"Armenia" is a motor ship, whose death was hidden for a long time by the authorities. About a thousand people died on board during the German offensive on Sevastopol. November 7, 1941, on the day of the parade on Red Square, this terrible tragedy occurred. “Armenia” sank to the bottom of the Crimea - a motor ship, which was considered one of the best ships of the Black Sea Fleet. It was forbidden to report anything about this disaster. Only in 1989 was the stamp "top secret" removed from a book published by the People's Commissariat of the Navy of the USSR, which spoke of this tragedy. There were no details in it - only the coordinates and time of the death of military vessels and ships, including the vessel of interest to us, were sparingly communicated.
Characteristic of the ship "Armenia"
The ship was designed by engineers under the leadership of J. Koperzhinsky, chief designer. In November 1928, he was launched. This ship was one of the six best passenger ships that plowed the Black Sea. The cruising range of "Armenia" was 4600 miles. “Armenia” is a motor ship that could carry 518 passengers in class cabins, 317 deck passengers and 125 “seated” passengers, as well as cargo weighing up to 1 thousand tons. At the same time, the ship could reach speeds of up to 27 km / h. The six best ships (except for "Armenia", which included "Abkhazia", "Ukraine", "Adjara", "Georgia" and "Crimea") began to serve the line Odessa - Batumi - Odessa. These ships carried thousands of passengers until 1941.
The motor ship becomes a sanitary transport vessel
“Armenia” was hastily converted into an ambulance ship with the outbreak of war. The smoking room was converted into a pharmacy, restaurants were turned into dressing rooms and operating rooms, and additional hanging beds were made in the cabins. Plaushevsky Vladimir Yakovlevich, who at that time was 39 years old, was appointed captain. Znayunenko Nikolay Fadeevich became a starpom. The crew of "Armenia" consisted of 96 people, as well as 75 orderlies, 29 nurses and 9 doctors. Dmitrievsky Petr Andreevich, the chief physician of the Odessa railway hospital, whom many in this city knew well, became the head of the medical staff. Bright red crosses, clearly visible from the air, appeared on deck and on the sides. A large white flag with the image of the Red Cross was hoisted on the main mast.
However, these measures did not save hospital ships. Goering aviation from the very first days of the war raided them. Sanitary transports "Anton Chekhov" and "Kotovsky" were damaged in July 1941. And "Adzharia", attacked by dive bombers and enveloped in flames, ran aground in front of the whole Odessa. The same fate in August befell the Kuban.
Merits of "Armenia"
The Red Army, squeezed by the enemy, suffered heavy losses in heavy battles. There were a lot of wounded. On board the "Armenia" in any weather day and night worked medical staff. The ship made 15 incredibly dangerous and heavy voyages. "Armenia" transported about 16 thousand soldiers, not counting the elderly, children and women who were placed in the cabins of crew members.
Such, in brief, is the history of the ship "Armenia".
Ship protection
There is still a lot of mystery in the circumstances of the death of this ship. The "Chronicle of the Great Patriotic War ...", declassified in 1989, says that the ship "Armenia" (photo presented above), "Kuban", as well as the training ship "Dnepr" carried out flights from Odessa together with the destroyer "Ruthless". Of course, this protected the ships from attacks by German aircraft.
Manstein with the 2nd Army rapidly attacked the Crimea. The Black Sea Fleet Command was not ready for this attack. Before the war, the teachings of the fleet were reduced only to military campaigns and the "destruction" of naval landings. No one could have thought that Sevastopol would have to be defended from land.
Transportation of the wounded and evacuation of residents
The Germans quickly took control of all land routes. Civilians of the peninsula (about 1 million people) were trapped. Hitler's trained troops were confronted by disparate units of the Red Army. They did not give the Russians a great chance to win. The inhabitants of the Crimean peninsula by the beginning of November 1941 began to leave it en masse. In cities with the approach of Nazi troops, panic began. People fought a real fight for landing on any vehicle.
Confusion reigned on the streets of Sevastopol in October and November 1941. Everything that was possible was evacuated from the city. The hospitals equipped in Sevastopol and in the adits were full of wounded, but someone ordered that all medical personnel be evacuated immediately. Already today, approaching the city, from the window of a bus or wagon in the region of Inkerman, you can see blocks and huge piles of stones. These are blown up hospitals located in adits. Only the wounded were evacuated from there to the ships on the orders of Stalin. E. Nikolaeva, the nurse of this hospital, testifies that the adit was blown up along with the "non-transportable" so that the wounded would not go to the enemy. A representative of SMERSH led the blasting operations. Two doctors refused to evacuate. They died along with the wounded.
F. S. Oktyabrsky, vice admiral of the Black Sea Fleet, constantly carried the destroyer "Boyky" with him. He avoided solving problems related to the protection of hospital and passenger ships and the formation of convoys when crossing the sea. Oktyabrsky believed that these issues should be decided by the leaders of the civilian fleet. This was one of the reasons why at the bottom of the Black Sea there were many of the best passenger ships along with the people there.
Circumstances prior to the tragedy
According to the testimony of eyewitnesses and the documents found, it was possible to restore the events that preceded the launch of the ship "Armenia" on November 6, 1941. The ship was in an internal roadstead. “Armenia” hastily received many evacuated and wounded citizens. The situation on the ship was very nervous. German air raids could begin at any moment. The bulk of the warships of the Black Sea Fleet went to sea on the orders of Oktyabrsky, including the cruiser Molotov, where there was the only Redut-K radar ship station in the fleet.
In the Quarantine Bay, besides "Armenia", the ship "Bialystok" was loaded. "Crimea" took people and equipment at the pier of the Morzavod. Loading on these ships was carried out continuously. Plaushevsky, captain of "Armenia", received an order to sail from Sevastopol at 19 hours on November 6. The ship was supposed to follow in Tuapse. Only a small sea hunter under the command of P. A. Kulashov, senior lieutenant, was allocated for escort.
Departure "Armenia"
Captain Plaushevsky understood that with such an escort only a dark night could provide the ship with stealth and protect it from enemy attacks. What were the captain's annoyance and surprise when he was ordered to leave the city not at evening twilight, but at 5 p.m., when it was still light. Indeed, the death of the sanitary ship "Armenia" in this case was inevitable.
Leaving Sevastopol at 17 o’clock, the ship moored in Yalta only after 9 hours, i.e., at about 2 o’clock in the morning. Historians have found that a new order was received along the way: to go to Balaklava and pick up the NKVD workers, medical staff and the wounded from there, as the Germans continue to advance.
Exit from Yalta and the death of "Armenia"
Plaushevsky was informed that the NKVD, party activists and 11 hospitals with the wounded were awaiting loading in Yalta. When Admiral F.S. Oktyabrsky learned that “Armenia” should leave Yalta in the afternoon, he gave the commander an order not to sail until 19:00, that is, until dark. At least that's what the admiral’s notes say. Oktyabrsky noted that there was no means to provide cover for the ship from the sea and air. The commander received an order, but nevertheless left Yalta. German torpedo bombers attacked him at 11 o’clock. "Armenia" was sunk. After hitting a torpedo, she was afloat for 4 minutes.
Did Oktyabrsky really give the order to leave no earlier than 19 hours
The absence of documents that were destroyed in 1949 or later casts a shadow over him. Historians cannot help but suspect that Oktyabrsky was trying to find an excuse for himself years after this tragedy. But we must admit that as a fleet commander, the admiral knew the situation in the theater of operations. He knew where the ship "Armenia" is located and the time when it sailed from the coast. Oktyabrsky also knew that this ship, which had been unprotected, dominated by German aircraft in the air, was an ideal target for diving bombers and torpedo bombers. The loss of the ship "Armenia" in 1941 in the event of departure during the day was easy to foresee. Therefore, it is very likely that he nevertheless passed the order to wait for the night to Plaushevsky. However, some ominous event happened on the ship that caused the captain to disobey this order. This is another secret of the death of the ship "Armenia".
To whom Plaushevsky was subordinate
Let's go back to investigate events. It is known for certain that the initial order transmitted to Captain Plaushevsky was clearly formulated: it was necessary to pick up the medical staff and the wounded and follow from Sevastopol to Tuapse at night. Then an urgent order was received that in order to save the wounded and party activists, one must follow to Yalta. The departure time of “Armenia” from Sevastopol was changed - it was necessary to leave 2 hours earlier, at 17 hours. The third order, which was transmitted to the captain, made him also pick up the wounded and representatives of the local authorities, without going into Balaklava Bay. The fourth order, which Plaushevsky received early in the morning of November 7 from F.S. October, ordered to sail from Yalta in the evening, not earlier than 19 hours. In a strange way, he was violated. The captain sent the Armenia ship to the open sea, the death of which became one of the greatest tragedies of the Great Patriotic War.
Plaushevsky undoubtedly ignored this order only because he had to submit to another authority, which was on board. She was the employees of SMERSH and the NKVD, taken on board the vessel. The people who remained on the pier saw how Plaushevsky, before ordering the return of the moorings, was furious. He cursed loudly and looked like a driven beast. And this is Plaushevsky, about whom his colleagues spoke of as an exceptionally seasoned and cold-blooded person. Of course, the captain was threatened by those who were in a hurry to leave Yalta. They promised him reprisal for refusing to obey.
Survivors
“Armenia”, leaving Yalta early in the morning accompanied by a marine guard, was immediately attacked by two torpedo bombers. She was unable to walk 30 miles. After torpedoing, the ship was afloat for 4 minutes, and then the ship "Armenia" sank (1941, November 7). Only eight on board managed to escape. Among them was a soldier Burmistrov I.A. and foreman Bocharov. I saw the death of "Armenia" and P. A. Kulashov, senior lieutenant and commander of a sea hunter. When he returned to Sevastopol, he was interrogated by the NKVD for a month, and then released.
Searches for "Armenia"
It so happened that the maps did not indicate exactly where the "Armenia" motor ship sank. The place of his death can be determined only approximately. The American and Ukrainian search engines made joint attempts to detect the remains of the vessel, including with the help of Billard, who found the Titanic. Many possible flooding sites were surveyed. The most advanced search engine was used in 2008. The specified square was examined 27 times up and down! The cost of the expedition is estimated at $ 2 million. As a result, a sunken longboat, an old sailing ship, shell shells were found. However, it was not possible to find the skeleton of "Armenia", whose length was 110 meters.
It is impossible to exclude the possibility that the vessel could slip along the slope to great depths, where it is very difficult to find it. Perhaps somewhere there is the ship "Armenia" at the bottom. Photos of this site showed that the nature of its relief does not exclude such a probability. However, it is also possible that experts are simply not looking there. The captain, realizing the hopelessness of the situation, could at the last moment decide to move back to Sevastopol, under the protection of aviation and anti-aircraft artillery of the main base of the fleet. However, it is most likely that Plaushevsky, in accordance with the directive signed at 2 am by Stalin himself, received an order to return the staff of the hospitals. The first paragraph in this document stated that Sevastopol should not be given to the Germans in any case. This means that you need to look for a ship not at Gurzuf. It is likely that it is located on the beam of Cape Sarych, west of the place where he was sought. This site has not yet been explored.
We hope that soon the ship "Armenia" will be found. 1941 was forever one of the most tragic in the history of Sevastopol. The events of the Great Patriotic War should be studied in more detail, and "Armenia" is raised from the bottom. The search for the ship "Armenia" continues.