Red Mutiny (29 page)

A
FEW HOURS
after midnight, the start of the mutiny's fourth day, a sailor committee member overheard a petty officer mention how easy it would be to sink the battleship by blowing up one of the magazines stocked with shells. He was arrested, and Matyushenko demanded the traitor be shot. Instead, the committee ruled to lock him in a cabin and send him ashore the next day.

Looking pale and haggard after the confrontation, Matyushenko retired to one of the staterooms to catch a few hours' rest. He had barely slept in three days, and his voice could manage little more than a whisper. He knew they had reached something of a standstill. Alone in their mutiny, they were, as Vakulenchuk had warned him, not as much of a threat to overthrowing the tsar as Matyushenko had hoped. Without other battleships at their side, their rebellion might be doomed—either to be sunk by the tsar's loyal ships or lost to a counter-revolt staged by the crew. They needed allies.

Into the early hours, Kirill roamed the battleship, exhausted but reluctant to lie down and risk being overwhelmed by his steady parade of fears and thoughts about what still needed to be done. He encountered sailors on the decks with the same problem, anxious either that the crew's support for the mutiny was waning, particularly among the youngest sailors, or that they had not made enough progress in bringing revolution to Odessa. The slaughter in the port still weighed heavily on their minds, as did the errant six-inch shots. Mostly, however, the sailors spoke of the Black Sea Fleet. They wondered when it would arrive and what they should do if the crews aboard had not revolted, forcing the
Potemkin
to engage them. Then sailor would have to fire on sailor, a thought they hated to contemplate. Finally, an hour before dawn, Kirill had heard enough, returned to a stateroom, and sank into a sofa. He had been asleep for barely a few minutes when a sailor banged on the door before bursting inside.

"We intercepted a telegram," he said breathlessly. "The squadron's coming!"

Kirill hastened to the small wireless telegraph room. It was already crowded with fifteen committee members standing over the machine, anticipating another message from the battleship
Three Saints.
All they had intercepted was a question: "Why don't you answer?" The intended recipient was unknown. Hoping to draw out more information, the
Potemkin
sailors sent a message, without identifying their ship: "Where is the rest of the squadron?" Finally, after it seemed they might not receive a reply, the telegraph machine shook and clicked out: "For
Twelve Apostles:
Why don't you answer?
Potemkin
remains off the harbor of Odessa—
Three Saints.
"

The message excited the sailors. The wireless telegraph had a limited range, so the squadron had to be a few hours away, at most. The ship's leaders hurried to the wardroom, deliberating quickly about what they should do.

"What if the squadron still hasn't mutinied?" Matyushenko asked.

The committee agreed that it was likely the other ships had yet to overthrow their officers. Otherwise, they would have informed the
Potemkin
of their success by telegraph and come straight to Odessa to join them.

"We ought to remain here and try to stop the squadron on the horizon," Feldmann suggested. "If the commanders refuse to negotiate, we open fire from a distance." The
Potemkin's
guns outranged those of the rest of the fleet.

"No. We have to go out to meet them," Kovalenko argued. Matyushenko backed this course. If their revolutionary comrades were still planning to take control of their ships, the
Potemkin
could not very well fire on them before they had a chance to do so.

This reasoning swayed the committee. Over the next few minutes, they hashed out a plan: they would steam toward the squadron as soon as they spotted its smoke on the horizon; the
Potemkin
would move at full speed, battle-ready, but it would not fire first; if the squadron attacked, the
Potemkin
would respond, with devastating force. There would be no surrender. They would scuttle their own battleship themselves as a last resort.

Matyushenko ended the meeting, and the order rang out: "Prepare for action."

The sailors cleared and hosed down the decks, filled the oar boats with water in case of fire, stacked coal sacks around exposed quick-firing gun positions, and jerry-rigged shields, using ropes and soaked tarpaulins to protect against shell splinters. The religious among them sprinkled holy water onto the guns while the gun crews loaded them with shells. Down in the engine room, the stokers fired eighteen of the twenty-two boilers. The battleship's searchlights were directed out to sea. The
Vekha
was prepared as a hospital ship (a red cross had been painted on its funnel), and the
Ismail
was sent out to scout the surrounding waters. Everyone had been ordered to try to sleep once they finished, at their stations, dressed and ready. But most remained awake. They chain-smoked and guessed what would happen when the squadron arrived.

As dawn lightened the sky, the
Potemkin
intercepted broken portions of two more telegraphs. The first was directed to the
Rostislav
with the message "Distincdy visible." The second was cut off: "We are wiring you at a distance of five—" Matyushenko was certain the squadron was drawing closer, but they needed to know exactly how close and how many ships it numbered. Kirill suggested commandeering a steamer to spy on the squadron's movements. The idea was welcomed. Sailors Dymchenko and Reznichenko left for the port. They found a fast steamer called the
Smely,
whose captain agreed to the mission at gunpoint.

After the
Smely
cut out of the harbor, the
Potemkin
crew kept staring out to sea, expecting to see the squadron take shape on the horizon at any moment. Kovalenko descended a series of iron ladders to the engine room to make sure everyone was prepared. As he walked across the gangways, they vibrated with the rhythmic hum of the engines. The air smelled of hot oil, and steam hissed through the web of pipes surrounding him. Through a hatch, he watched the stokers shovel coal into the furnaces, their faces glistening with sweat, illuminated by the fire's orange glow. The spirit of the sailors inspired him with confidence. He told the men who had once taken commands from him that he was now their comrade, and he hoped they would perform at their best in the hours ahead.

Then he left to check on the ship's hospital. He found several medics rolling bandages on the operation table, but Dr. Golenko was missing.

"Where's the doctor?" Kovalenko asked.

"Aboard the
Vekha
" a medic answered.

"He hasn't returned yet?"

"No. He said he was setting up a hospital there in case of a battle."

"But that's insane," Kovalenko said. "If there's a fight, the wounded will be on the
Potemkin,
not the
Vekha?

The medic shrugged, obviously not in the habit of questioning his former superior. "He took almost all the medical supplies with him," he finally added.

Kovalenko went to the quarterdeck and told a sailor to go to the
Vekha
and bring the doctor and the supplies back to the battleship. A few minutes later, the sailor returned with the supplies only. Disgusted, the lieutenant almost went to the
Vekha
himself to drag the doctor back when, at 8
A.M.,
he was sidetracked by the
Smely
's return.

Dymchenko told the sailor committee that they had spotted three battleships twenty minutes after steaming out of Odessa. They were traveling at a slow six knots, and the flags above the
Three Saints
indicated that Rear Admiral Vishnevetsky was leading them. When the
Smely
ventured farther out to sea in order to check for additional battleships, a torpedo boat chased after them, firing several warning shots. Reznichenko ordered the captain to increase speed. "Cut steam. Will sink you," the torpedo boat signaled to them. "No steam here," Reznichenko taunted. The
Smely
reached its top speed of twenty knots, outrunning the torpedo boat, and then veered back to the
Potemkin.

The squadron would appear soon, Dymchencko warned his comrades. Very soon.

Ten minutes later, a lookout using a telescope sighted the first smudge of smoke from the squadron and yelled, "On the horizon! The squadron's coming!"

Matyushenko rushed to the bridge. This was what he had been waiting for since they had arrived in Odessa. He believed so much in their cause that it was beyond his imagination to think that the revolutionary sailors on other ships would not risk their lives to join the
Potemkin.
When they did, the advance of the revolution would be unstoppable, he thought.

After looking through the telescope himself, Matyushenko turned to Ensign Alekseyev. "Give the order to raise anchor. We'll sail immediately. We don't want to be trapped in the bay."

Trumpets and drums sounded the battle alert. Everyone rushed to their positions as the anchor was raised, knowing this was not a drill. Through the wireless telegraph came a message from the
Three Saints:
"The Black Sea crews are saddened by your actions. Enough scandal. Surrender. The sword spares the penitent head. Explain your demands. Be reasonable. Rear Admiral Vishnevetsky."

Matyushenko told the telegraphist to respond: "Unclear. Please repeat."

The
Potemkin
began to accelerate, passing between the harbor breakwaters. As the battleship gained speed, the red flag snapped in the wind on the foremast. The twelve-inch turrets rotated on their mounts, steel grinding against steel, until the big barrels pointed forward. The smoke from the squadron finally could be seen with the naked eye. Several minutes later, the
Potemkin
sailors could distinguish the lines of three battleships and a flotilla of torpedo boats.

"What do you want, madmen?" Vishnevetsky telegraphed. The
Potemkin
traveled on a direct course toward his squadron, five miles distant.

Matyushenko answered, "If you want to know our demands, come aboard the
Potemkin.
We guarantee your safety." He hoped that if he could get the admiral on the battleship, the crews would sense weakness among their commanders and mutiny.

The
Three Saints
did not answer. Four miles away, the three battleships shifted into a line-abreast formation. "Now they're forming up for battle. They'll be opening fire soon," a sailor in the conning tower predicted. With no hesitation, Matyushenko told Alekseyev to maintain their course. The sailors braced for battle.

The
Potemkin
closed on the squadron. Suddenly, the
Three Saints
turned hard to port, followed by the
St. George
and the
Twelve Apostles.
The battleships increased speed through the maneuver until they had turned almost 180 degrees. Cheers echoed throughout the
Potemkin
when the crew realized what was happening: the squadron was fleeing. "Apparently, it's no fun to taste our guns," a sailor joked.

Kirill and Feldmann demanded that they pursue the squadron and fire on its battleships while in retreat, but Matyushenko ordered the engine room to slow down. They had to give the sailors on those vessels more time to mutiny.

The
Potemkin
returned to Odessa while the squadron disappeared out to sea. Matyushenko knew they would see the Black Sea Fleet again soon enough. If his fellow revolutionaries aboard the squadron's battleships failed to wrest control from their officers, the next confrontation would likely end in a hail of steel.

"
Three Saints,
what is keeping you?" Admiral Krieger telegraphed to Vishnevetsky at 10:10
A.M.
, spotting his second in command's squadron heading toward Tendra Harbor without the
Potemkin
at its side. "Why are you not on your way to Odessa?"

The
Rostislav,
Krieger's flagship, had dropped anchor off the sliver of an island an hour before, accompanied by the battleship
Sinop
and four torpedo boats. When he discovered his senior officer absent from the rendezvous point, he suspected that Vishnevetsky had already departed to win the
Potemkin\
capitulation and that he would soon return with the
Potemkin,
now once again flying the St. Andrew's flag. An inevitable result, Krieger believed. The mutinous crew would never dare resist the gathered strength of the Black Sea Fleet. But now Vishnevetsky was returning, and the
Potemkin
was nowhere in sight.

Steaming at fall speed toward the island, Vishnevetsky made no reply to Krieger, sure that an abbreviated telegraph message was an ill-advised way to explain the past couple of hours. He had never expected the
Potemkin
to race out of Odessa, guns trained on the
Three Saints.
His ships were unprepared for battle, and he was definitely against engaging the
Potemkin,
of all battleships. He had come only to negotiate the mutiny's surrender.

When Vishnevetsky neared Tendra, Krieger signaled by semaphore that every commander was to report to his flagship at once. As a launch from the
St. George
carried Captain Guzevich to the meeting, sailor Koshuba met with the other revolutionaries on his battleship, certain they had to act if the squadron was sent after the
Potemkin
again. Krieger, now in command, would undoubtedly order the sailors to fire on their brothers. As usual, Koshuba—whose gaunt, uncomely face and sallow skin belied his tremendous passion—was adamant they follow through on Tsentralka's plan to launch a fleetwide mutiny, even if the
Potemkin'
s actions had changed the timetable. They had witnessed the cowardice of their officers when the
Potemkin
approached the squadron: they dashed about the ship like frightened children, and some begged the engine room to increase speed as they fled toward Tendra Island. Koshuba was sure these same officers lacked the courage to resist an uprising among their men. His task was to persuade and lead the crew to mutiny, and this was exactly what he meant to do.