In the cycle dedicated to the Russian "lightning", armored cruisers "Pearls" and "Izumrud", we left these ships at the end of the hostilities of the Russo-Japanese War, in which they took part. For "Emerald" it was a breakthrough between the Japanese troops surrounding the remnants of the 2nd and 3rd Pacific squadrons, and for "Pearl" - when he together with "Oleg" and "Aurora" arrived in Manila after the Tsushima battle. But the further service and death of both of these cruisers are of considerable interest. In the proposed material, the author will consider the tragic end of the history of the cruiser "Izumrud".
Panic victim
According to the now classic point of view, the death of the cruiser was the result of a psychological breakdown of its commander, Baron Vasily Nikolaevich Fersen. He quite reasonably and adequately commanded the cruiser in the battle of Tsushima. After a devastating daytime battle for the Russian squadron, on the evening of May 14, V. N. Fersen left the Emerald with the main forces of the squadron, although it would have been much safer to try to break through to Vladivostok alone. And, finally, despite the shock experienced by the Russian sailors and the commander of the Izumrud, at the sight of the pitiful remnants of their squadron and the practically intact Japanese fleet on the morning of May 15, V. N. Fersen nevertheless found the strength to ignore the shameful order of Rear Admiral N. I. Nebogatov on surrender and go for a breakthrough.
But then the commander of the "Izumrud" panicked. Instead of going directly to Vladivostok, for some reason he took to the northeast, wanting to bring the cruiser either to the bay of St. Vladimir, or to the bay of St. Olga, and, as a result, landed the cruiser on stones in the bay of Vladimir. Then, instead of sending a message to Vladivostok and waiting for help from there, he blew up the cruiser.
How substantiated is this point of view?
Breakout and chase
Let us briefly recall the circumstances of the "beautiful departure" of the "Izumrud" from the main forces of the enemy, which took place on May 15. The cruiser made a breakout at about 10.30 trying to develop the maximum speed. It is difficult to say exactly what speed he achieved, nevertheless, an analysis of the officers' reports suggests 21.5 knots. Russian official history claims that the 6th Japanese Combat Unit and the armored cruiser Chitose were chasing the cruiser. But to get close to the ship V. N. Fersen at a distance of effective shooting they did not succeed: A. A. Alliluyev and M. A. Bogdanov, in his work devoted to the Emerald-class cruisers, note that the shells fired from the Japanese ships did not reach the Emerald. According to a number of domestic sources, the pursuit of the Russian cruiser was terminated at 14.00.
According to Japanese data, everything went a little differently. Only Akitsushima and Chitose followed the Emerald. The first "chased" the Russian cruiser for about half an hour, having a speed of no more than 14 knots. Chitose was a little more persistent. Quickly losing sight of the Emerald, it moved in the direction where the Russian cruiser had left for a little over two hours, while developing 17 or 18 knots. They did not open fire from Japanese ships, the Emerald also did not fire beyond the range, which follows from the report of its commander. And it can be argued that the Japanese abandoned any attempts to catch up with the "Emerald" a little later than 12.30, maybe 13.00. Where, then, in Russian sources the time is 14.00?
Perhaps this is taken from the testimony of the Investigative Commission of the navigator officer Lieutenant Polushkin, who stated that "The pursuit of the enemy cruisers lasted about 3 hours" and "At about 14.00 the enemy cruisers disappeared from view." Here one can only assume that the officer, writing from memory, was inaccurate, or that some other Japanese ships or ships were seen on the Emerald, mistaken for cruisers pursuing him. It is also possible that Polushkin did not mean the Japanese cruisers themselves, but the smokes that can be seen long enough after the ships releasing them disappeared over the horizon.
Further events on 15 May
Be that as it may, but on the "Izumrud" it was believed that they broke away from the Japanese only at 14.00, and did not doubt that the enemy cruisers continued pursuit - this should be the starting point when evaluating the further actions of the crew and the commander of the Russian ship. It follows from Japanese sources that the chase was terminated earlier, but there can be no complaints about our sailors. At sea, it very often happens that what is seen is not what is actually happening, especially when it comes to observations at a great distance. In addition, the refusal of the Japanese from the pursuit looks completely unnatural. Their forces surrounding the Russian squadron had an overwhelming numerical advantage, and the admirals of the United Fleet had plenty of relatively fast armored cruisers to send in pursuit of the Emerald. The sources do not contain a clear explanation of why this was not done. Perhaps the attention of the Japanese commanders was so captured by the capitulating squadron of N. I. Nebogatov, that they forgot to give the appropriate order, hoping that another admiral would give the necessary command? Or the Japanese, knowing the "passport" speed of the "Emerald", believed that they would not be able to catch up with it anyway? But even in this case, an attempt still had to be made - the Japanese knew from their own experience that ships in combat conditions are far from always capable of giving the move demonstrated in tests. In addition, our opponents should have taken into account that in the battle on May 14, the Emerald could receive damage that did not allow it to maintain high speed for a long time.
Thus, the refusal to pursue the "Izumrud" looked completely illogical and V. N. Fersen could not, and should not have counted on, such a gift from fate. He did not count: no doubt, both the commander of the ship and his officers understood the poor condition of the Emerald machines, but it was still obvious that after the "parting" of the chase, for some time it was necessary to go at maximum speed in order to finally break away from the Japanese cruisers and only then reduce speed.
Alas, the “Izumrud” power plant was unable to withstand such a load. Somewhere between 14.00 and 15.00, that is, only within an hour after the "Izumrud" stopped "seeing" the pursuers, the steam line on the ship burst, feeding the steering gear and auxiliary mechanisms of the stern engine. From the side, the accident had a very terrible look - the cruiser was noticeably losing speed, and thick clouds of steam escaped up the ladder leading to the boiler room. The fireman Gemakin was not at a loss: just a few minutes after the accident, he pulled canvas mittens over his hands and a bag over his head, doused himself with cold water, and was already going down to the stoker. One of the drivers followed shortly thereafter. The accident was eliminated after half an hour, but, of course, it was no longer possible to put the steam main into operation.
Usually it is indicated that the ship's speed has dropped to 15 knots, but, apparently, the fall was even more noticeable. So, the senior officer of the "Emerald" P. Patton-Fanton-de-Verrion pointed out: “Initially, the speed was about 21.5 knots, then, about 3 hours, when the steam line burst, they reduced the speed to 14-15 knots, and then reduced and up to 13 ".
Thus, by about 15.00 on May 15 "Emerald" from a fast and practically intact cruiser turned into a wounded slug, unable to evade a battle with the overwhelming majority of Japanese armored cruisers. There is no doubt that if the Japanese had shown a little more perseverance in pursuing the Emerald, it would have suffered a heroic death in battle. Fortunately, this did not happen, but all the same, the position of the Russian ship remained extremely difficult: in addition to the loss of progress, great fears were caused by the coal reserves on the cruiser.
And again to the question of reloading Russian ships with coal
Unfortunately, it is impossible to indicate the exact amount of coal on "Izumrud" on May 15. V. N. Fersen shed light on this issue in his testimony to the Commission of Inquiry:
"How many tons of coal there were, I can't say, the last loading of coal was on May 10 in the North China Sea, after the passage of the Mao-Tao and Lyceum island groups, where 750 tons were accepted."
The indicated 750 tons obviously led to the reloading of the ship - according to the project, the normal supply of coal was 360 tons, and the maximum, calculated according to the capacity of the coal pits, was 535 tons. However, it can be assumed that V. N. Fersen, by mistake, nevertheless somewhat overestimated the amount of coal (on the morning of May 11, the Izumrud reported that it had 629 tons of coal), but in any case, it turns out that at the time of the last bunkering, the coal reserves far exceeded the total coal supply for the cruiser. It would seem - horror-horror-horror, to which this nightmarish coal maniac Z. P. Rozhdestvensky, that's just …
On the morning of May 13, the coal reserves at the Izumrud were almost at their maximum load, 522 tons
After the battle on May 14 and the breakthrough on May 15, the cruiser had not just little coal left, but catastrophically little. In total, the cruiser had 6 boiler rooms and 16 boilers, while in the 1st and 2nd stoker there were 2 boilers each, and in the rest - three. So, almost the entire remaining supply of coal lay in the pit of the 1st stoker. There was almost no coal in the pits of the 2nd and 3rd stokers, and the 4th, 5th and 6th stokers had no coal at all. In order to use them, the sailors had to manually carry coal from a large pit near the 1st stoker. In words - it is easy, but it is almost 2/3 of the length of the cruiser! Moreover, for this it was necessary to lift it to the upper deck, transfer it, and then lower it into the necessary stoker.
And in fact, the reserves of the 1st boiler house turned out to be not too large - despite the fact that the rest of the day on May 15 and 16, the cruiser was only 13 knots, by the time the coal arrived in the bay of St. Vladimir, about 10 tons remained. Taking into account the testimony of Lieutenant Polushkin that the cruiser spent "about 60 tons" of coal per day of economic progress, it turns out that the Izumrud had about 4, at most 5 hours of economic fuel left. And this despite the fact that all the wood on the cruiser, excluding 3 boats and masts with topmills, was sent to the furnaces and burned on the night of May 15-16 …
Undoubtedly, at the beginning of the Tsushima battle "Emerald" had a supply of coal close to the maximum. But on May 14, the cruiser did not receive any noticeable damage, which would have entailed increased coal consumption. It also cannot be said that V. N. Fersen abused the speed of his ship. Sometimes on May 14, the Emerald gave full speed, but still for the most part kept close to the main forces and moved at quite a moderate speed. The same applies to the night of May 14-15. At the same time, from the beginning of the breakthrough on May 15 and until the breakdown of the steam line, when the "Izumrud" squeezed out of its power plant everything it was capable of, it took at least 4.5 hours.
In other words, in the Battle of Tsushima, nothing extraordinary happened to the cruiser in terms of fuel consumption - the usual combat work for a ship of its class. Nevertheless, by the evening of May 15, there was just enough coal left on the "Izumrud" to "crawl" to Vladivostok with an economic speed of 13 knots. And not a ton more.
Why did this happen? Of course, the "Izumrud" was far from all right with the power plant, but alas, on many other ships of the Russian squadron, things were not much better. But the fact is that the peculiarities of the running modes in battle lead to a high consumption of coal even if the ship does not receive damage, and if it does, then it can increase even more. And the commander of the 2nd Pacific Squadron could not ignore this.
According to the author, the history of the "Izumrud" cruiser is an excellent example that explains why Z. P. Rozhestvensky needed "extra" coal for the squadron.
But what if it’s still a fight?
The prospect of meeting Japanese ships on May 15-16 for the Emerald was extremely depressing. Of course, extreme crew fatigue would have affected. It is clear that there was no time to rest during the battle on May 14 and the breakthrough on May 15, but then V. N. Fersen had to use almost the entire crew to carry coal to the empty stokers. This is how he himself described it in the testimony of the Investigative Commission: “The team, which worked on May 14 without rest, was so tired that three people had to be assigned to work performed by one at ordinary times, especially to supply coal to the boilers. The entire combatant crew was busy hauling coal across the upper deck."
Analyzing naval battles of those times, we often limit ourselves to studying the technical condition of ships, while ignoring the condition of its crew. But we must never forget that it is people who are fighting, not technology.
However, on the "Izumrud" and on the technical side, everything was more than bad. In the event of a battle, of course, it would have become impossible to carry coal around the deck, and this led to the need to stop the steam in the 4th, 5th and 6th stoker, thus stopping only 9 out of 16 boilers working in this way. would stop, too, and the cruiser would have to fight with two working machines out of three. But it would also be dangerous to overload them - the refrigerators of the Emerald were heavily clogged, which had a particularly bad effect on the operation of the right machine. The latter, even when moving at 13 knots during May 16, had to be stopped periodically.
Thus, if, say, on May 16, the "Izumrud" would have met an enemy cruiser, then all that was left for it was to engage in battle, having under steam 7 boilers out of 16 and 2 vehicles out of three. Perhaps, having dispersed both of them "to the fullest", the ship managed to give full speed, which was only possible in such a situation - offhand, hardly more than 18 knots. But, even if a miracle happened and the machines withstood it, the coal reserves were enough for about 2 hours, after which the "Izumrud" completely lost its speed and could only move with the flow.
In the event of a fight with at least some equivalent enemy, "Emerald" was doomed.
The actions of V. N. Fersen in the evening of 15 and 16 May
As you know, in order to follow to Vladivostok, the Russian squadron had to adhere to the general course of NO23, but during the breakthrough, the Emerald went rather to O, that is, to the east. This, of course, was a forced decision, since the breakthrough course was determined by the position of the Japanese combat units, between which the cruiser should have slipped. But then, when the Japanese ships disappeared from the horizon, Baron V. N. Fersen should have corrected the route and decided exactly where he would lead the cruiser entrusted to him.
Why didn't Emerald go to Vladivostok? All sources known to the author give the same answer: V. N. Fersen was afraid of meeting enemy forces there. Today we know that there were no enemy cruisers on the way to Vladivostok, and this makes the decision of the cruiser commander look like unnecessary caution. But this is today.
And then for the Russian sailors the refusal of the Japanese to pursue the "Izumrud" was categorically incomprehensible. And the only reasonable explanation why this happened was that the Japanese, instead of running east for a fast cruiser, which they could not catch up with, immediately went to the northeast, along the shortest route to Vladivostok. That is how they could neutralize the advantage of the Emerald in speed, and besides, from the point of view of the Japanese, it would be reasonable to set up a cruising barrier near Vladivostok to intercept not only the Emerald, but also other Russian ships that fought off the main forces of the squadron in the night May 14-15.
Thus, reasoning without bias, the likelihood of stumbling upon Japanese forces on the way to Vladivostok seemed very high, while the Izumrud had no chance of surviving such a collision at all. So V. N. Fersen to go to St. Vladimir or St. Olga looks quite logical and reasonable.
But where exactly did the Emerald commander take his cruiser to? Here in the sources big discrepancies begin. So, A. A. Alliluyev and M. A. Bogdanov write:
“The coal was running out when, on the night of May 17, the Emerald approached the bay of St. Vladimir, but the commander, who had spent almost no sleep for the third day already, decided to suddenly move south, to the bay of St. Olga. But on the way, hearing about Japanese ships that often looked there before the war, Fersen changed his mind, and the cruiser, burning the last tons of coal, headed back. Unfortunately, it is in the bay of St. Olga had a supply of coal that the cruiser needed so much.
One gets the feeling that V. N. Fersen just rushed about in panic, not knowing where to stick to. But V. V. Khromov, in his monograph, describes the same events much more calmly: "At 18.00 we lay down on a course leading to a point equidistant from Vladivostok and Vladimir Bay, 50 miles from the coast, and there they were already going to decide where to go." Moreover, in the future, according to V. V. Khromov V. N. Fersen really wondered whether to go to Vladimir's Bay or to go to Olga's Bay, which is on the same side. And, on the advice of his senior officer, he chose Vladimir Bay. It is also worth noting that the distance between these two bays is as much as 13.5 nautical miles, so it would not have been possible to burn a significant amount of coal even in the case of "throwing" between them.
If you read the documents, then, according to the testimony of lieutenant navigator officer Lieutenant Polushkin, the commander of the "Izumrud" decided to go to St. Vladimir immediately after the mechanic's report that the cruiser was unable to move more than 15 knots. due to fear of breakage, that is, on the evening of May 15. At the same time, according to V. N. Fersen: “At first I intended to go to Olga, but the senior officer expressed the opinion that this bay was probably mined in order to give shelter to our destroyers from the enemy. Recognizing this opinion as sound, he chose Vladimir as the closest to Olga, where he hoped, perhaps, to find a telegraph station."
Unfortunately, the author was unable to find an exact description of the route of the "Emerald", which alone could dot the "i". But nevertheless, proceeding from the above, the conclusion suggests itself that there was no "shuffling" between the bays, and that V. N. Fersen decided where to take the cruiser on the evening of May 15th. Moreover, this decision was quite balanced, made after discussion with the officers of the cruiser and not at all like any panic.
And then … on the night of May 16 and the day that followed, the cruiser barely moved at 13 knots, periodically stopping the right car. To the bay of St. Vladimir "Izumrud" arrived at the first hour of the night on May 17. And here, in an amicable way, it would be necessary to anchor near the coast in order to enter the bay in the morning, but the "Izumrud" did not have enough coal until morning. Thus, V. N. Fersen had no choice but to lead the cruiser into the bay in the darkness of the night.
Did the Emerald commander have any other options? The author does not see such. It was extremely dangerous to anchor the cruiser by the bay and completely extinguish the furnaces to save coal. In order to "fire up" them back, it would take a lot of time, and the sea for that and the sea, which sometimes presents surprises, and it was impossible to leave the ship without the opportunity to set the course for the night. And in the same way, it was impossible to "play" with the speed of the ship in order to have time to approach the bay during the day or, on the contrary, at dawn - there was simply no coal for that.
Catastrophe
The rest is well known. V. N. Fersen was going to place the Emerald in the depths of the southern part of the fertoing bay (a rather difficult method of anchoring) with the side to the entrance to the bay and thus be able to meet with full onboard fire any enemy ship that tries to pass to the cruiser. Then the commander intended to establish contact with Vladivostok, and then act according to the circumstances.
Unfortunately, these calculations were not destined to be fulfilled. "Izumrud" quite successfully passed the entrance capes, but then, trying to pass through the three-cable passage to the southern part of the bay, took too close to Cape Orekhov and jumped out onto the reef. The cruiser sat down tightly - two-thirds of its hull were in a very shallow shallow, while the port side was about 60 cm (two feet) out of the water.
And this failure, most likely, became the very straw that breaks the back of the camel. Before landing "Izumrud" on the aground, all actions of V. N. Fersen looks logical and reasonable. But everything that happened afterwards does not at all fit into the idea of a brave and resourceful commander, which V. N. Fersen before that.
An attempt to remove the Emerald from the shallow was carried out "for show" - only provisions and part of the crew were transported from the cruiser to the shore, but the ammunition and water in the boilers remained in place. V. N. Fersen explained this by the fact that he could not deprive the cruiser of the shells due to the danger of the appearance of the enemy, but who prevented the transfer of ammunition to the stern of the Emerald? Shoot at St. Olga's enemy, in any case, could only have two 120-mm guns, poop and right quarter-side, so the other guns obviously did not need ammunition. And if the need arose to detonate the cruiser, the shells and charges would detonate in the stern no worse than in any other place in the hull, and would inflict no less damage. In addition, such a solution loaded the stern, unloading the center of the hull and the bow, that is, it created good prerequisites for removing the ship from the shallows. The water from the boilers, probably, could also be drained - not from all, but only those that could not be used anyway due to lack of coal.
Thus, it appears that V. N. Fersen did not do his best to save his cruiser. Having lost hope to remove the ship from the shallows, V. N. Fersen was absolutely sure that the Japanese would soon find the Emerald and considered its destruction the only way to prevent the capture of the cruiser by the Japanese. He considered it impossible to fight, since only two 120-mm guns could shoot towards the exit of their bay.
It may well be that on the part of the battle V. N. Fersen was right. As far as the author could figure it out, the Japanese, if they appeared at the Vladimir Bay, did not need to climb into it, they could shoot the Emerald while maneuvering in the sea. In such conditions, 120-mm artillery could be quickly suppressed. But why was it impossible to wait for the enemy to appear, and only then blow up the cruiser?
In his testimony to the Investigative Commission V. N. Fersen explained his decision by the fact that he was not sure of the destructiveness of the prepared explosions. In other words, the Emerald commander feared that on the first attempt the cruiser would not receive decisive damage, excluding its refloating and towing, and that repeated mining and detonation would be required - but due to the enemy, there would be no time left for it.
There was a certain reason in these considerations, but even taking all this into account, it was necessary to soberly assess the risks. If the Japanese show up at all, if they find a cruiser, then perhaps its detonation will not lead to decisive damage …
Could it be expected that the Japanese would appear at Vladimir Bay, where the Izumrud accident occurred? The author is absolutely sure that V. N. Fersen really should have expected the Japanese near Vladivostok, although in reality they were not there. But the likelihood that the Japanese would still view the coastline for hundreds of kilometers should have been assessed as very insignificant.
Yes, theoretically, having not found the Emerald near Vladivostok, the Japanese could have assumed that it was standing somewhere in the bays of the Russian coast and carried out a search there. But what would it look like in reality? Obviously, the detachment, which the Japanese could send to patrol near Vladivostok immediately after the battle, would have to be diverted to bunkering after a short time, so that the passage to Vladivostok again became open. Why then would the Japanese go back and search along the coastline?
Nevertheless, the ships of the United Fleet did visit Vladimir Bay, but this happened only on June 30, when the Japanese sent the Nissin and Kassuga with the 1st detachment of fighters for reconnaissance and demonstration - that is, without any connection with the search for the cruiser.
In other words, even in theory, the chances of the appearance of the Japanese at Vladimir Bay were, although different from zero, but low. In reality, after the Battle of Tsushima, the Japanese did not just ransack the coastline - they even considered the patrol near Vladivostok unnecessary. Thus, the firm conviction of V. N. Fersen's idea that the Japanese "are about to appear" turned out to be deliberately wrong.
Finally, the Emerald commander's suspicions that it would not be possible to destroy the cruiser on the first attempt were also not justified. For detonation, the charging compartments of Whitehead mines were used, which were laid in the aft cartridge cellar and the provision compartment located at the bow cartridge cellar. At the same time, the tubes of segment projectiles in the cellars were installed for impact.
It is not entirely clear why it was not the cellar itself that was mined in the nose, but the room adjacent to it, but this had a decisive effect on the effectiveness of the detonation. The explosion in the nose did not seem to cause serious damage, but caused a fire that reached the cartridge cellar, so that the shells exploded in it within half an hour. But the explosion in the stern tore the hull right up to the midship. There was no talk of any refloating and towing, but the commander, having examined the cruiser, found that the vehicles had survived and additionally blew them up, after which the Emerald finally turned into a heap of scrap metal.
Thus, it can be stated that none of V. N. Fersen, which he was guided by, making the decision to undermine the cruiser was not justified. The Japanese did not appear at the Vladimir Bay, and the cruiser was actually destroyed by the explosion on the very first attempt.
The third mistake made by V. N. Fersen should be considered the rejection of the war council. I must say that the commander of the "Izumrud" was not inclined to collect it earlier, but here there can be no complaints. When it was necessary to go for a breakthrough, there was no time to collect advice, and the decision to turn to Vladimir Bay instead of Vladivostok was completely within the competence of the cruiser commander and did not require a military council.
But now it was about the destruction of the Emerald, and in the absence of an immediate threat - after all, there were no Japanese on the horizon. Thus, V. N. Fersen had both an occasion and a time for a council of war, but instead he confined himself to individual conversations with officers. During these conversations, only two officers, midshipman Virenius and mechanic Topchev, spoke out against the immediate destruction of the cruiser, while the rest agreed with their commander.
But, if so, was there any point in the council of war? V. V. Khromov in his monograph expresses an interesting hypothesis that the council's decision could still lead to a refusal to undermine the "Izumrud". The fact is that, as you know, the junior officer speaks first at the military council, and then according to seniority. So, ensign Shandrenko (Shandrenko?) Should have been the first to speak at the military council, but he, according to the entries in his diary, was against the immediate blowing up of the cruiser. After him, the midshipman Virenius and the mechanic Topchev, who, as we know, also opposed the explosion, should have spoken out.
If this happened, and three junior officers spoke out in favor of refusing to immediately destroy the Emerald, then the rest of the officers would psychologically be much more difficult to support the idea of the cruiser commander. And - who knows, it could well have turned out that the council of war would have spoken out against the destruction of the ship. However, of course, V. N. Fersen, and in this case, could decide to undermine the cruiser, taking full responsibility for himself - he had such a right.
It is, of course, impossible to argue that the council of war prevented an immediate detonation of the cruiser. But it is obvious that the refusal to conduct it destroyed the last chance to save the Emerald from its own commander. There is also no doubt that the "Emerald" could have been saved. There was a telegraph in Olga Bay, through which it was possible to contact Vladivostok, and, according to V. V. Khromov from there even managed to send the armored cruiser "Russia" to the rescue of "Izumrud". Undoubtedly, he could share coal with a cruiser that ran aground. And it is more than likely that, using the giant armored cruiser as a tug, the Emerald could be brought out into the open water, after which both ships could return to Vladivostok. There were no Japanese detachments nearby that could interfere with them.
conclusions
The blame for the death of the "Izumrud" cruiser should be placed entirely on its commander, V. N. Fersen. The Baron established himself as an experienced navigator, having led his essentially unfinished cruiser across half the world. He quite reasonably commanded the Emerald in the daytime battle, devastating for the Russian squadron on May 14, and did not leave the main forces of the squadron to fend for themselves on the night when the Japanese destroyers went out to hunt. V. N. Fersen directed his ship to break through as the others surrendered. To do this, one had to have real courage, especially since the commander of the Emerald perfectly understood how unreliable the mechanisms of his cruiser were, and what awaited him if they failed at the wrong moment. And, finally, all the actions of V. N. Fersen after breaking away from the Japanese, including the decision to enter Vladimir Bay at night, were quite reasonable and adequate to the situation, as it should have been presented on a Russian cruiser.
Apparently, V. N. Fersen did not panic even after the Emerald ran aground. But the heavy burden of responsibility for the ship entrusted to him, the fatigue of the 9-month transition to Tsushima, the psychological stress of the battle lost with a crushing score led to the thought: “The Japanese are close and are about to appear and capture the Emerald, and I am not I can prevent this”became, in fact, intrusive for him. Obviously, the worst thing for V. N. Fersen was about to hand over the ship to the enemy: he could not and did not want to follow the example of Admiral N. I. Nebogatova.
According to the author, the commander of the Emerald cruiser should not be accused of cowardice. It is noteworthy that V. N. Fersen, destroying the cruiser, did not seem to be playing, he really was absolutely sure of the correctness of what he was doing. It can be assumed that V. N. Fersen some form of neurosis or other form of mental disorder, and that this case should rather be studied from a medical point of view.
But something else is also undoubted. The commander of a battleship cannot afford such a luxury as neurosis; he must be extremely psychologically stable in any situation. V. N. Fersen, alas, was not like that.
One can argue about whether V. N. Fersen golden weapon with the inscription "For Bravery" for the breakthrough "Emerald". But, according to the author, in the future he should not have been appointed to the post of commander of a ship, or, even more so, a detachment of warships, as it happened in reality: after the Russo-Japanese war, V. N. Fersen commanded the cruiser Aurora, the 2nd mine division, a cruiser brigade, and even a battleship brigade of the Baltic Fleet. Probably, he should have been left in a "coastal" position, like the commander of some major port, or persuaded to resign.
