Lenin (icebreaker)

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Icebreaker Lenin, built at Newcastle upon Tyne and completed in June 1917, was the largest Russian icebreaker of her time. Her design was supervised by Russian naval architect and author Yevgeny Zamyatin.^[1] This icebreaker was named St. Alexander Nevsky when it came out of the docks after Russian statesman and military hero Alexander Nevsky.

Following the Russian Revolution of 1917 the icebreaker St. Alexander Nevsky was renamed icebreaker Lenin, after the leader of the Bolsheviks Vladimir Ilich Ulianov "Lenin".

In 1920 icebreaker Lenin was in distress and was rescued by icebreaker Svyatogor (later renamed Krasin). At the time of this rescue operation Lenin had 85 persons on board, including women and children.

Otto Sverdrup’s fourth and last expedition in Arctic Siberian waters was in 1921, when, from the bridge of the Soviet Icebreaker Lenin, he commanded a convoy of five cargo ships on an experimental run through the Kara Sea to the mouths of the Ob and Yenisei. The ships reached their destinations and returned safely. This was considered an important step in the development of the Kara Sea sector of the Northern Sea Route.

During WW2 the Lenin took part in Russian convoys in the Arctic. In 1942 the Lenin was spotted at the Mona Islands in the Kara Sea by a Kriegsmarine plane during Operation Wunderland. Heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer rushed to find it, but bad weather, fog, and ice saved icebreaker Lenin from destruction.

The Lenin continued in service during the Cold War, but in 1960, when a newly-built nuclear-powered icebreaker was also named Lenin, she was renamed "Vladimir Ilich".

[edit] In popular fiction

In his dystopian novel We, Zamyatin refers to the specifications of St. Alexander Nevsky in the names of some of his characters.^[1]

[edit] References

• Barr, William (March 1980). "The Drift of Lenin's Convoy in the Laptev Sea, 1937-1938". Arctic 33 (1): 3–20. 
• T. C. Fairley, Sverdrup’s Arctic Adventures. London 1959.

1. ^ ^{a b} Myers, Alan. Zamyatin in Newcastle. Retrieved on 2007-05-11. (updates articles by Myers published in Slavonic and East European Review)