So, at the end of July 1904, the need for the Port Arthur squadron to break through became completely obvious. The point was not that on July 25, the Sevastopol returned to service, which was blown up by a mine during an unsuccessful exit on June 10, and not even that on July 26 a telegram was received from the governor, containing an order from the emperor to break through, although, of course, it was impossible to ignore her. But the most dangerous thing happened for the squadron: on July 25, the Japanese siege artillery (so far only with 120-mm cannons) began shelling the harbor and ships standing on the inner roadstead. The Japanese did not see where they were shooting, so they were hitting "squares", but this turned out to be extremely dangerous: on the very first day "Tsarevich" received two hits. One shell hit the armor belt and, of course, did not cause any damage, but the second hit right into the admiral's wheelhouse - oddly enough, just at that moment there were not even one, but two admirals in it: V. K. Vitgeft and the head of the port Artur I. K. Grigorovich. The telephone operator was seriously injured, and temporarily I. D. the commander of the Pacific squadron and the senior flag officer received shrapnel wounds in the shoulder and arm, respectively. On the same day, the battleships began counter-battery firing and continued it on 26 and 27 July, but were unable to suppress the Japanese. This was prevented by the closed, out-of-line-of-sight positions of the Japanese battery. It was extremely difficult to hit its location with naval artillery shells, even knowing its location, but the Japanese tried not to betray it.
The next day, July 26, V. K. Vitgeft held a meeting of the flagships and commanders of the ships and appointed the departure of the squadron for July 27, but later was forced to postpone it to the morning of the 28th due to the fact that the battleship Sevastopol was not ready for the departure. From the latter, even before the repair, ammunition and coal were unloaded, but now the battleship was towed to the southeastern basin, where it hastily took everything it needed.
Preparation of the squadron for the exit began only on July 26, and there was a lot to be done. The ships had to replenish the stocks of coal, provisions and shells, and, in addition, some of the battleships did not have the amount of artillery they were supposed to have in the state - it was brought ashore. Without considering the presence of small-caliber artillery with a caliber of 75 mm and below (there was little sense from which in a sea battle, respectively, and the damage from its absence, too), we note that the battleships of the squadron as of July 26 lacked thirteen six-inch guns - two for Retvizan”, three on“Peresvet”and eight on“Pobeda”.
One important point should be noted here: any loading is very tiring for the crews of the ships, and going straight into battle after it is not the best solution. However, in some cases it could be justified. For example, when leaving on June 10, the squadron could try to keep the time of its departure secret by starting to load as late as possible and closer to the time of departure in order not to give the Japanese spies in Port Arthur the opportunity to somehow inform about the impending exit. Most likely, nothing would have worked, but (based on what the Russian officers in Port Arthur might have known) it was still worth trying. Well, after the release on July 10, the squadron was convinced (and quite rightly) that it was impossible to slip out of Arthur imperceptibly, so the overly hasty training made no sense.
However, since July 25, the ships were under fire, and one should not think that the small, in fact, 120-mm caliber was harmless to large battleships. When on July 27 the Japanese began shelling the area where the battleship Retvizan was parked, the first shell that hit it, hitting the armor belt, made an underwater hole of 2, 1 square meters. m, which immediately received 400 tons of water. Of course, this did not threaten the death of a huge battleship, but the problem was in an extremely unfortunate place of impact - in the bow, which, when moving forward, created significant pressure on the internal bulkheads of the ship. At high speeds, the bulkheads could not withstand, and flooding could become uncontrollable with all the ensuing (although in this case the word “flowing” would be more appropriate) consequences. VC. Vitgeft, having learned about such damage to the battleship, ordered that if the night before leaving the Retvizan they could not reinforce the bulkheads, the battleship would remain in Port Arthur, and he, V. K. Vitgeft, will lead only five battleships out of six to break through. If it was possible to reinforce the bulkheads, the commander of the "Retvizan" should have informed V. K. Witgeft the maximum possible speed of the ship: then Wilhelm Karlovich was going to keep the squadron speed according to the ability of the "Retvizan". And, besides, as we will see later, temporarily i.d. the commander of the Pacific squadron, going to the breakthrough, really tried to burn the bridges behind him, leaving neither himself nor his subordinates with loopholes to return to Port Arthur. The Retvizan is the only one of all the ships in the squadron that received direct permission from V. K. Vitgefta to return to Arthur if the need arises.
Thus, starting from July 25, every extra day under fire from Japanese batteries represented an unjustified risk of heavy casualties, so the squadron had to break through the sooner the better. Unfortunately, V. K. Vitgeft did not consider it necessary to keep his ships in constant readiness to leave. So, nothing prevented the return of the six-inch cannons to the battleships in advance, for this it was not even necessary to disarm the fortress. The armored cruiser "Bayan", returning after shelling the coast, was blown up by a mine on July 14 and was not operational. Interestingly, in the end, his guns were transferred to the battleships of the squadron, but this could have been done earlier. If V. K. Vitgeft considered it necessary to keep the ships of Port Arthur ready for the exit, then it was possible to regularly replenish coal supplies (which even when anchored was consumed daily) and other things, in this case, preparing for the exit would take much less time and effort. This was not done, and as a result, right before the exit, they had to arrange an emergency.
However, it should be noted that Wilhelm Karlovich, on the eve of the release on July 28, made much more serious mistakes. On the morning of July 27, he sent a detachment of ships to shell the Japanese in Tahe Bay: this was certainly the right thing to do, but the cruiser Novik should not have been sent with gunboats and destroyers: there was not so much sense from it, but the cruiser burned coal, and, having returned to the roadstead only at 16.00 in the evening, he was forced to carry out loading operations until late at night. And, despite all the efforts of the crew, he did not load the coal, taking only 420 tons instead of 500 tons. The fatigue of the crew after such a rush is unpleasant in itself, but remember the words of A. Yu. Emelin ("Rank II cruiser" Novik "):
“Realizing that the Korea Strait would be reliably blocked by the enemy, MF von Schultz led the ship around Japan. The very first days showed that while following the economic course, fuel consumption increased almost twice, from 30 to 50-55 tons per day. Vigorous measures managed to reduce it to 36 tons, but still the prospect of reaching Vladivostok without a new replenishment of reserves became problematic."
80 tons, which Novik did not manage to load, is more than 2 days of economic progress. If the cruiser had these 80 tons, perhaps entering the Aniva Bay for loading coal, which became fatal for the cruiser, turned out to be unnecessary, and Novik would have managed to reach Vladivostok. It could also happen that, having used up these 80 tons, "Novik" arrived at the Korsakov post earlier and managed to leave it before the appearance of the Japanese cruiser. Of course, guessing on the coffee grounds about "what would happen if" is a thankless task, but still sending a cruiser on a combat mission right before the breakthrough was not the right decision from any point of view.
The second mistake, alas, was even more unpleasant. As you know, there was no direct connection between Port Arthur and Vladivostok, which made the interaction and coordination of the actions of the Port Arthur squadron and the Vladivostok cruiser detachment very difficult. Commander of the Pacific Fleet N. I. Skrydlov informed the governor of Alekseev about these difficulties and he gave V. K. Witgeft is absolutely sensible instruction - to inform in advance about the day of the squadron's exit for a breakthrough, so that the cruiser K. P. Jessen could support him and distract Kamimura's armored squad. VC. Vitgeft, however, did not consider it necessary to carry out this order of the governor, so that the destroyer "Resolute" left with a message only in the evening of July 28, i.e. on the day of the breakout.
All this led to the fact that Vladivostok learned about the squadron's withdrawal only in the second half of July 29 and, although they made every effort to help the ships breaking through from Port Arthur, they did it belatedly, when the detachment of Vladivostok cruisers was already nothing could not help the squadron. Of course, we cannot know what decisions could have been made and what this led to, find out Vice Admiral N. I. Skrydlov about the exit of V. K. Vitgeft on time. But we know for sure that the battle in the Korea Strait, which took place on August 1, 1904, during which the armored cruiser Rurik was killed, and Russia and Thunderbolt received serious damage, did not contribute to the breakthrough of the Arthurian squadron.
As for the plan for the upcoming battle, it turned out like this: the commanders expressed a desire to discuss the actions of the squadron and work out tactics for the battle with the Japanese fleet, but V. K. Wigeft replied, "That this is his business, and that he will be guided by the methods developed under the late Admiral Makarov."
Was this evidence of V. K. Witgeft of any plan for the coming battle? Let's try to figure it out. Any plan should assume not only the presence of the enemy, but also take into account his position relative to his own forces, as well as the enemy's battle tactics. But can all this be foreseen for a naval battle? In some cases, of course, but the upcoming battle was clearly not one of those. At what time will the squadron breaking through to Vladivostok be intercepted by the main forces of the United Fleet? Will the enemy find himself between the Russian squadron and Vladivostok, or will he be forced to catch up with the Russian ships? Will V. K. Vitgefta only the 1st combat unit of Heihachiro Togo, or should we expect the 2nd unit - the armored cruisers of H. Kamimura? What tactics will the Japanese commander choose? Will he put the armored cruisers in line with the battleships, or will he separate them into a separate detachment, giving them the right to act independently? Will Togo strive to outplay the Russians in maneuvering and put a "stick over the T", or will he prefer to just lie down on parallel courses and give a classic line battle, relying on the training of his gunners? And at what distances would he prefer to fight?
VC. Vitgeft did not create illusions about his battleships and cruisers, he perfectly understood that after such a long break in combat training, the squadron was not amalgamated and was not ready for difficult maneuvering, and the Japanese fleet was ready. He also understood that Japanese ships are faster, which means, other things being equal, the choice of battle tactics will remain with them. But what kind of tactics will be chosen by the Japanese commander, V. K. Vitgeft could not know, because all that remained for him was to act according to circumstances, adapting to the maneuvers of the Japanese. Obviously, even the best admirals of any time could not have drawn up a plan for such a battle. All that V. K. Vitgeft is to give general instructions, i.e.explain to the commanders the goals that the squadron will pursue in the battle, and assign missions to the squadron commanders in order to achieve these goals. But … this is exactly what Wilhelm Karlovich did, referring to the instructions of S. O. Makarov!
The point is this: by order No. 21 of March 4, 1904, Stepan Osipovich approved a very interesting document called "Instructions for a campaign and battle." This instruction contained 54 points and a number of schemes and therefore cannot be fully cited in this article, therefore we will limit ourselves to a brief retelling.
S. O. Makarov assumed to fight, having his main forces (battleships) in the wake column. Before the battle, the cruisers were supposed to provide reconnaissance in all directions from the main forces, but after finding the enemy, they were ordered to gather in a wake column behind the battleships. The torpedo boats, divided into two detachments, had for the time being to "hide" behind the battleships, having them between themselves and the enemy. The battleships were controlled by S. O. Makarov, but his "Instruction" assumed a fairly large freedom in the choice of decisions for ship commanders. So, for example, if the admiral gives the signal "all of a sudden turn":
“In case of a turn of the wake formation by 16 points, all of a sudden, the end point becomes the head and he is given the right to lead the line, so he may not sink to 16 points and choose whatever direction is favorable for the battle. The rest enter his wake."
S. O.'s instructions Makarov allowed the battleships to leave the line under certain conditions: if, for example, they were attacked by destroyers, then it was necessary to focus on them the fire of all the guns, up to six inches inclusive, but if, nevertheless, the destroyers managed to approach the line by 15 kbt, the battleship should not have while waiting for the admiral's signal, turn aft to the attacking destroyers and give full speed. At the same time S. O. Makarov considered maintaining the formation very important and demanded that after the events that caused its violation, the battleships re-form the line as quickly as possible. The admiral determined the order in which his battleships were to follow in formation, but if the wake line for some reason turned out to be violated, then the commanders of the ships had to restore the formation as soon as possible, even if they were out of place:
"As soon as the attack is over, the battleships and cruisers must immediately enter the wake of the Fleet Commander, observing the order of numbers only as much as possible and trying to take a place in the column as soon as possible."
An ambiguous innovation by S. O. Makarov, there was a reduction in the intervals in the ranks:
“Ships in battle must keep at a distance of 2 cables, including the length of the ship. Keeping the ships compressed, we get the opportunity for every two enemy ships to have three of our own and, thus, at every place of battle to be stronger than him."
As for the cruisers, their main task was to put the enemy "in two fires":
“Bearing in mind the main task of the cruisers to put the enemy in two fires, the chief of the detachment must vigilantly follow the progress of my maneuvers and, when the opportunity presents itself favorable, he can change course and add speed; the rest of the cruisers follow him and in this case are guided by his signals or act, evading somewhat from the formation, in order to fulfill the main task of increasing the fire on the attacked part of the enemy squadron. The deviation, however, should not lead to a complete disorder of order."
In addition, the cruisers were supposed to protect the battleships from destroyer attacks - in this case, the head of the cruiser squadron also had the right to act independently, without waiting for orders from the squadron commander. As for the destroyers, they had to stay no further than 2 miles from their own battleships, on the side opposite to the enemy. However, the right of the detachments to occupy a position convenient for an attack without an order was specially stipulated. At the same time, the detachment commanders were instructed to carefully observe the course of the battle and, if a convenient moment presented itself, to attack the Japanese battleships without an order from the commander. Of course, the commander himself could send the destroyers into the attack, and in this case no delay was allowed. And besides:
"An enemy mine attack is a wonderful moment for our destroyers to make a counterattack, firing at enemy destroyers and attacking enemy ships."
Of undoubted interest is Stepan Osipovich's order on torpedo firing in areas:
“It may happen that I accept the battle on the retreat, then we will get advantages in relation to mines, and therefore we must prepare for firing mines. In these conditions, it must be assumed that the shooting is at the squadron, and not at the ship, and therefore it is permissible, setting at the farthest distance and reduced speed, to shoot when the enemy column enters the mine action area, the size of which, especially in the stern directions, with a large opponent's move, it can be significant."
And there was also a clause in Stepan Osipovich's Instruction that became, to a certain extent, prophetic:
“No matter how important it is to place your ships in favorable tactical conditions against the enemy, the history of naval wars proves to us that the success of a battle depends mainly on the accuracy of artillery fire. Well-aimed fire is not only a sure means of inflicting defeat on the enemy, but also the best defense against his fire."
On the whole, it can be stated that some document, which could be called a plan of a decisive battle with the united fleet, at S. O. Makarov was not there. However, in his "Instructions" he clearly formulated the basic principles that he was going to adhere to in battle, the role and tasks of battleships, cruisers and destroyers. As a result, wherever the enemy was seen, and no matter how the battle developed, the flagships and commanders of the ships of the squadron fully understood what they had to strive for and what the commander expects from them.
It is interesting that Heihachiro Togo did not have any battle plan on July 28 (as well as, later, Tsushima). The Japanese commander limited himself to instructions of a similar purpose as S. O. Makarov. Of course, they had significant differences: for example, S. O. Makarov did not consider it possible to break the formation of battleships, except in special situations and assumed that the enemy should be set in two fires by two separate columns, one of which was formed by battleships, and the second by the squadron's cruisers. Heihachiro Togo allowed the division of the 1st combat squad into two groups of three ships in each for the same purpose (if only the 1st combat squadron is fighting without Kamimura's cruisers). But in essence, the instructions of the commander of the United Fleet were similar to those of Makarov - both were not a battle plan, but gave a general idea of the objectives of the detachments and the principles that the commanders and flagships had to adhere to in battle. Neither the Russian nor the Japanese commanders drew up any more specific plans.
And what V. K. Vitgeft? He approved the "Instruction for the campaign and the battle" with some changes. One of them was, of course, logical: he abandoned the reduced intervals in the ranks between battleships and this was the right decision, because for unsaved ships such an order contained the danger of piling on the next ship in the ranks, if he suddenly reduced speed as a result of performing some either maneuver or combat damage. The second innovation looks very dubious: the cruisers of the squadron were confirmed that their main task was to capture the enemy "in two fires", but at the same time they were forbidden to go to the non-firing side of the enemy line. This was done in order to prevent the enemy from launching guns from the second side: after all, it would have turned out that Russian battleships and cruisers, fighting on one side, would only use part of their artillery,and the Japanese - all the guns on both sides. Theoretically, this reasoning may be true, but in practice it is not, since even the most effective reception of armored fleets - "crossing T" or "stick over T", theoretically allowed the "stick over T" fleet to fight on both sides and, accordingly, with an order VC. Vitgefta was unacceptable for cruisers.
In favor of the decision of V. K. Vitgeft, it can be noted that from the enemy artillerymen one would expect the concentration of fire on the lead ship of the independently maneuvering detachment of cruisers. Until recently, the Port Arthur cruiser was headed by the armored Bayan, capable of withstanding such fire, because the heavy 305-mm guns of the Japanese battleships would be linked by battle with the main forces of the Russian squadron, and the Bayan was quite well protected from the enemy's rapid-fire cannons. However, on July 14, 1904, the only armored cruiser of the squadron was blown up by a mine and could not participate in the battle, the armored "Askold" was supposed to lead the cruiser, for which the Japanese 6-inch shells would be much more dangerous than for the "Bayan". Unfortunately, we can assume that V. K. Vitgeft deliberately limited the freedom of action of the cruisers, realizing how much their capabilities had diminished with the failure of the squadron's only armored cruiser, since the specified additions to the "Instruction" by S. O. Makarov were given to them on June 6, long before the Bayan went out of action.
Also, Wilhelm Karlovich made other changes, but all of them, by and large, are of little significance and did not relate to the basic principles of the squadron, established by S. O. Makarov. Thus, one cannot temporarily reproach id. the commander of the Pacific squadron in that he did not give his subordinates a battle plan: the Russian commanders were supplied with no less, and even more detailed instructions than their Japanese "colleagues". But a psychological problem arose, which Wilhelm Karlovich did not see or did not consider necessary to solve.
The fact is that the "Instructions" of S. O. Makarov assumed offensive tactics, giving the flagships enough freedom and the right to make independent decisions. Such an approach was completely understandable to the officers while Stepan Osipovich himself commanded the fleet, not only allowing, but demanding reasonable initiative from his subordinates. At the same time, the leadership style of the governor Alekseev and V. K. Vitgefta demanded only obedience and strict observance of orders given by the authorities, the initiative was suppressed by the eternal "take care and not take risks." That is why it is easy to refer to the "Instruction" of S. O. Makarov was for V. K. Vitgeft is not enough, he should still agree to the proposal of his officers and explain what he expects from them in battle. VC. Vitgeft did not do this, which is why we can assume that the commanders were in some confusion.
However, if V. K. Witgeft ignored the wishes of his flagships in terms of discussing tactics, then the task of breaking through was set as clearly and clearly as possible:
“Whoever can, will break through,” the admiral said, “not to wait for anyone, not even to save, without delaying because of this; in case of impossibility to continue the journey, to be thrown ashore and, if possible, to rescue the crews, and to sink and blow up the ship; if it is not possible to continue the journey, but it becomes possible to reach a neutral port, then enter the neutral port, even if it were necessary to disarm, but in no way return to Arthur, and only a ship completely knocked out near Port Arthur, which certainly cannot follow further, willy-nilly he returns to Arthur."
An exception, as mentioned above, was made only for the Retvizan damaged by a 120-mm projectile.
In total V. K. Vitgeft led the 18 warships listed in the table below to break through.
One 305-mm gun in the battleship "Sevastopol" was damaged and could not function at all, one more gun of the same bow turret "Retvizan" could not shoot at long distances. In addition, the battleships lacked four 152-mm guns: two on the Retvizan, one each on the Pobeda and Peresvet. Presumably, this almost did not affect the power of the detachment's onboard salvo, since most likely, they did not install running guns on both battleships-cruisers, which were almost useless in linear combat. If this assumption is correct, then the absence of 4 six-inch guns led to a weakening of the onboard fire by only one such weapon. The sources note that the Pobeda crew was very tired, which had to install 7 six-inch guns, despite the fact that the installation was not finally completed (they did not have time to fit the shields to three guns).
In total, 8 destroyers of the 1st detachment went out with the squadron to break through. The rest of the ships of this detachment could not go to sea: "Vigilant" - due to a malfunction in the boilers, "Battle" was blown up by a torpedo from a Japanese mine boat, and although it managed to get from Tahe Bay to the harbor of Port Arthur, it was never repaired was until the fall of the fortress. The destroyers of the second detachment were in such poor technical condition that they could not go for a breakthrough.
The Japanese were able to oppose the Russian ships that went out to sea with 4 combat detachments, which included 4 squadron battleships, 4 armored cruisers, a coastal defense battleship (Chin-Yen), 10 armored cruisers, 18 fighters and 31 destroyers. The main combat force, of course, was the 1st combat detachment, the composition of which is presented below:
In addition, Heihachiro Togo had two cruising squads. The 3rd combat detachment under the command of Vice Admiral S. Deva included the armored cruiser Yakumo and the armored cruisers Kasagi, Chitose and Takasago - perhaps the best armored cruisers in the Japanese fleet. The 6th combat detachment under the flag of Rear Admiral M. Togo consisted of the armored cruisers Akashi, Suma and Akitsushima - these ships were very small cruisers of unsuccessful construction. In addition, there was the 5th combat detachment, commanded by Rear Admiral H. Yamada, as part of the Chin-Yen coastal defense battleship and the Hasidate and Matsushima armored cruisers. These were old ships that had limited combat capability in naval combat and were more suitable for bombarding the coast. Outside the detachments were the Asama armored cruiser and the Izumi and Itsukushima armored cruisers.
Such a distribution of ships by detachments does not seem very reasonable - sometimes you have to read that H. Togo should have combined his most modern armored ships into one fist - in this case, he would have received a tangible superiority in firepower over the detachment of battleships V. K. Vitgeft. But the point was that the Japanese commander could not know in advance the date of the Russian squadron's breakout. Accordingly, H. Togo positioned his ships in the best way, perhaps, for solving his tasks - observing Port Arthur and covering Biziwo and Dalny.
The exit from Port Arthur was patrolled by numerous detachments of fighters and destroyers, to the south and about 15 miles from Port Arthur were the "dogs" of Vice Admiral S. Dev, reinforced by "Yakumo". The armored cruisers Nissin and Kasuga were located southeast of Port Arthur and out of sight.
The Russian cruising detachment, even with the Bayan out of service, was a rather formidable force and was able (at least theoretically) not only to drive away destroyers from Arthur, but also to successfully fight the "dogs" - armored "Takasago", "Chitose" and "Kasagi" and if not defeat, then at least drive them away. But with the "addition" in the form of the Yakumo, the Japanese became obviously stronger than the Arthurian cruisers. Likewise, the "Nissin" and "Kasuga" were cruisers N. K. Reitenstein is too tough. Consequently, V. K. Vitgeft was completely unable to drive off the Japanese patrols and bring their battleships out to sea unnoticed by the Japanese: however, even if something suddenly went wrong, there was still the 6th detachment of three cruisers at Encounter Cliff.
The main forces of H. Togo were located at the Round Island, from where they could equally quickly intercept the Russian squadron, should it follow the breakthrough to Vladivostok or to Dalniy or Bitszyvo. If cruisers or destroyers had ventured to make a sortie from Port Arthur to Biziwo, they would have encountered old armored cruisers, destroyers and Chin-Yen in the Dalny and Talienwan Bay area. And in any case, Biziwo itself and the Elliot Islands, where the Japanese had a temporary base, were covered by the Asama, Izumi and Itsukushima, capable of at least engaging the Russian cruising detachment in battle before the arrival of reinforcements.
Thus, Kh. Togo brilliantly solved the problem of blocking the Russian squadron, providing a multilayer cover for everything that he was supposed to defend. But the price of this was a certain fragmentation of his forces: when V. K. Vitgefta at sea and the Yakumo and Asama were too far from the main Japanese forces. Only "Nissin" and "Kasuga" were located so that they could easily connect with the battleships of H. Togo, so that the 1st combat detachment could fight in full force.
The Vladivostok cruisers still managed to draw off part of the Japanese fleet: the main forces of the 2nd combat detachment of Vice Admiral Kh. Kamimura (4 armored cruisers) and three armored cruisers of the 4th combat squad were located on Tsushima island, from where they could within two days to join the main forces, or move towards Vladivostok to intercept the "Russia", "Rurik" and "Thunder-Boy".
At 4.30 am on July 28, 1904, the Russian ships began to separate the pairs. The trawling caravan, under the cover of the 1st destroyer detachment, entered the outer roadstead and at 5.30 began clearing it from mines, at about the same time the "Novik" and "Askold" joined the destroyers.
At 05.50 the teams were given breakfast. A detachment of gunboats of Rear Admiral M. F. Loshchinsky, the first battleship Tsesarevich followed them at 0600, accompanied by the destroyers of the 2nd detachment "Fast" and "Statny". At the same time, the battleship's radio station tried to suppress the Japanese negotiations. At 08.30, the last of the ships going for the breakthrough, the armored cruiser Diana, moved to the outer roadstead.
By this time, the exit of the Russian squadron was no longer a secret for the Japanese - they were told everything by the thick smoke that poured from the Russian chimneys when the battleships and cruisers bred steam on the inner roadstead. Therefore, it is not surprising that even before the squadron entered the outer roadstead, its actions were observed by Matsushima, Hasidate, Nissin, Kassuga, as well as 4 gunboats and numerous destroyers. The Japanese had no problems with wireless telegraph.
At about 08.45 on the battleship "Tsesarevich" a signal was raised: "To unanchor and take your place in the ranks", and when the ship began to unanchor: "Prepare for battle." At about 08.50 the ships lined up in a wake column and at a speed of 3-5 knots moved behind the trawling caravan.
Usually, the exit from the outer roadstead was carried out as follows: there were minefields to the south and east of the outer roadstead, but there was a small passage between them. Following to the southeast, the ships followed this passage between the minefields and then turned to the east, but this time Rear Admiral V. K. Vitgeft, quite sensibly fearing any Japanese "surprises" on the usual route, led his squadron in a different way. Instead of passing between the flooded Japanese fire ships, lead the squadron right between the minefields and then turn to the right (east), V. K. Vitgeft immediately turned left behind the fire-ships and went through his own minefield - Russian ships did not go there and, accordingly, there was no reason to wait for Japanese mines. This was definitely the right decision.
The squadron followed the trawling caravan along the Tiger Peninsula to Cape Liaoteshan. At 09.00 "Tsesarevich" raised the signal:
"The fleet is informed that the emperor has ordered to go to Vladivostok."
