"Kreml", named after the Kremlin, was ordered on 20 April 1863 when a contract was signed with the Russian shipbuilder Semiannikov &amp; Poletika for a total cost of 898,000 rubles. Construction had not yet begun when the Russian Admiralty Board amended the contract on 20 July to shorten the construction time by one year for a payment of an extra 48,000 rubles in response to the adverse foreign reaction to the brutal Russian suppression of the revolts in Poland and Lithuania that year. Fearing attack by Britain and France, the Board switched priority to the smaller s shortly afterwards in the belief that they could be completed more quickly so that progress on "Kreml" slowed to a crawl once construction began on 2 October. The ship was not formally laid down until 23 December and she was launched on 26 August 1865.