You can now get to the islands of the Moonsund archipelago through any of the Baltic republics, since there are no borders between them and a visa to any of the three states allows you to safely move throughout the Baltic. There is a ferry service in the small village of Virtsu on the Estonian coast. From where once an hour a ferry leaves for the islands. On the island of Muhu, the port of Kaivisto welcomes travelers with the noise of a port under construction. Once Kaivisto was the base of the Baltic Fleet destroyers, from where they went out in dashing raids on enemy convoys. For 18 years this is the territory of sovereign Estonia, and most of the flow of tourists coming to the islands are tourists from Finland.
It takes half an hour to cross the island of Muhu along the highway, its population is small - about two thousand people. There is not a soul around, only occasionally a car rushes towards you or the red tiled roof of an Estonian farm flickers in the green of the trees.
Suddenly, the road leads to a wide dam connecting the island of Muhu with the main island of the Moonsund archipelago - Saaremaa. The capital of the island - the city of Kuressaare - is about seventy kilometers along the highway. There is silence and tranquility all around, and it is even difficult to imagine that in the last century these islands became the scene of fierce battles during the First and Second World Wars. The dramatic events that took place in these places are described in the novel by Valentin Pikul "Moonzund".
During the First World War, fierce battles were fought in the Baltic between the Russian and German fleets. To the credit of the Russian Andreevsky flag for the entire three-year period of 1914-1917, the Kaiser's battleships did not manage to establish themselves in the Baltic. This became possible thanks to the competent actions of the command of the Russian fleet and the commander of the Baltic Fleet, Vice Admiral Otto Karlovich von Essen. Under his leadership, the defense of the Gulf of Finland and Riga was organized in such a way that the enemy fleet could not enter them until the October Revolution.
The key position in the defense of the Gulf of Riga was the Svorbe Peninsula with Cape Tserel, which protrudes deeply into the Irbensky Strait, connecting the Gulf of Riga with the Baltic Sea. You can get to Cape Tserel from the capital of the island, the city of Kuressaare, by car in about forty minutes. The Svorbe Peninsula is about seventy kilometers long, but narrows in places to one kilometer. The closer to Cape Tserel, the more clearly the approach of the sea is felt. And now the last settlement of Mento is left behind, and at a fork in the road we stop near a strange monument. On it there is an inscription in Estonian and German: "To the soldiers who died at Cape Tserel". Most likely, a tribute to modern political correctness, without mentioning who these soldiers, invaders or defenders are. On the very cape, the smell of the sea and seaside meadow grasses walks, there are small pines bent in the direction of the prevailing winds. Through the strait, and here it is about 28 kilometers wide, the coast of Latvia can be seen through binoculars. The road goes to the left, and a little to the side, among small hills and craters, there are the concrete bases of the four guns of the famous 43rd battery. There is a small sign in Estonian by the path leading to the battery. A brief description of the battery and the name of its commander is Senior Lieutenant Bartenev.
Even in the remnants of the battery, one can feel the power that these weapons once possessed. The entire position of the battery takes about a kilometer along the front. The extreme guns, apparently, had no protection and stood in open positions, the two central guns had protection from the rear in the form of two-meter thick belts, which have survived to this day. The building of the Soviet frontier post was attached to the position of the third gun. The building is safe and sound, windows and doors are safe. There is even a border tower. We climb it, and to our surprise we find that relative order has been preserved on it. Remnants of documentation on the wall with the silhouettes of ships, a searchlight and even a canvas soldier's raincoat hanging on a hanger. As if the Soviet border guards left here yesterday, and not nineteen years ago. The tower offers a beautiful view of the sea and the lighthouse, standing on a spit far out in the sea, on the territory of the battery itself. Only from a height you can see how the surrounding space is pitted with funnels. A lot of blood was shed for this piece of land both in 1917 and 1944, as evidenced by memorial signs installed near the battery, and the burial of Wehrmacht soldiers preserved by local residents.
So, some facts. Battery No. 43 was the most powerful at Cape Tserel. The battery was commanded by senior lieutenant Bartenev, who became the prototype of the protagonist of the novel by Valentin Pikul "Moonzund" by senior lieutenant Arteniev.
Nikolai Sergeevich Bartenev was born in 1887 and came from an old noble family. His grandfather P. I. Bartenev was a famous Russian historian, Pushkin scholar, publisher of the Russian Archive magazine.
NS. Bartenev graduated from the Naval Cadet Corps, a course in artillery officer classes. From the very beginning of the officer's service, the fate of Bartenev was inextricably linked with the Baltic Fleet. In 1912 he was promoted to lieutenant and was appointed junior artillery officer on the armored cruiser Rurik. With the outbreak of World War I, in December 1914, he was assigned to the naval fortress of Emperor Peter the Great on the island of Worms. In March 1915, he became the commander of Battery No. 33 on the Werder Peninsula and took part in repelling the attacks of the Kaiser's fleet on the coast of modern Latvia. Here Bartenev received his first military award - the Order of St. Stanislav III degree. Then, in July 1916, he was appointed second artillery officer on the battleship Slava, a ship that made an invaluable contribution to the defense of the Baltic coast during the First World War. On this ship, Bartenev had a chance to participate in many operations to support the ground forces and protect the sea approaches to Petrograd, Riga and Revel. The Orders of St. Anne of the III degree and St. Stanislav of the II degree with swords and bows became a worthy assessment of the courage and combat skill of a naval artillery officer.
Meanwhile, the situation on the fronts began to develop not in favor of Russia. The internal political situation in the country has also deteriorated significantly. The February Revolution broke out, the emperor abdicated the throne. A wave of bloody massacres of naval officers swept through the Baltic Fleet. Most of the victims were at the main bases of the fleet - in Kronstadt and Helsingfors, where the influence of various extremist political organizations was especially strongly felt.
During this turbulent time, Senior Lieutenant Bartenev was appointed commander of battery No. 43, located at Cape Tserel, Saaremaa Island in the Moonzund Archipelago. This battery was built by the outstanding Russian fortifier N. I. Ungern from the fall of 1916 and entered service in April 1917. NS. Bartenev was entrusted with the command of the most modern and powerful for that time defensive artillery complex, consisting of four open positions of 305-mm guns and two armored caponiers. To supply the battery, a 4.5-kilometer narrow-gauge railway line was laid between it and the Mento pier. Each coastal artillery installation was an imposing structure with a cannon barrel 16 meters long and weighing more than 50 tons. At the same time, the installation height was 6 meters, the total weight was more than 120 tons. Each unit was serviced by a team of over 120 people. In this case, only the weight of the projectile was 470 kg. The projectile was lifted to the feed line with a manual winch, and then 6 people sent it into the barrel with a punch. Powder charges weighing 132 kg were also sent manually. The 1911 high-explosive projectile carried 60 kg of explosive, had an initial speed of 800 m / s and a flight range of 28 km. Thus, the entire Irbensky Strait, which was the only passage for ships to the Gulf of Riga, was in the range of battery fire.
In addition, for the defense of the Irbene Strait, the Russian fleet fielded about 10,000 mines over the three years of the war, and in 1917, in connection with the capture of the Kurland coast (the Baltic coast of modern Latvia) by the Germans, the Russian fleet set up an additional large minefield at Cape Domesnes (Kolkasrags).
The German fleet has repeatedly tried to sweep mines in the Irbensky Strait, but every attempt to sweep the fairway was repelled by the fire of the Tserel batteries. The Germans understood that without destroying the 43rd battery, they would not be able to break through with large forces into the Gulf of Riga.
In September 1917, German air raids on the battery became more frequent, on September 18, as a result of one of them, a powder magazine caught fire, followed by an explosion, as a result of which 121 people died, including several senior officers, and Senior Lieutenant Bartenev was seriously injured.
In October 1917, taking advantage of the economic and political chaos beginning in Russia, the Germans launched Operation Albion, the ultimate goal of which was to capture the Moonsund Archipelago and drive the Russian fleet out of the Gulf of Riga.
It should be added that in October 1917 the disintegration of discipline in the army and navy, provoked by the criminal actions of the Provisional Government, reached its peak. Fundamental principles that ensured the maintenance of discipline and order in the armed forces were abolished, orders of officers were declared unenforceable, commanders were elected and removed from office at meetings and rallies, each commander was assigned a representative of a committee of soldiers' deputies, who, often without sufficient experience and military knowledge, intervened in the leadership of hostilities.
Senior Lieutenant Bartenev found himself in a very difficult situation. Its battery was not intended for firing on the land front, its guns were directed only towards the sea. The Germans, taking advantage of the massive desertion and lack of military discipline in the troops defending the coast of the Moonsund Islands, landed troops and approached the battery from land, cutting off the escape route. At the same time, the main forces of the Kaiser's fleet began an offensive from the sea through the Irbensky Strait.
On October 14, 1917, Senior Lieutenant Bartenev gave the order to open fire on German battleships that appeared in the range of the Tserel battery. He perfectly understood that by holding back the main forces of the German fleet at the entrance to the Gulf of Riga, his battery enabled the Baltic Fleet to carry out the necessary regrouping and organize the evacuation of Russian troops and population from the islands to the mainland. The first volleys were successful, the German battleships, having received several hits, began to retreat, firing at the battery. Two of the four guns were damaged, but the worst thing was that the servants of the guns began to scatter under enemy fire. This is how Nikolai Sergeevich himself describes the battle that he led, being at the observation post, equipped at the lighthouse: "… Two cannons soon went out of order. From the central one I was told that the team was running away from the guns, which was visible from the lighthouse. First, the servant cellars and feed, hid behind the cellar and fled into the dugouts and further into the forest, then the lower servants also escaped, i.e. the feed finally stopped. They ran first from the 2nd gun, then from the 1st and 3rd, and only the 4th gun fired to the end. For me, the flight of the team was a surprise, since the enemy's shooting was nasty, while our team was fired upon by the previous frequent bombing. The chairman of the battery committee, miner Savkin (based on the novel Travkin), who was my telephone operator at the lighthouse, was furious at the behavior of the team and demanded to shoot the fugitives, while the others were outraged and suppressed by this."
But neither the flight of a part of the team, nor the shelling of the battery by German battleships could break the courage of the Russian officer and the soldiers and sailors who remained faithful to their military duty. Well-aimed battery fire forced the German battleships to retreat. Thus, the attempt of the Kaiser's fleet to break through into the Gulf of Riga was thwarted. Bartenev tried to organize the continuation of the defense of the strait, for which, ignoring warnings about provocateurs who had infiltrated the soldiers' masses, he went to the barracks to the soldiers: “Taking into account the whole situation and the beginning complete demoralization and systematic provocation … In case I remain at my post, and it is necessary that everyone stay in their places; the same bastard who does not want to fight, but wants to surrender, can go wherever he wants, I will not delay."
According to Bartenev, when the Germans, who had already captured almost all of Ezel, offered Knüpfer honorable terms of surrender, he said that he would order the "self-seekers" who would bring the envoys to him to be shot, and the envoys themselves to be hanged. Tserel's batteries held out until the end.
The coast of the Svorbe peninsula, according to the descriptions of eyewitnesses, was a continuous yellow-red strip of fire, from which prominences of greenish bursts burst out to the sky. In the hot glow of the glow from Tserel, people could be seen on the water fleeing in boats and rafts. The ships decided that battery 43 had already been captured by the Germans. After all, it is impossible in this hell, in this chaos, in these almost hopeless conditions, to still hold on and hold on. The Russian battleship "Citizen" was ordered to destroy the Tserel batteries so that they would not fall into the hands of the enemy. And the ship's guns were already firing when the searchlight beam found the figure of a man, barely visible in the water, spread out on the board. Raised on deck, he kept shouting: "What are you doing? Shooting at your own people!" It turned out that Tserel's batteries were still alive, the sailors were still shooting, they were still resisting.
Senior Lieutenant Bartenev under fire from the Kaiser's battleships with the few officers and sailors who remained with him mined and detonated guns and ammunition. With the loss of the 43rd battery, the Baltic states were lost to Russia for many decades. On October 17, 1917, the German squadron entered the Gulf of Riga. For two more days naval battles continued, the battleship "Slava", the ship on which NS had served, perished. Bartenev. The battleship's hull lay to the bottom, blocking the fairway for the passage of ships in the Moonsund Strait.
Bartenev himself, while trying to break through from the encirclement, was captured by German captives. In captivity, he was interrogated by the commander of the German squadron, Admiral Souchon. During interrogation, the Germans confirmed that the fire from the 43rd battery had caused severe damage on the battleship Kaiser and forced the German squadron to abandon an immediate breakthrough into the Gulf of Riga.
NS. Bartenev returned from German captivity in September 1918 and was accepted by the Bolsheviks to serve in the naval general headquarters. Lenin's government appreciated the feat accomplished by the Baltic sailors in the defense of Moonsund. In fact, having delayed the German offensive against Petrograd, they made it possible for the Bolsheviks to seize and retain power in the country.
During the Civil War, N. S. Bartenev, as a military expert, fought on the side of the Reds as part of the Severodvinsk river flotilla, received another award for bravery and a shell shock, which forced him to leave service in 1922. The wound received on September 18, 1917 on Tserel during a night bombardment also had an effect.
Until the end of the twenties, N. S. Bartenev worked as a geography teacher at the Higher School of the Red Army. But the persecution of the former officers of the tsarist army began, and Nikolai Sergeevich was forced to leave Moscow. He settled in Pavlovsky Posad, where he worked as an engineer at a factory.
Unlike the hero of V. Pikul's novel "Moonzund" by NS. Bartenev was a family man, he had three sons - Peter, Vladimir and Sergei. When the Great Patriotic War began, Nikolai Sergeevich asked to be sent to the front. But age and wounds did not allow Bartenev to fight. On the altar of Victory, he put the most precious thing that he had - all three of his sons died a heroic death, defending the Motherland. After the war, Nikolai Sergeevich lived in Moscow and died in 1963 at the age of 76.
Unfortunately, in modern Estonia, the war against the monuments to our Russian soldiers who laid down their heads on this land is gaining momentum. It is not scary to fight with the dead or the dead, they cannot answer and stand up for themselves. This does not require the courage and fearlessness that the senior lieutenant of the Russian fleet Nikolai Sergeevich Bartenev showed under a hail of German shells back in 1917. It was the last battle of the Russian imperial fleet …
