The clouds obscured the moon that dark and rainy night, and the black launches moved slowly, their wakes gentle on the quiet river. The lead launch seemingly shuddered, picked up speed and quickly turned toward some dark masses on the river. The stillness of the night was broken by a sharp challenge, repeated and then again. The answer, “Friend,” found reply in the whine of a bullet. The masses came alive, assumed shape, and gave off sounds of sleepy voices raised in questioning alarm, the patter of bare feet and urgent commands to man posts and commence firing. One launch, its spar torpedo extended, shot under the bow of a now clearly- defined and awakened warship. The torpedo was dropped into the water, striking the hull with the clank of metal on metal, and climaxing in the muffled roar of dynamite exploding under water.
This incident, reminiscent of the campaigns on the western rivers during the Civil War and influenced by them, occurred in the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878. Known to us mainly for the role played in it by American-made rifles in the hands of the Turks, and for the emergence of Russia’s last great seaman, Admiral Stepan Makarov, this war is also of interest to the naval reader because of the Makarov-inspired use of mines, spar torpedoes, and torpedo boats by the Imperial Russian Navy to secure control of the Danube against numerous and heavy Turkish naval units. Russian naval control of the Danube was an absolute necessity if the Russian Army was to invade the European portion of the Ottoman Empire and gain decisive victory over the Turk.
On 24 April 1877, Tsar Alexander II of Russia ordered his forces to cross the Turkish frontier, ostensibly to protect the rights of Christian minorities in the Ottoman Empire, but also with an eye to fulfilling the long- cherished dream of giving Russia access to the shores of the Bosporus. The Russian strategy was straightforward. One arm of a strategic pincer was aimed through the Balkans, crossing the independent principality of Rumania with its consent and piercing the Turkish Empire in modern-day Bulgaria with Constantinople as its ultimate goal. The other arm, originating in Georgia, was directed through the Transcaucasia and into the breadth of Turkey.
The Russian plan of advance through Southeastern Europe was complicated, however, by the provisions of the Treaty of Paris of 1856 which ended the Crimean War. By that Treaty, the Russian Black Sea fleet was destroyed, and although Russia had been able to set aside other provisions by 1877, it had not been able to construct a fleet on the Black Sea capable of coping with Turkey’s English- built ironclads. The lack of a suitable fleet precluded a Russian advance down the shore of the Black Sea to Constantinople, a route which might have given the Russians the quick, decisive victory they sought and needed.
The Russian main line of advance originated in the vicinity of Odessa and was directed west to Bucharest, and then south across the Danube at Nikopolis or at some point between that and Rustchuk. The Danube, flowing eastward to the Black Sea, formed the boundary between the Ottoman Empire and Rumania. This frontier was anchored in the west by the fortress of Vidin, in the center by that of Rustchuk, and on the Lower Danube by those of Silistria and Braila. After crossing the Danube, the Russian Army was then ordered to advance with protected flanks over the Balkan passes to Adrianople and thence to Constantinople. One Russian force protecting the left flank of the main line of advance was directed to make its crossing of the Danube in the vicinity of the Rumanian city of Galatz.
At the beginning of the war, the Turks had on the Danube near Braila eight large ironclads of not less than 4-inch armor and carrying 30 guns. Near Vidin, high on the river, they had seven light iron-plated gunboats and 18 wooden ships of 1,000 men and 60 guns. The Turkish Naval List of 1876 gives the strength of the Turkish establishment as 132 vessels and 18,292 officers, seamen, and marines. This fleet, commanded by an ex-officer of the English Navy, included 15 costly, English-built seagoing ironclads, five wooden steam-frigates, 11 wooden corvettes, and seven armored river gunboats. The Turkish fleet was, in terms of the number of its ships and the quality of its equipment, one of the finest in the world at that time.
When the Russians crossed the Danube, they had 25 steam launches at various points on the river which had been transported by rail, or carried in the wagons of the Army; later this number was increased to 54. After the crossing, these were used to patrol the river and guard mine barricades. Some of the Russian launches were of a special pattern which could attain a speed of 15 knots. Others were ordinary ship launches with engines protected by boiler plate. The largest of these launches was not over 30 feet in length and carried a crew of 15. The Russian mines were of a common submarine type which could be exploded on contact or by an electrical impulse from a shore station. They were made of sheet copper and filled with dynamite.
In essence, the Russian naval plan for protecting the passage of the Danube was to lay mine barricades across the river designed: to keep the strength of the Turkish fleet on the river divided by preventing the units on the upper and lower portions from joining; to impede movement of the Turkish units onto and on the river; supported by field batteries erected along the river bank, to provide close-in protection of the crossing sites against naval attack; to contain the Turkish ships within their protected moorings and immobilize them; and to attack the Turkish ships underway or at anchor and destroy them by use of mines and spar torpedoes.
The War of 1877-1878 began with the movement of Russian Armies into Rumania, immediately following the Tsar’s order of 24 April. The earliest Russian moves in the Balkans were sure and reflect long premeditation. Within a week of the Russian declaration, the Russian left wing had occupied Galatz on the Lower Danube, cleared neutral shipping from that port, brought torpedo boats over the Rumanian railways, and commenced to compartmentalize the Danube by laying mine barricades at Braila above Galatz, and at Reni below it. The mines were laid in two rows at night by the torpedo boats and protected by 9-pounder field batteries. This Russian action prevented the main Turkish forces on the Black Sea from reinforcing the Turkish Danube flotilla. For the next month, the Russians and Turks kept a lively pace on the Lower Danube. On 6 May, five monitors and two wooden ships of the Turkish upriver flotilla attacked Braila and the defending Russian batteries. On 10 May, the ships attacked again, but a shell from a heavy Russian piece penetrated the deck of the Lufti-Djelil, one of the largest of the Turkish monitors—a twin-screw, seagoing ironclad carrying four Armstrong 150-pounder guns—and exploded in the magazine. She blew up immediately and sank with most of her crew of 17 officers and 200 men. The Turkish captain reportedly was not on board during this action. Two weeks later, a young Russian lieutenant by the name of Dubassoff, sought and obtained permission to attack the Turkish forces lying near Braila. He planned his attack using four steam launches painted black and rigged with spar torpedoes after the manner of Lieutenant William B. Cushing and his attack on the Confederate ram Albemarle. Using the cover of darkness and rain, he attacked a Turkish force of two monitors and one wooden ship lying in mid-channel. Discovered by a sentinel and under fire from the whole Turkish force, Dubassoff made straight for the largest monitor and exploded his torpedo under the ship’s port quarter. This was the Seife, a light- draught river gunboat, carrying two-inch armor, two 80-pound breechloading Armstrong guns forward, and two smaller guns near the stern. The young Russian was dissatisfied with the slow rate of sinking of the Turkish vessel, so he called out to the next launch to “come on.” The explosion of a second spar torpedo amidships caused the Turkish ship to go down within a few minutes. As three of the four Russian boats were now damaged, it took some time before all four could withdraw under constant Turkish heavy and small arms fire. This was finally accomplished without a single Russian casualty.
The Turks gathered a fleet at the Sulina mouth of the Danube below Galatz to prevent Russian gunboats from entering the river. In response, the Russians tried an attack from the Black Sea. On 10 June, the steamer Grand Duke Konstantin left Odessa towing six torpedo boats. That night, the boats put in for the river mouth and passed upriver. They found three Turkish vessels at anchor and one under steam, which they immediately attacked. The attack miscarried, however, as the torpedo of the leading launch prematurely exploded— or was exploded—and alerted the Turks. The Russians were forced to retire, losing one boat and her crew.
In support of the main Russian crossing between Rustchuk and Nikopolis, ten steam launches were carried overland and launched on the Danube on 20 June. A mine barricade was begun immediately to isolate the monitors lying at Rustchuk and prevent them from moving upriver. The launches laying the mines were soon attacked by a Turkish monitor which opened on them with shrapnel. The monitor, in turn, was attacked by a torpedocarrying launch, but the torpedo failed to explode upon contact. However, the monitor had had enough and turned for home. Nearly the entire intrepid crew of the Russian launch was wounded during this action. The Turks belatedly brought up a field artillery battery as the launches finished the barricade and damaged three of them before they could hurry out of range.
The Russians further divided the river by laying mines above Nikopolis on 23 June. This operation was carried out by rowboats as the launches had been assigned troop transport roles in the river crossing; a similar role had been given to the launches at Galatz. A Turkish monitor, commanded by an English officer, which was at Nikopolis came down river on the same day, but was immediately attacked with spar torpedoes by two launches as well as by some light Russian field guns. Again the torpedo failed. The Turkish ship, under accurate shore fire, retired to her anchorage at Nikopolis. The next day, 24 June, another monitor from Nikopolis attempted to escape upriver but was turned back by Russian siege guns before she could reach the mine barricade. Newspaper dispatches of this war relate that the Russians, having discovered a Turkish monitor at anchor on the river, or under the protection of fortifications, would encircle the vessel with a ring of mines laid at night in order to immobilize it.
After 24 June 1877, no Turkish gunboat on the Danube was able to leave the shelter of Turkish fortresses until the end of the war in March 1878. In addition to the two monitors sunk on the river, the Russians captured two at the subsequent surrender of Nikopolis, while three monitors sat out the rest of the war at Rustchuk. Of the Turkish ironclads lying at the Sulina mouth of the Danube, one was sunk by a mine in October 1877, while the others remained idle.
This history of the Turkish fleet on the Danube is one of complete failure. By the time the war was two months old, ships and groups of ships were isolated from one another by Russian mine barricades and their crews were terrified of the Russian torpedoes. The Turks made no move to sweep the barricades. Their river flotilla did not even delay the Russian advance—high water on the river did that— much less obstruct it. By forethought, planning, imagination, skillful propaganda and audacity, the Russian Navy was able to reduce to impotence a large Turkish fleet whose equipment was certainly among the best in the world. The Russian neutralization of the Turkish river fleet was not a haphazard solution. It was a calculated answer using available forces to achieve a specific objective, well thought-out in advance, planned-for and coordinated with the Army in detail, and executed with precision and dash. The torpedo boats were with the van of the advancing Russian Armies, torpedoes and naval supplies were present when needed, and augmented by Army manpower and engineer officers. The Russians quickly placed their mine barricades in advantageous locations and covered them with field batteries. From contemporary newspaper accounts, we learn that the Russian effort to dominate the Danube was a joint Army/Navy venture with senior Russian naval officers present on the staff's of the forward division commanders. The Russian naval successes were abetted by a Turkish inability to comprehend the new naval weapons and to neutralize them realistically. There appears to have been no Turkish spirit confident enough to “damn the torpedoes.”
The lack of an effective Russian navy on the Black Sea dominated the Russian strategy in the Balkans throughout the war. The easiest and shortest route, allowing the Russians to advance in a concentrated mass, would have been a march down the shore of the Black Sea to Constantinople, protected by the guns of the fleet—had there been one on the Black Sea—and supplied by sea. There are few geographical barriers along this route and they would not have caused the Russian Army much trouble. Varna was the only fortress in the way, and its fortifications were not designed to withstand shells from rifled artillery —this was subsequently proven. A Russian march along this route might well have been comparatively short and decisive. The Russian Army, instead, had to detour inland—to Bucharest—penetrate a defended river line while dissipating its own strength masking fortresses threatening its flanks, and pierce a defended mountain line. It had to march with lengthened communications over a long road of poor quality, and utterly defeat the Turks before the Great Powers could move to force a peace. The length of the campaign, however, gave the Great Powers their chance and, led by the British, they forced a peace by the Treaty of San Stefano of March 1878. Although by its terms, the Turks were almost pushed off the European land mass, retaining Thrace, Salonika, and Albania, the Russians did not gain overlordship of the Dardanelles. The lack of modern ships and a strategic doctrine appreciative of blue water was as heavily felt by the Russians at the conference table as it had been during the campaign in the Balkans. One postwar result was a Russian naval expansion which by 1897 brought Russia close to France in ranking as a naval power.