Petropavlovsk - class battleship The " Petropavlovsk " class , sometimes referred to as the " Poltava " class , was a class of three pre - dreadnought battleship s built for the Imperial Russian Navy during the 1890s . They were transferred to the Pacific Squadron upon completion and based at Port Arthur before the start of the Russo - Japanese War of 1904 – 1905 . All three ships participated in the Battle of Port Arthur on the second day of the war . sank two months after the war began after striking one or more mines laid by the Japanese . The remaining two ships participated in the Battle of the Yellow Sea in August 1904 and were sunk or scuttled during the final stages of the Siege of Port Arthur . Design and description . Design work for the " Petropavlovsk " class began as an enlarged and improved version of the battleship , but with her main armament of four guns mounted in barbettes . Based on experience with in which the casemate - mounted secondary armament could often not be worked in rough weather , the Naval Technical Committee adopted the layout of the American s with the secondary armament of guns mounted in turret s on the upper deck . Use of the lighter barbette mounting allowed for a flush - deck hull which gave the ship high freeboard . The class was designed with a displacement of , a full - length waterline armor belt , and the upper hull featured a modest amount of tumblehome . It was approved in January 1891 . The design was intended to have a maximum speed of using forced draft , but model testing of the hull showed that it could only reach . Rather than delay construction by redesigning the hull to reach the desired speed , the navy accepted the slower speed . Development of the quick - firing gun meant that an upper belt of armor was necessary and the weight required was gained by shortening the waterline armor belt , which left the ships ' ends protected only by the sloping armor deck . Other changes included the replacement of the barbettes with turrets of the same type as used in the battleship and the substitution of quick - firing guns for the original eight - inch guns . This saved enough weight that four additional six - inch guns could be added . The " Petropavlovsk " - class ships were long overall , had a beam of and a draft of . Designed to displace , they were overweight and actually displaced . The ships were the first flush - decked battleships built for the Navy . They had a partial double bottom and the hull was divided by 10 watertight transverse bulkheads ; a centerline bulkhead divided the machinery spaces . The upper part of the hull between the main and upper decks curved inwards ( tumblehome ) , although the tumblehome on these ships was much less pronounced than that found on French battleships of the time , which began curving inwards at the waterline . They had a designed metacentric height of and were good seagoing ships . Their crew consisted of 26 – 27 officers and 605 – 25 enlisted men ; " Petropavlovsk " had a crew of 750 when serving as a flagship . The ships were powered by two vertical triple - expansion steam engines , each driving one propeller , using steam generated by 14 cylindrical boilers at a working pressure of . Unlike her sisters , " Sevastopol " had 16 boilers . The engines were rated at and designed to reach a top speed of 16 knots . The machinery for " Poltava " and " Petropavlovsk " was ordered from British companies and slightly exceeded their specifications ; the ships reached maximum speed of from , respectively , during their sea trials . " Sevastopol " , using domestically built machinery , only reached a speed of from , despite the extra boilers , but the Naval Ministry chose not to exercise the penalty provisions of the contract for failing to attain the design speed because it had specified the machinery to be used . They carried a maximum of of coal which allowed them to steam for at a speed of . Armament . The main armament consisted of two pairs of 40 - caliber 12 - inch guns mounted in French - style center - pivot twin - gun turrets fore and aft . They used hydraulic power for loading and traversing , but the ammunition hoists were electrically powered . They were designed to fire one shell every 90 seconds , but the rate of fire in service proved to be one round every three minutes . The structure of the turrets proved to be too weak to withstand extra - strength charges and had to be reinforced . These guns had a maximum elevation of 15° and could traverse 270° . 58 rounds per gun were carried . They fired a shell at a muzzle velocity of to a range of at an elevation of 10° . The secondary armament of the ships consisted of a dozen 45 - caliber Canet Model 1892 six - inch quick - firing ( QF ) guns , eight mounted in four twin - gun turrets on the upper deck and four pedestal - mounted guns in embrasure s on the sides of the hull , one deck below and between the turrets . The turrets were traversed by and the ammunition hoists were worked by electric motors , but the guns were elevated manually . They had an 135° arc of fire and the guns could elevate to a maximum of + 15° and depress to −5° . The rate of fire of the turret - mounted guns was generally only about half that ( 2 – 3 rounds per minute ) of the pedestal - mounted guns . The motors and mechanism of the ammunition hoists were problematic and sometimes reduced the rate of fire down of one round per minute . The guns in the hull could traverse 100° and each six - inch gun was provided with 200 rounds . They fired shells that weighed with a muzzle velocity of . They had a maximum range of when fired at an elevation of + 20° . A number of smaller guns were carried for defense against torpedo boat s . These included twelve Hotchkiss gun s in hull embrasures and on the superstructure . They fired a shell at a muzzle velocity of at a rate of 20 rounds per minute to a range of . Twenty smaller Hotchkiss guns were positioned in hull embrasures , on the superstructure and in the fighting tops . They fired a shell at a muzzle velocity of . They had a rate of fire of 20 rounds per minute and a maximum range of . The " Petropavlovsk " - class ships carried four torpedo tube s , all above water , mounted on the broadside and two broadside underwater tubes . The forward 15 - inch tubes were near the forward main gun turret and were unprotected by any armor ; aft , the 15 - inch tubes were protected by the upper armor belt . The underwater tubes were protected underneath the armor deck , forward of the forward 12 - inch magazine . The 15 - inch Type L torpedo carried a warhead of TNT . It had two speed settings which gave it a maximum range of at or at . No data is available for the 18 - inch torpedo . The ship also carried 50 mines to be laid to protect her anchorage in remote areas . The ships were fitted with Liuzhol stadiametric rangefinders that used the angle between two vertical points on an enemy ship , usually the waterline and the crow ' s nest , to estimate the range . The gunnery officer consulted his references to get the range and calculated the proper elevation and deflection required to hit the target . He transmitted his commands via a Geisler electro - mechanical fire - control transmission system to each gun or turret . Protection . The Russian armor plate industry had not yet mastered the process for forming thick steel plates so the armor for these ships was ordered from companies in Germany and the United States . Even they could not produce enough of the latest types of armor plate in the quantities required for all three ships . " Petropavlovsk " had ordinary nickel steel , while " Sevastopol " used Harvey armor and " Poltava " used the latest Krupp armor . The thicknesses of the armor plates varied in an attempt to equalize their effectiveness . In " Petropavlovsk " , the maximum thickness of the waterline armor belt over the machinery spaces was which reduced to abreast the magazine s . The belt tapered to a thickness of at its bottom edge . The belt armor in the other two ships was over the machinery spaces and thinned to over the magazines . Their belt tapered to a thickness of at its lower edge . The belt covered of the ship ' s length and was high , of which the upper was intended to be above the waterline . The belt terminated in a transverse bulkhead thick forward and eight inches thick aft , leaving the ends of the ships unprotected . Above the waterline belt was an upper strake of armor that ran between the turret bases , seven and a half feet high . The ends of the upper belt were closed off by five - inch angled transverse bulkheads that connected the ends of the upper belt to the turret support tubes . The armor of the main gun turrets and their supporting tubes was ten inches thick ( Krupp armor in " Poltava " , nickel steel in the other two ) with roofs thick . The turrets of the secondary armament had five - inch sides with roofs . The six - inch guns in the hull embrasures were unprotected . The sides of the conning tower were nine inches thick while the armor deck in the central citadel was two inches thick . Outside the area covered by the belt armor , the flat portion of the deck was thick , while the sloped portion was thick . Careers . " Petropavlovsk " was the first of the three ships to enter service ; she departed Kronstadt on 17 October 1899 and reached Port Arthur on 10 May 1900 . She became flagship of the Pacific Squadron commander , Vice Admiral Nikolai I . Skrydlov , upon her arrival . The ship supported international efforts to suppress the Boxer Rebellion in mid - 1900 . " Poltava " and " Sevastopol " departed for Port Arthur on 15 October 1900 and arrived on 12 and 13 April 1901 respectively . " Petropavlovsk " was the flagship of Vice Admiral Oskar Victorovich Stark at the beginning of the Russo - Japanese War in February 1904 . During the Battle of Port Arthur on the second day of the war , " Poltava " was hit twice in the aft hull , " Petropavlovsk " was hit three times in the bow and " Sevastopol " was hit once . Between them , the three ships lost two men killed and seven wounded and none of them suffered any significant damage . Tsar Nicholas II relieved Stark and he was replaced by Vice Admiral Stepan Makarov who assumed command on 7 March . On 31 March , " Petropavlovsk " and " Poltava " sortie d to support Russian cruisers and destroyers engaging their Japanese counterparts , but they headed back to Port Arthur to join the rest of the Pacific Squadron when the main Japanese battlefleet appeared . They ran into a newly laid minefield en route and " Petropavlovsk " struck at least one of the mines . Observers saw three explosions , one of which appeared to be that of her magazines , and the ship sank in less than two minutes . Casualties included Admiral Makarov and his guest , Russian battle artist Vasily Vereshchagin , 26 officers and 652 enlisted men . Only seven officers and 73 crewmen were rescued . The new commander , Vice Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft , made an attempt to lead the Pacific Squadron to Vladivostok on 23 June , but abandoned the sortie when the squadron was discovered and pursued by the Japanese . While returning to Port Arthur , " Sevastopol " struck a mine and the ship took on an estimated of water ; despite the flooding she was able to keep up with the fleet and reached port successfully . While under repair , which lasted until 9 July , a fire broke out aboard the ship and killed two crewmen and injured an additional 28 . All of the 47 - and 37 - millimeter guns in the lower hull embrasures were removed from " Poltava " and " Sevastopol " during this time ; some were remounted on the superstructure , but others were used to reinforce the land defenses of Port Arthur . Vitgeft made another attempt to break through the Japanese blockade on 10 August in accordance to a direct order from the Tsar . The squadron was spotted relatively quickly and the Japanese main fleet intercepted the Russians in the early afternoon . During the Battle of the Yellow Sea , " Poltava " and " Sevastopol " were the last battleships in the Russian column and " Poltava " , which was slowed by engine problems , became the primary target of the Japanese battleships and armored cruiser s when Vitgeft maneuvered the squadron past the Japanese and forced them into a stern chase . Shortly before sunset , a lucky hit killed Vitgeft and threw the squadron into confusion . The squadron second - in - command , Rear Admiral Prince Pavel Ukhtomsky , eventually gained control of the squadron and led most of them back to Port Arthur . " Poltava " had been hit by 12 – 14 shells , eight or 12 inches in caliber , and suffered 12 killed and 43 wounded ; " Sevastopol " was only hit by several shells that killed one crewman and wounded 62 men . On 23 August , " Sevastopol " sortied to bombard Japanese troops and struck a mine near her forward magazines while returning to port . She was badly damaged and took on a lot of water . The ship was towed back into Port Arthur and her repairs lasted until 6 November . In the meantime , the new squadron commander , Rear Admiral Robert N . Viren , decided to use the men and guns of the Pacific Squadron to reinforce the defenses of Port Arthur and even more guns were stripped from the squadron ' s ships ; by September " Poltava " had dismounted three 6 - inch , four 47 - and twenty - six 37 - millimeter guns . " Sevastopol " lost one 47 - and twenty - six 37 - millimeter guns as well . Both ships were lightly damaged by shells in October when the Imperial Japanese Army ' s siege guns began firing blindly into the harbor . The capture of Hill 203 , which overlooked the harbor , on 5 December allowed them to fire directly at the Russian ships and " Poltava " was sunk in shallow water that same day by a shell that started a fire in a magazine that eventually exploded . By 7 December all of the Russian battleships except " Sevastopol " had been sunk and the ship ' s captain , Nikolai Essen , anchored her under the guns of the remaining coast defense guns outside the harbor . He rigged torpedo net s and laid a minefield around his ship that thwarted repeated attacks until 16 December when one torpedo struck the ship in the stern during a blinding snowstorm . Badly damaged , " Sevastopol " was towed to deep water about two weeks later , when Port Arthur surrendered on 2 January 1905 , and scuttled . " Poltava " was subsequently raised , repaired and reclassified as a first - class coastal defense ship in the Imperial Japanese Navy . Renamed " Tango " ( 丹後 ) , she served as a gunnery training ship and the ship participated in the Siege of Tsingtao at the beginning of World War I . She was sold to Russia in March 1916 and arrived in Vladivostok on 2 April 1916 . Renamed " Chesma " ( " Чесма " ) , the ship arrived in Port Said , Egypt on 19 September and later supported efforts to intimidate the Greek Government into support Allied operations in Macedonia . She arrived at Alexandrovsk on 16 January 1917 after a brief refit in Birkenhead and became flagship of the Arctic Flotilla . Her crew joined the Bolsheviks in October 1917 and " Chesma " was captured by the British in Murmansk in March 1918 during the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War . The ship was already in bad shape and the British immobilized her when they departed Russia in October 1919 . She was stricken on 3 July 1924 and subsequently scrapped . Sources . Online sources