Russian battleship Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya
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The Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya (Императрица Екатерина Великая) was an Imperatritsa Mariya-class Dreadnought battleship of the Imperial Russian Navy.
Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya was launched in 1914, originally named Ekaterina II, and renamed Svobodnaya Rossiya (Свободная Россия, Free Russia) in 1917. She twice engaged the German battlecruiser SMS Goeben while the latter was in Turkish service as Yavuz Sultan Selim. The ship was scuttled on 18 June 1918 in Novorossiysk to prevent it from falling into German hands. She was scrapped in the 1930s, her turrets and guns being salvaged and used in coastal defense batteries near Sevastopol, along with those of her sister-ship Imperatritza Mariya. The guns saw action against Nazi forces during the Great Patriotic War (World War II).
