Pobeda as the Japanese battleship Suwo in 1908 |
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| Career (Russia) | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Pobeda |
| Builder: | Baltic Works, Saint Petersburg, Russia |
| Laid down: | 1 August 1898 |
| Launched: | 24 May 1900 |
| Commissioned: | 31 July 1902 |
| Fate: | Sunk, 7 December 1904 |
| Career (Japan) | |
| Name: | Suwo |
| Acquired: | Refloated, October 1905 |
| Commissioned: | October 1908 |
| Struck: | 1922 |
| Fate: | Broken up, 1946 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Peresvet-class battleship |
| Displacement: | 13,500 long tons (13,717 t) |
| Length: | 129.2 m (424 ft) |
| Beam: | 21.8 m (71 ft 6 in) |
| Draught: | 8.3 m (27 ft 3 in) |
| Propulsion: | 3 shaft reciprocating vertical triple expansion (VTE) engines 30 Miyabara boilers 14,500 shp (10,800 kW) |
| Speed: | 16 knots (18 mph; 30 km/h) |
| Range: | 6,000 nmi (11,000 km) at 10 kn (12 mph; 19 km/h) |
| Complement: | 732 |
| Armament: | • 4 × 254 mm (10 in) guns • 10 × 152 mm (6 in) guns • 16 × 12-pounder guns • 21 × 3-pounder guns • 8 × 1½-pounder guns • 2 × torpedo tubes |
| Armour: | Belt: 230 mm (9 in) Deck: 70 mm (2.76 in) Conning tower: 254 mm (10 in) |
Pobeda (Russian: Победа), was one of eight Russian pre-dreadnought battleships captured by the Imperial Japanese Navy during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. She was sunk during the war, and then salvaged afterwards by the Japanese and placed into service under the name Suwo (周防).
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Pobeda was built as one of three Peresvet-class battleships and commissioned into the Imperial Russian Navy in 1903. She was one of Russia's first ships to mount quick-firing guns. She had a high forecastle and secondary guns mounted on two decks, and armor that stretched the entire length of the hull.
The Peresvet design inspired by the British battleship HMS Centurion, and was designed as essentially an enlarged armoured cruisers, with good range and seakeeping, with higher speed but weaker armour and armament than contemporary first class battleships.
After trials, both of her sister ships were transferred to Port Arthur as part of the Russian Pacific Fleet. Pobeda was damaged first by gunfire off Port Arthur, then by a mine. She took eleven hits at the Battle of the Yellow Sea, and while back at Port Arthur for repairs she was repeatedly hit by Japanese shore batteries during the Siege of Port Arthur. On 7 December 1904, Japanese siege guns finally sank the vessel. Her sister ship Peresvet was likewise also lost at Port Arthur, and her other sister ship Oslyabya was sunk at the Battle of Tsushima.
Salvaged by Japanese engineers after the war in October 1905, she was refloated, repaired, and taken into service as the Suwo, taking her name from the ancient Japanese province Suo Province, now part of Yamaguchi Prefecture.
After reconstruction at Yokosuka Naval Arsenal with Japanese boilers and guns, Suwo was re-designated as a 1st class coastal defence ship in October 1908. She served in this role for many years, and received a refit in 1912. In World War I, during the Battle of Tsingtao from 27 August 1914, serving as flagship for the Imperial Japanese Navy squadron under Vice-Admiral Kato Sadakichi, to blockade the coast of German-controlled Kiaochow. The British Royal Navy attached the China Station's pre-dreadnought HMS Triumph and the destroyer HMS Usk to the Japanese squadron, which consisted of mostly obsolete warships, and several modern ones including the seaplane carrier Wakamiya, dreadnoughts Kawachi and Settsu, and the battlecruiser Kongō for this operation.
After the end of World War I, Suwo was assigned to training for cadets and engineers. She became a gunnery training ship in 1917. In 1922, as one of the results of the Washington Naval Treaty, Suwo was disarmed at Kure Naval Arsenal. During this process, on 13 July, the old vessel capsized. The hull was righted and the turrets, machinery, and main armor removed, but work stopped there. The hull was towed to Mitsugojima, were it remained throughout the Pacific War as a storage hulk. In 1946, the hulk was towed back to Kure and broken up for scrap.
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