Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IV RUSSIAN SUBMARINES The Imperial Russian Navy at the commencement of hostilities included 37 submarines in active service, and 19 in various stages of construction. The composition and distribution of the submarine flotillas was as follows: ? Baltic Flotilla: 14 Submarines with dep6t ships in commission, and 12 vessels building. Bases: Kronstadt, Port Peter the Great (Reval) -jnd Port Alexander III. (Libau) (ice free). Black Sea Flotilla: 11 Submarines with depot ships in commission, and several new vessels building. Bases: Sevastopol and Nikolaieff. Siberian Flotilla: 12 Submarineswith depot ships in commission, and 6 vessels building. Base: Vladivostok. The first Russian naval submarine was completed at Kronstadt in 1902, and named the Petr Kochka. She was built in sections to facilitate transport over the Siberian Railway, being intended for the defence of Port Arthur, and had a surface displacement of only 20 tons. Her armament consisted of two holders, or Darzewiecki launching apparatus, containing two small Whitehead torpedoes. The maximum speed was 8 knots on the surface and 4 knots when submerged. The second submarine ordered for the Russian Navy was the Delphin, which foundered off Kronstadt, but was subsequently raised and is now used as a training ship for the submarine service. These two vessels have been removed from the active flotillas, but the third vessel to be built for the Russian Navy ?the Graf Cheremetieve?is still in commission. Graf Cheremetieve Class. (Completed 1904-5.) Graf Cheremetieve. Kasatka. Nalim. Skat- These are the oldest submarines in the Russian Navy, and are small vessels of the Holland-Bubnoff type. They have a submerged displacement of 200 tons. Petrol and electric engines drive them at 9 knots on the su…