Russian cruiser Varyag (1899)

In 1897, the Russian Admiralty, as part of a program to reinforce the Imperial Russian Navy's Far East Fleet, published specifications for a fast protected cruiser, capable of commerce raiding. The ships were required to be armed with 152 mm (6-inch) quick-firing guns, and to have a speed of . Russian shipyards were already busy, and the Imperial Admiralty placed an order with the American shipyard William Cramp & Sons of Philadelphia on 11 April 1898 to build a single cruiser, Varyag against this specification. Single ships were also ordered from the German shipyards Germaniawerft () and AG Vulcan () against these specifications. Varyag was laid down in October 1898, was launched on 31 October 1899 and commissioned into the Imperial Russian Navy on 2 January 1901 O.S. (14 January 1901 N.S.), under the command of Captain Vladimir Behr. Varyag was long overall and between perpendiculars, with a beam of and a draught of at normal displacement. Design displacement was with full load displacement about . As a protected cruiser, the main protection consisted of an arched armoured deck which protected the ship's engines and magazines. The deck was thick in the central horizontal portion, and thick in the sloping sections towards the ship's sides. The ship's conning tower was protected by , with protecting the ammunition hoists and for the bow and stern torpedo tubes. The ship's main armament was twelve Obukhoff 152 mm (6-inch) L/45 guns, with two guns side by side on the ship's forecastle, two side-by-side on the quarterdeck, and the remaining eight on sponsons on the ship's upper deck. Six 381 mm (15 inch) torpedo tubes were carried, two on each broadside and one in the bow and stern. ==First Russian service==

At the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War, under the command of Captain Vsevolod Rudnev, Varyag was stationed at Chemulpo Bay with the aging gunboat . On 8 February 1904, a large Japanese force under Admiral Uriu blockaded the Russian in the harbor. As Chemulpo was in neutral Korean waters, Admiral Uriu gave the Russian ships a written ultimatum to sail by 12:00 noon or be attacked in the harbor itself. Captain Rudnev attempted to fight his way out, but after sustaining heavy casualties (31 men dead, 191 injured out of 570) and outgunned, both ships returned to harbor by 1:00 p.m., the crew decided to scuttle both ships. The crew was saved by transferring them to the British cruiser , the , and the ; the captain of the US gunboat declined doing so as a violation of U.S. neutrality. In 1907, Vsevolod Rudnev (by that time dismissed from Russian naval service in the rank of rear admiral) was decorated with the Japanese Order of the Rising Sun for his heroism in that battle; although he accepted the order, he never wore it in public. == Japanese cruiser Soya ==

After the Russo-Japanese War, the Japanese raised the badly damaged wreck from Chemulpo harbor, repaired it, and commissioned it into the Imperial Japanese Navy as the cruiser Soya on 9 July 1907. Its new name was taken from the northernmost cape of Hokkaidō, Soya Misaki. After being placed into Japanese service as a cruiser, Soya was used primarily for training duties. From 14 March 1909 to 7 August 1909, it made a long distance navigational and officer cadet training cruise to Hawaii and North America. It repeated this training cruise every year until 1913. == Return to Russia ==

During World War I, Russia and Japan were allies and several ships were transferred by the Japanese to the Russians. Along with and , she was repurchased by the Imperial Russian Navy at Vladivostok on 5 April 1916 and renamed Varyag. In June, she departed for Murmansk via the Indian Ocean, arriving in November 1916. She was sent to Liverpool in Great Britain for an overhaul by Cammell Laird in February 1917, and was due to re-enter service with the Arctic Ocean Flotilla of the Imperial Russian Navy. However, following the Russian October Revolution on 7 November 1917, crewmen who had remained onboard hoisted the red flag and refused to set sail. On 8 December 1917 she was seized by a detachment of British soldiers. Assigned to the Royal Navy in February 1918, she ran aground while under tow off of Ireland, but was refloated and used as a hulk until 1919. She was then sold to a German firm in 1920 for scrap, but on 5 February 1920 ran aground on rocks near the Scottish village of Lendalfoot () in the Firth of Clyde, while being towed to Germany. She was scrapped in place from 1923 to 1925. ==Legacy==

The stoicism of Varyags crew at Chemulpo has inspired the Austrian poet Rudolf Greinz to write a poem dedicated to Varyag. The Russian translation of this poem was put to music by A.S. Turischev. The result was the 1904 song that remains popular today: (German original) Auf Deck, Kameraden, all' auf Deck! Heraus zur letzten Parade! Der stolze Warjag ergibt sich nicht, Wir brauchen keine Gnade! (Russian poetic translation) Наверх вы, товарищи, все по местам! Последний парад наступает. Врагу не сдается наш гордый “Варяг”, Пощады никто не желает. (translation) Get up, you comrades, everyone to his place, The final parade is at hand. Our proud "Varyag" will not surrender to the enemy, No one wants mercy. Rudolf Greinz . On 30 July 2006 (Russian Navy Day), a memorial plaque to the cruiser was unveiled at Lendalfoot in a ceremony attended by senior Russian politicians and navy personnel, veterans and local dignitaries. On 8 September 2007 a monument in the form of a large bronze cross was unveiled as an addition to the Lendalfoot memorial, in a ceremony attended by former Nato Secretary General George Robertson, British and Russian navy officers and diplomats. The "Cruiser Varyag" Charity Foundation had organised a competition in Russia for the design of the monument. In 2010, as a gesture marking the 20th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Korea and Russia, the flag of Varyag was restored. The Japanese Navy recovered the flag when the ship was salvaged; and the Incheon Metropolitan Museum acquired them after Japan's defeat at the end of World War II. The return of the flag takes the form of a two-year renewable loan because of the Korean law protecting cultural assets. File:Varyag Plaque Obverse 2014.jpg|Obverse of plaque at Varyag memorial at Lendalfoot, Scotland. File:Varyag Plaque Reverse 2014.jpg|everse of plaque at Varyag memorial at Lendalfoot, Scotland. File:Varyag Memorial Monument 2014.jpg|Obverse of monument at Varyag memorial at Lendalfoot, Scotland. File:Varyag Memorial Anchor 2014.jpg|Anchor at Varyag memorial at Lendalfoot, Scotland. ==Footnotes==