Russian ship Dvienadsat Apostolov (1841)

The Russian ship Dvienadsat Apostolov () was the lead ship of her class of three first rate ship of the line built for the Imperial Russian Navy. Completed in 1842, she served her whole career with the Black Sea Fleet. Dvienadsat Apostolov took part in the defence of Sevastopol during the Crimean War. Rather than facing the powerful Anglo-French fleet, her guns were landed to reinforce the landward fortifications and she was used as a hospital ship. On the night of 25/26 February 1854, she was one of the Russian ships that was sunk as a blockship in the northern bay of Sevastopol.

Design and description

The design of the Dvienadsat Apostolov-class was said to have been based on the 1839 British ship of the line, . The ship was  long between perpendiculars and measured  at the lower gundeck. She had a beam of  and a deep draught of about . The ship displaced  and measured 3,190 tons bm.

Her modern main armament of 28 Paixhans guns, designed to fire a  explosive shell and located on the lower gundeck; these had been introduced into the Russian Navy in 1838 and were based on the latest British and French designs. Also on that deck were located four 36-pounder long guns. The armament of the middle gundeck consisted of thirty-four short 36-pounder guns, while the upper gundeck was fitted with thirty-four 36-pounder gunnades. Distributed between the forecastle and quarterdeck were twenty-four 24-pounder gunnades, and a variety of carronades: one 24-pounder, two 12-pounders and a pair of 8-pounders.

Service history
 
Dvienadsat Apostolov was laid down on 4 October 1838 at the Nikolaev (modern Mykolaiv) shipyard of S. I. Chernyavskiy and was launched on 15 July 1841. Her first voyage was from Nikolaev to the main Black Sea Fleet base Sevastopol in 1842, followed by a cruise in the Black Sea. Her first commander was Captain Vladimir Kornilov (1806-1854), who later became an admiral. In 1843, Dvienadsat Apostolov helped to transport the 13th Infantry Division from Sevastopol to Odessa and then return them. She took part in further cruises in the Black Sea between 1843 and 1847 and between 1849 and 1850. She underwent a refit from 1851 to 1852, during which her carronades were removed. 

In October 1853, she transported 1,466 Russian troops from Sevastopol to Sukhum Kale (modern Sukhumi in Georgia), where the outbreak of the Crimean War had reignited the Russo-Circassian War. Returning to Sevastopol in April 1854, she participated in the defence of the port by landing her guns and their crews to establish an onshore artillery battery named after the ship, located between the Panaitova ravine and Hollandia Bay to the west of the town. All of her guns had been landed by December 1854, leaving only 80 sailors aboard to convert her into a temporary hospital ship, which was completed on 18 December. Dvienadsat Apostolov was scuttled on 13 February 1855 as part of a line of blockships to prevent the Anglo-French fleet from entering the harbour.

A Russian naval jack, believed to have been taken from the ship by Henry Keppel, is in the collection of the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. In 1905, the Monument to the Sunken Ships was erected in Sevastapol Harbour on the 50th anniversary of the siege, to commemorate the scuttling of the Black Sea Fleet.

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External links 
 

Ships of the line of the Imperial Russian Navy
1841 ships
Crimean War ships
Scuttled vessels