The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-03-16
RUSSIA ONCE
WON At SEA
But John Paul Jones
Commanded the
Ships.

ed Russian navy at Port Arthur, bot
owe their origin to brilliant victorie
won by an extraordinary man? Singu
Lar, indeed, that the naval greatness o
the most advanced republic and tn,
most medieval autocracy on eartf
should have both been the work of one
man.
After the Revolution. and the famou:
victory when he won over the Scraps
Jones, after a short sojourn in this
country, returned to Paris, where he fell
in with Prince Potemkin, the favorite
of Catherine II. of Russia, who present.
ed him at the court of his mistress in
st. Petersburg. This was in 1881.
Some time before this Catherine had
made a tour of her realm. Potemkin
acting as a sort of advance agent ana
fixing up agreeable surprises for her.
among other things posting over the
gates of the city OF EMERSON the legend.
This is the way to ByZantium.' AT
the same time, Catherine had been
meddling in the affairs of Poland, and
many other things had occurred which
gave the Turks such an alarm that they
lost no time in declaring war against
the Muscovite empire. Since the days
of Peter the Great the Russians had
been employing foreign officers as COM
manders of their navy, and there hap
ipened at this time to be a particularly
strong demand for such in the war
against the Turks.
Consequently, John Paul Jones, hav-
ing at that time the most brilliant ma
val record in the world, was placed in
command of the Russian fleet in the |
Black Sea, to the great disgust of the |
English, French, German and Swedish |
mercenaries, and the Russian officers |
as well, many of whom resigned, rather |
than serve under "a vulgar adventur-
err Rear Admiral Paul Jones was not /
long in. command of the Black Sea
squadron before he fell in with the |
Turkish fleet off Sebastopol. A terrific |
battle followed, resulting in glorious |
victory for Admiral Jones, who, on that |
occasion, displayed the same undaunted |
courage that he had shown in the bat
tie off Marlborough Head, when, in re-
ply to the question put by the COM
mander of the Scraps, Have you /
struck" Jones replied, 81 have not yet
begun to fight" The glorious victory |
won by Jones destroyed the Turkish |
naval power in the Black Sea, added
the Crimea and Bessarabia to Russia,
and was productive of a greater crop |
of hate.
NOT ADEQUATELY REWARDED.
Jones received a handsome present
from the Empress Catherine, but it was
a mere nothing compared with the es-
tate and other presents given to one |
of the German princes who served un-
der Jones in the engagement, and who |
had contributed little if anything to |
the victory.
A general row followed, in which all !
might have gone we'll enough with |
Jones, who would undoubtedly have |
come out the victor, had it not been
for one thing. Jones was as ready with |
his tongue as he was with his sword.
Moreover he was a stranger to Russian
customs, and his habit of saying what
he saw fit and not as his superiors di-
rected did not set we'll with the Rus
sian nobility. Had he cultivated the
good graces of Prince Potemkin he
might have obtained his just reward,
but the facts are that the victory over
the Turks was won in direct violation
of Potemkin's advice and Jones made
no bones of setting at naught the ideas
of the Russian grandee. This offended
Potemkin, who was not accustomed to
such independence. AS a result OF thus
falling at loggerheads with the favorite
of the empress, Jones lost influence and
was removed from the command of the
Black Sea squadron, and placed in
command of the few old tubs which
constituted the Russian fleet in the
torm-tossed Baltic. A few months or
this inaction was enough for Jones. and
he left the Russian navy, returning to
Paris. He never forgot this injustice,
and for the remainder of his life never
let a day pass without writing letters
to the Russian court, trying once again
to obtain command of the Russian
Black Sea fleet.
PERCENTAGE OF FOREIGNERS.
From the days of Peter the Great
down to the present day the percentage
of foreigners in the Russian navy has
been enormous. The sailors are in very
few cases genuine Russians, but are
for the most part made up of Swedes,
Courlanders, Firms, Greeks and Odes-
sa Italians. In fact it might be said |
that the foreigners have not only made
but are still maintaining the Russian
navy. The reason for this is because
the Russians are not a maritime people.
Russia proper, that is to say that
part of it inhabited by Russians, and in
which the Russian language is spoken,
is confined to an area about as large as
the Southern states, around the cities
of Moscow and Kiev, the Baltic coast
having in times past formed a part of
Finland. Germany, Sweden, and Poland.
Thus the whole Baltic coast of Russia
is inhabited by Germans. Swedes, and
Firms who speak their own language, |
and are members of the Lutheran
church. while the coast of the Black
Sea which was wrested by Admiral
Jones from Turkey, and the Khans of
Crimea, is inhabited by Tartars, Turks,
Greeks, Italians and Roumanians. As
for the officers. they are made up from
every nation in Europe. with a scat
tering here and there of Russians. The |
commander OF the Russian battleshiD
Variag, captured by the Japs in the
. battle of Port Arthur, was a Captain |
Rodney. Another commander mention
{ ed in the dispatches from the Far East