On April 9, 1906, a training squadron for diving of the Russian Imperial Navy was formed in Libau.
In the history of the Russian Navy, and primarily in the history of its submarine forces, 1906 occupies a very special place. He became the time from which these forces actually count their destiny. On March 19 (according to the new style), the All-Russian Emperor Nicholas II imperially ordered the inclusion of a new class in the classification of ships of the Russian navy - submarines. And less than a month after this significant event (in memory of which the Russian Day of the Submariner is now celebrated on March 19), something else happened, no less important - and perhaps even more. After all, it is not enough to introduce a new class of warships and start building or buying them - first of all, people are needed who will serve on these ships and without whom they will remain dead iron. So the tsar's decree of April 9 (new style) April 1906 on the creation of the first diving training unit in the country in the structure of the Libau seaport of Alexander III is of particular importance for all generations of Russian submariners.
Like many other events of military history, the day of the signing of the decree on the creation of the Libau detachment, of course, should not be considered the true starting point of the fate of this unit. The earliest documentary mention of him is a document by which the State Council (the upper chamber of the legislative institution of the Russian Empire at that time) approved the composition of the ships and vessels of the diving training squad. According to the decision of the State Council, the detachment included the floating base "Khabarovsk" and the supporting steamer "Slavyanka", as well as four submarines, which, according to the classification adopted at that time, were considered destroyers: "Beluga", "Losos", "Peskar", "Sig" and "Sterlet". And the head of the detachment was appointed the legendary hero of the Russian-Japanese war, the commander of the battleship Retvizan and one of the most active propagandists of diving - not long before he was promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral Eduard Schensnovich.
Eduard Schensnovich. Source: libava.ru
He got down to business with his characteristic energy, and pretty soon the news that the legendary Schensnovich was recruiting naval officers and sailors to serve on new warships - submarines - spread throughout the Russian fleet. This is how Captain 2nd Rank Georgy (Harald) Graf, at that time midshipman, recalled his attempt to get into a new unit: “At that time, submarines appeared for the first time, and young officers, given their enormous combat significance in the future, began to strive to get into the detachment to become "submariners" My friend, midshipman Kossakovsky, and I, too, came to the conclusion that why shouldn't we go on the underwater part. But we heard that warrant officers were not very eagerly hired into the Training detachment, which, in essence, was very correct, since the warrant officers were still too inexperienced officers. However, we, as participants in the campaign of the 2nd Pacific Squadron and the Tsushima battle, could be an exception. Therefore, before submitting the official reports, we decided to go to the head of the detachment and get his consent to take us among the listeners. Rear-Admiral Shchensnovich, known throughout the fleet for his severity and captiousness, was appointed the head of the Scuba Diving Training Detachment (for the sake of simplicity, he was called Shcha). He especially found fault with the poor midshipmen. His favorite epithet was "midshipman is not an officer," which, of course, greatly outraged us. The admiral kept his flag on the Khabarovsk transport, which stood in the canal near the outport and served as a mother for the submarines. The entire personnel of the submarines lived on it, since it was impossible to live on the boats themselves. Finally we were called to the admiral's cabin. He was sitting at the writing-table, and when we appeared, he immediately began to look at us with a searching eye. We bowed and stood at attention. He nodded his head not particularly affably and said abruptly: "Sit down." For a good hour, he tormented us, asking tricky questions about the arrangement of ships on which we served. Finally, he said sternly: “Although you are warrant officers and you should have served as officers of watch on large ships, you can submit reports on enrollment in the detachment; there will be no obstacles on my part”.
By the time Georgy Graf recalls, such renowned officers as Aleksey Andreev (commander of the submarine "Beluga"), Pavel Keller (commander of the submarine "Peskar"), Ivan Riznich (commander of the submarine "Sterlet "), Alexander Gadd (commander of the Sig submarine), Viktor Golovin (commander of the Losos submarine), as well as Mikhail Babitsyn (assistant commander of the Pescary) and Vasily Merkushev (assistant commander of the Siga). Later, four more submarines were included in the Diving Training Squad: "Mackerel" under the command of Mikhail Beklemishev, "Lamprey", commanded by Ivan Brovtsyn, as well as "Okun" (commander - Timofey von der Raab-Thielen) and the world's first submarine with a single engine - "Postal", commanded by Appolinarius Nikiforaki.
The mere listing of the names of the submarine commanders who served in the Scuba Diving Training Squad testifies to the place this unit occupied from the first days in the structure of the submarine forces of the Russian fleet. Almost each of the named sailors managed to become a legend of the Russian submarine before the end of the First World War and command more than one boat. Moreover, until 1914, every single submarine of domestic and foreign projects, which entered service in the Russian Imperial Navy, passed through the Training Detachment. It was here, in Libau, that crews were formed for them and they began to teach them how to handle the units and mechanisms of their submarines.
To cope with this task, the sailors who got into the Libau detachment had to go through a serious training program. It included such courses as the construction of submarines, the construction of internal combustion engines - electrical engineering, mine weapons, diving, and even such a strange at first glance, but in fact vital course, like the hygiene of a submariner. It took officers 10 months to master all the intricacies of these courses, and from 4 to 10 months for sailors, depending on their specialty. At the same time, the officers, who, of course, had to study much more intensively, were trained in two classes in less than a year - junior and senior. The first gave theoretical training, the second was responsible for practical sailing on submarines. And the training ended with training torpedo firing at the vessel "Khabarovsk" - the floating base of the Libavsky detachment. The officers, in addition, had to pass a special exam, which was taken by a commission formed by the Main Naval Headquarters. Those who withstood this test with honor were awarded the title of "Scuba Diving Officer", and since 1909 they were also awarded a special badge with the image of a submarine, approved by Nicholas II on January 26 of the same year.
After the outbreak of the First World War, the Scuba Diving Training Squad was evacuated from Libava, first to Revel (present-day Tallinn), and in April 1915 to St. Petersburg, where he - more precisely, his current heir - is still located today. In Soviet times, it was called the Kirov Red Banner Scuba Diving Training Squad, in 2006 it was reorganized into a naval school for junior specialists, and in December 2010 it became a member of the Baltic Fleet Training Squad. But the traditions laid down by the first commanders, teachers and students of the Scuba Diving Training Squad continue to this day - after all, the high rank of a Russian submariner simply does not allow anything else.
