow into the King's Channel, or through the Black Deep into the open sea, required a combination, of either a good breeze and an ebb-tide, or such a strong wind from the west, with a flood-tide, as would enable a fleet to make head against the current. ”

“ Let us now consider the fearful preponderance which Russia would gain by the possession of these straits, including of course that half of European Turkey bordering upon them. We have seen that the shores of the Black Sea furnish every facility for the construction of a navy of any required strength, and its waters afford ample space for its training. With these approaches in her grasp, Russia might in ten years construct and discipline her fleet there, perfectly safe from molestation by the navies of Europe. ”

“ Again in the war of 1878 between Russia and Turkey the Russians had only a few light craft in the Black Sea, and the Turkish fleet under Hobart Pasha, weak as it was, held the undisputed command of these waters, and had only to fear some isolated torpedo attacks. In South American civil wars and international conflicts there were duels between individual ships, and some dashing enterprises by torpedo boats, but nothing that could be described as a fleet action between ironclads. ”

“ Her war vessels claimed and exercised the right of searching for English seamen on board American vessels. During the year 1807, the English Admiral Berkeley, in command of the North American Station, issued instructions to commanders of vessels in his fleet to look out for the American frigate Chesapeake, and if they fell in with her at sea, to board her and search for deserters, as all English seamen in the American service were regarded by England. With the instructions, were the descriptions of four sailors, three negroes and one white man, who were missing. ”

“ Some of our naval mechanics stationed at Sebastopol had tried to make seaworthy the warships which the Russians had handed over to us in accordance with the terms of the treaty, but they met with great difficulties owing to the neglected condition of the ships. Among these were the battleship Volya and several torpedo-boats and mine-sweepers which we wanted put in order to assist in the transport of large numbers of troops that were to be taken across the Black Sea from the Caucasus and Southern Russia to Romanian ports. ”

“ The joint expedition of French and British against the Turks and Germans in the Dardanelles filled 1915 with many a deed of more or less wasted daring. Victory would have meant so much: joining hands with Russia in the Black Sea, getting the Russian wheat crop from Odessa, driving the Turks from Constantinople, and cutting right through the Berlin-to-Bagdad line. ”

“ Then folding one arm around Hope as he stood by her, and taking May on her knee, she said, "It is not the sea I dread; it is the Black Ship. That is the terrible secret; and it is, indeed, better you should learn it from my lips than learn it by losing me, and no one be left to tell you how.
"My children," she continued, making a great effort to speak calmly, "this is the one sorrow of our country. From time to time a Black Ship, without sails or oars, glides silently to our shores, and anchors there. ”

“ Many a green isle needs must be
In the deep wide sea of Misery,
Or the mariner, worn and wan,
Never thus could voyage on—
Day and night, and night and day, _5
Drifting on his dreary way,
With the solid darkness black
Closing round his vessel's track:
Whilst above the sunless sky,
Big with clouds, hangs heavily, _10
And behind the tempest fleet
Hurries on with lightning feet,
Riving sail, and cord, and plank,
Till the ship has almost drank
Death from the o'er-brimming deep; ”

“ I am afraid no one knows anything about the country from which the Black Ship comes. At first the amulet-makers promised to tell me a great deal. Some of them told me they believed it was a great king, an enemy of our race, who sent the ship; but that if we kept certain rules, and put on a certain dress they would sell us, or give them certain treasures to throw into the sea when the Ship appeared, they would watch for us, and make the powers beyond the sea favourable to us. ”

“ Only with the help of these ships can we accomplish anything and realize our far-reaching plans."
"They'll get here, old man," the other replied confidently. "We are dealing with men of iron and steel. Maybe the time just isn't right yet. If any suspicion were created, half our plans would be ruined. The surprise has to be complete, then we will be masters of the Black Sea, then everyone else will be powerless, then we will be able to dictate our conditions, we will demand immense payments of all the ports and our ships will be loaded with treasure." ”

“ The old man bowed in assent.
"I come from across the mountains, and I bring you glad tidings from beyond the sea."
"Glad tidings!" they all exclaimed.
"Glad tidings, if you will obey them," he replied;—"if not, the saddest you ever heard. It is not an enemy who sends the Black Ship, but a friend."
Not a question, scarcely a breath interrupted him; and he continued, in brief, broken sentences—
"It is our King. Our island belongs to Him. He gave it us. But, long ago, our people rebelled against Him. They were seduced by a wicked prince, His deadly enemy, and, alas! ours. ”

“ It could not be held that the existence of these released the fleet from all duty but that of protecting our ocean commerce, because, if any enemy's navy was able to carry out an operation of such magnitude and difficulty as a serious attack on our home territory, it would assuredly be able to carry out the work of damaging our maritime trade. Power to do the latter has always belonged to the navy which was in a position to extend its activity persistently to the immediate neighbourhood of its opponent's coast-line. ”

“ American troops went ashore in Northwest Africa on November 8, 1942. (On the other side of the world, the Japanese were just forming the massive relief fleet that was smashed and dispersed definitively a week later in the great three-day sea battle of Guadalcanal.) The United States Navy rushed to put American torpedo boats into the Mediterranean to join the British in harrying Axis shipping. ”

“ It does not take longer to reach America from the same ports, by a voyage at once less difficult and more lucrative. 3. The Black Sea is situated at the extremity of the inland seas of Europe, [Pg 27] and its coasts, which have little traffic, especially with each other, offer few resources to merchant vessels; so that if there is nothing profitable to be done at Odessa or Taganrok, a ship has no alternative but to take freight at ruinously low prices, or to return in ballast, and retrace some hundred miles of a route on which it has already incurred such delays. ”

“ Twenty-nine—All Black Sea ports are to be evacuated by Germany; all Russian war vessels of all descriptions seized by Germany in the Black Sea are to be handed over to the Allies and the United States of America; all neutral merchant vessels seized are to be released; all war-like and other materials of all kinds seized in those ports are to be returned and German materials as specified in Clause Twenty-eight are to be abandoned. ”

“ The fact is that all the white man's countries of the British Empire overseas are perfectly free commonwealths in which not only those of British blood but those of foreign origin, like Boers and French-Canadians, can live their lives in their own way, without the Mother Country's having the slightest wish or power to force them to give a ship, a dollar, or a man to defend the Empire without which they could not live a day. She protects them for nothing. They join her or not, just as they please. And when they do join her, her Navy is always ready to take their soldiers safe across the sea. ”

“ Before a month was over a small squadron of battle-cruisers raided the Bight between Heligoland and the German harbours, sank there small cruisers and half-a-dozen destroyers, challenged the High Seas Fleet to battle, and came away without the enemy having attempted to use his capital ships to defend his small craft or to pick up the glove so audaciously thrown down. The mere mobilization of the British Fleet seemed to have paralyzed the enemy, and it looked as if our ability to control sea communications was not only surprisingly complete, but promised to be enduring. ”

“ This means that the Navy, in spite of all its losses, became bigger than any other country's navy, mercantile marine, fishing fleet, river steamers, and all other kinds of shipping, put together, since the world began. When we add the British mercantile marine, British shipbuilding, the British fishing fleets, and all the shipping interests of the Empire overseas, we shall find that British sea-power of all kinds equalled all the sea-power of all the rest of the world together. Destroy that sea-power and we die. ”

“ The navy that can beat its enemy from all the shortest ways across the sea must win the war, because the merchant ships of its own country, like its men-of-war, can use the best routes from the bases to the front and back again; while the merchant ships of its enemy must either lose time by roundabout voyages or, what is sure to happen as the war goes on, be driven off the high seas altogether. ”

“ It would better, indeed, become us to remember that no small share of the naval glory of the war belongs to the race which we have forbidden to fight for us; that one negro has recaptured a vessel from a southern privateer, and another has brought away from under the very guns of the enemy, where no fleet of ours has yet dared to venture, a prize whose possession a commodore thinks worthy to be announced in a special despatch. ”

“ The Navy is not the whole of British sea-power; for the Merchant Service is the other half. Nor is the Navy the only fighting force on which our liberty depends; for we depend upon the United Service of sea and land and air. Moreover, all our fighting forces, put together, could not have done their proper share toward building up the Empire, nor could they defend it now, unless they always had been, and are still, backed by the People as a whole, by every patriot man and woman, boy and girl. ”

“ The end may be very sudden and of a kind one hardly likes to think of. Mistakes—and mistakes with half trained crews are inevitable—bring quick disaster. The deep sea pirates aboard super-submarines operating on the trade routes have lighter hearts no doubt than those engaged in the narrow seas, but exits and entrances are not without peril, as the North Sea depths could reveal. Yet their work goes forward, and the last sentences of this barbaric sea history are not yet written.
What of the defence in this crafty and lawless war, and what counter measures have been taken? ”

“ But the main fighting was done on galley platforms, and not so very differently done from the way the Greeks and Persians fought at Salamis twenty centuries before. Then, after less than twenty years, the Armada, though better than the Spaniards at Lepanto, was sent across the open sea to fight a regular sea-going fleet, whose leaders were admirals, whose chief fighting men were sailors, whose movements were made under sail, and whose real weapon was the shattering broadside gun. It was ancient Spanish floating army against modern English Sea-Dog fleet. ”

“ It proposed to destroy Russian preponderance in the Black Sea, by binding her and Turkey never to have there more than “four ships, four frigates, with a proportionate number of light vessels and of unarmoured vessels exclusively adapted to the transport of troops.” Russia, as an alternative, suggested that ships of war of all nations might have free access through the Dardanelles or Bosphorus to the Black Sea, or, if it were preferred, that the Sultan might admit the vessels of the Western Powers, or of Russia, in such numbers as he pleased. ”

“ Marseilles and Trieste now receive, viâ Egypt, cases of indigo from India and bales of silk goods from China. Powerful companies, in anticipation of peace, are at this moment engaged in building ships expressly for trading to the East, or else in devoting to that purpose the steamers and sailing vessels now used as transports in the Black Sea. ”