The sunken royal yacht Livadia was found off the coast of Tarkhankut. Imperial yacht "Livadia Livadia yacht 1873

Yesterday I saw this yacht "Livadia" in person on a magnificent model and I really wanted to have my own exactly the same pontoon house.

Original taken from humus V Imperial yacht "Livadia"

Black Sea wheeled imperial yacht. The only imperial yacht that directly participated in the hostilities and the only yacht that died in a shipwreck.
In the summer of 1825, Emperor Alexander I acquired the Oreanda estate not far from Yalta. The architect A. I. Stackenschneider built a magnificent palace there, completed in the spring of 1852. In the autumn of the same year, Nicholas I, with the Empress and younger children, rested in this palace for the only time in his life, spending about a month and a half there. Naturally, the question arose of transporting the "August" family to a new building.
Since there were no royal yachts on the Black Sea at that time, an 18-oared boat, specially built there in 1840, armed with one small carronade for salutes, was brought from Nikolaev. In 1860, Oreanda passed into the possession of Grand Duke Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich. He ordered the construction of a small wheeled 4-gun steamer for the voyages of the imperial family on the Black Sea, which became the first Black Sea royal yacht. The wooden steamship "Tiger" with a three-masted barquentine was built in the Nikolaev Admiralty in 1855-1858. Although the "Tiger" was listed as part of Black Sea Fleet 14 years old (until 1872), about sailing on it royal family almost no information has been preserved, except for the mention of the transfer in August 1861 of Alexander II with his family from Sevastopol to his new estate Livadia, which since 1866 became the favorite residence of Russian emperors in the Crimea. Since the trips of the imperial family to the Black Sea began to acquire a certain regularity, it became necessary to replace the old "Tiger" with a new comfortable yacht "for service off the coast of Crimea." Previously, in 1868, the issue of acquiring a steamship in England and “turning into a yacht for the sovereign emperor” was considered, but then a decision was made to build a yacht in the Nikolaev Admiralty. The construction of the yacht, named "Livadia", began at the end of 1869, but the official laying of the vessel took place on March 19, 1870.
The yacht was designed and built by the well-known Black Sea shipbuilder, Captain of the Corps of Ship Engineers L. G. Shvede, who completed the work by the summer of 1873. The new 4-gun wooden wheeled yacht was not inferior to the Baltic “Derzhava” in terms of comfort and decoration of the royal premises, and even surpassed the latter in the design of the “royal cabin” in the stern of the yacht and the dining room on the middle deck, designed by the architect Monighetti. During the construction of the Livadia, L. G. Shvede in 1872 made a drawing of the alleged bow decoration of the yacht in the form of an oval convex shield with the image of a double-headed eagle. The Livadia received a bow decoration in the form of a double-headed eagle crowned with a crown, similar to that installed on the Derzhava.
First steamImperialwheeled yacht "Livadia" after commissioning. 1873 There's also a double decker.

In the middle of the year, agreed with the English shipbuilding company John Elder and Co., the project was finally prepared. In August, after a written assurance from the chief builder of Pierce's company about the possibility of creating such a vessel, Alexander II's personal permission to build a new yacht in England followed. On September 5, Pierce and the famous Russian shipbuilder M.I. Kazi signed a contract. The terms of this document were not quite usual. Their essence was the obligation of shipbuilders not only to build the ship itself according to Russian drawings, with the installation of its own production of steam mechanisms, but also to guarantee that the yacht would reach a speed of 15 knots. For each undeveloped 0.1 knot, the company paid heavy fines, and if the ship sailed at a speed of less than 14 knots, the customer had the right not to accept it at all, but to take only the power plant, for which he was obliged to make contractual payments in the process the buildings. If the tests were successful, the payment for the yacht followed after its delivery. For exceeding the limits of speed (15 knots) and power (12,000 hp), builders received significant bonuses. The last condition was to stimulate the company to create perfect power plants, intended not only for the yacht, but also, with success, for future Russian ships and the battleship Peter the Great, whose machines, like those of the Novgorod series, did not develop their design capacity.
The construction period was short in English: until July 1 of the next, 1880. Moreover, during a personal audience with Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich after signing the contract, Pierce proposed early surrender yachts! Work at the shipyard, located in Ferrol (on the River Clyde, on the outskirts of Glasgow), began immediately after the signing of the documents. Appointed to oversee the construction, the author of the project, E. E. Gulyaev, reported a month later on the manufacture of templates for metal structures and full training slipway place. By the beginning of November, two-thirds of the set of the second bottom had already been riveted ... Then A. A. Popov intervened again, achieving highest resolution on the decoration of the yacht's premises in England, referring to the "desirability of testing the ship in its finished form" and the high cost of such work in the Nikolaev Admiralty. On November 10, another contract was signed: shipbuilders received, in addition to an additional fee, a real opportunity to postpone, if necessary, the yacht's readiness date. Nevertheless, the work continued according to the initial calculations.
On January 5, 1880, the yacht was included in the lists of the ships of the fleet under the name "Livadia", and 10 days later received a commander - captain 1st rank I.K. Vogak ( former first the commander of both Novgorod and Peter the Great) ... On March 25, the official laying of the vessel took place; at this time, the casing of the hulls was already mounted. Exactly four months later, on June 25, the yacht was launched. The ceremony was attended Grand Duke Alexey Alexandrovich (the future Admiral General of the Russian Navy and a consistent detractor of A. A. Popov).
Yacht Livadia in the dock

"Livadia", launched in a pretty high degree readiness, with add-ons and a propeller-steering complex, had such an original look that the English "Times", which traditionally did not place drawings even of domestic ships on its pages, made an exception for the yacht. This double-hulled vessel was figuratively described by newspapermen as a "bull on a halibut". Indeed, the yacht itself (upper hull) was a vessel 79.25 m long and 33.53 m wide, cut along the waterline, installed on a semi-submerged pontoon (lower hull), which had an elliptical shape in plan, 71.63 m long and maximum 46.63 m wide. Its height amidships did not exceed 5.49 m, the bottom was flat, with three keels: the middle one in the diametrical plane and the side ones, each of which was 5.49 m apart from the average one. According to E. E. Gulyaev "... the yacht could be somewhat longer ... and narrower, to satisfy the taste of the majority ...", but this would lead to the need to increase the power of the machines and reduce stability. Shallow draft was defined by the designer as an “outstanding feature” that made it possible to reduce wave resistance, which, according to Froude, was the most significant for wide vessels, such as Novgorod, at high speeds. From this it is clear that the design of two parts-hulls was actually applied from the desire to reduce the draft of the yacht as much as possible in order to achieve a given speed. In this form, the combination of the named features of the Livadia design really proves the complete originality of the ideas of its creators.
Imperial yacht "Livadia" on the slipway

The design of the lower hull of the yacht (the sailors called it "pancake") was unique. Designed taking into account the experience of building Novgorod, it provided an unprecedented, for that time, level of unsinkability. The second bottom stretched for the entire length, spaced from the skin to a height of 1.07 m at the midsection and 0.76 m at the ends and divided into 40 watertight compartments; along the entire side there were two longitudinal vertical bulkheads, the space between which and the side was also divided by transverse bulkheads into 40 compartments. Covered with a convex, in the form of an inverted saucer, deck, the pontoon served as a solid annular base for the upper part of the yacht, where all the living quarters and royal apartments were located, and the second bottom was the foundation for three vertical double-expansion steam engines with a design capacity of 3500 hp each. With. each and 10 cylindrical boilers. Coal pits and auxiliary mechanisms and ship supplies fit in the pontoon ...
Imperial screw yacht "Livadia" after launching

Significant Difficulties had to be overcome in determining the overall and local strength of the steel structures of the pontoon and the junction of the hulls (annular stringer), which, in turn, gave rise to technical problems in their provision. To the credit of Russian and British engineers, these difficulties were largely overcome. The entire set was made of mild “Simenson” steel, the pontoon lining and bulkheads were made of iron sheets; the decks and cladding of the yacht itself are pine. The total height from the keels to the roof of the upper superstructures was 14 m. Special attention. During construction, by the end of 1879, they assembled and tested a self-propelled steel model of a yacht on a scale of 1:10 by the spring of next year, on which they worked out the location of the propellers, their pitch and dimensions. The test methodology was developed by Tideman, and the experiments were carried out by both Russian and English engineers. As a result, the deadwood shafts of the yacht were brought out in such a way that the screws with most of their diameter were below the bottom, while the middle screw, as on Vice-Admiral Popov, was placed 0.76 m further from the stern and deeper than the side ones. The diameter of each four-blade propeller was 4.72 m, the pitch of the middle one was 3.81 m, the rest was 6.25 m; The material was manganese bronze.
Imperial yacht "Livadia" in Naples. May 1881

The premises were illuminated with electric "Yablochkov's candles"; All electrical equipment was supplied from Russia. There was plumbing throughout the yacht and 23 auxiliary steam mechanisms, including a rudder drive. On the bridge, similarly to popovki, they put a device for maneuvering the direction of the vessel with the help of onboard vehicles. As raid boats, yachts in England ordered 3 large mahogany steam boats, respectively, 11.9, 9.8 and 8.5 m long. Rowing vessels were used old, from the first Livadia. The total volume of cabins, salons and halls intended for the king and retinue was 3950 m3 - 6.7 times higher than that on the lost yacht. The huge "reception" of the emperor, about 4 m high, resembled the rooms of Louis XVI in Fontainebleau; there was also an active fountain surrounded by a flower bed... The living room on the middle deck was furnished in the Crimean Tatar spirit, the rest of the rooms were decorated in a modern English style. The decoration of officers' cabins and command rooms was not included in the contracts and had to be carried out after the ship arrived on board. Black Sea.

General view of the yacht Livadia at the pier

Despite the “absolutely original design”, the ship looked great from the outside, the smooth hull was covered with a shiny black lacquer, and the light gray pontoon almost merged with the water surface.
It took almost three months to complete the construction of the yacht afloat. In August, all boilers were loaded (8 identical three-furnace boilers were installed across the pontoon, and two half-boilers were installed behind them along the sides), and in early September, the main machines, which were already tested on mooring lines from 10 to 19 of the same month. The most experienced mechanical engineers of the fleet, Major Generals A.I. Sokolov and I.I. Zarubin, who were called to England in the summer, took part in these works.
On September 24, the Livadia, led by the builder Pierce and the factory team, left the shipyard pool and passed down the river under the middle car to Greenock; just in case, she was taken by three tugboats. On the same day, the yacht entered the bay, easily reaching 12 knots.

General view of the dining room

The chief consultant Tiedeman noted that the ship kept well on course and obeyed the helm like a boat. The next day, factory tests took place. Several Russian officers and 12 sailors from the team assigned to the yacht were invited to the ship. According to A. I. Sokolov, it was possible to develop a speed of 15 knots, and with a headwind!
living room corner

On the 26th, Pierce invited on board the commission of the Naval Ministry, chaired by Vice Admiral I.F. Likhachev, for an official six-hour trial. "Livadia" showed an average speed of 14.88 knots. with a power of 10200l. With.; the machines, due to the difference in the pitch of the propellers, worked with different speeds: the average was 90, the side ones were 84 rpm. The same Tideman noticed that when all three machines were operating, the circulation radius was “somewhat large,” but recognized this as insignificant, since it was possible to turn “in a much smaller space” with the help of side propellers - like on popovki. On September 27, the yacht was tested on a measured mile: according to the averaged data of six runs, its highest speed was equal to 15.725 knots, and the power plant power was 12,354 hp. With. And this despite the fact that the hull of the vessel during the completion of the construction was somewhat overgrown and sat deeper than expected, due to the heavier superstructure and interior decoration than in the calculations. The draft reached 2.1 m, and the displacement -4420 tons.
Boudoir table in one of the rooms

Calculations and experiments brilliantly confirmed. Everyone was happy. The company received 2.7 million rubles, including 414 thousand rubles, premiums. About A. A. Popov and E. V. Gulyaev wrote in all European newspapers.
Upon completion of the tests, the Russian team, which arrived in August from the Baltic Fleet, switched to the yacht (it exceeded the staff and consisted of 24 officers and 321 lower ranks). On September 30, the yacht was received from the factory and on the same day, raising the flag, guis and pennant, she began the campaign.
Corner of one of the living rooms (smoking room),

The ferry to the Black Sea was also planned as a training voyage “with only such a development of the power of machines,” A. A. Popov reported back in August, “to enable all machine personnel to calmly look around and get well acquainted with the operation and control of machines.” After preparations, on October 3, the yacht left the Greenock raid. On board, as guests of honor, were the shipbuilders Pierce, Tiedeman and Reid, as well as the controller of the English fleet, Admiral Steward. In Brest, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich boarded and, under the flag of the Admiral General, the Livadia on October 7 went further, across the Bay of Biscay to Cadiz.
View of the cabinet

Until midnight on October 8, the campaign took place in favorable conditions, at a speed of 12-13 knots. The wind that rose at night quickly grew stronger, spreading a strong oncoming swell. From two o'clock in the morning on October 9, the waves began to hit the bow of the pontoon of the yacht - at first rare, these blows became more frequent with increasing wind and wave heights. The course had to be reduced to 4-5 knots, but the blows did not stop. Reed, who was very restrained in his assessments, wrote: “wave impacts on the flat bottom of the yacht were terrible at times ...” I.K. Vogak also reported the same in the report: “... one of them was especially strong, the impression of being struck hard object... "At 10 o'clock in the morning they found that the first double-bottom compartment was filled with water; urgently had to change course and head to the Spanish port of Ferrol.
According to eyewitnesses, the wave height reached 6-7 m, while the side roll did not exceed 3.5 ° on board, and the keel roll did not exceed 9 ° in a span of 5.5 ° forward and 3.5 ° aft. The screws were never exposed. “Nothing fell on the yacht,” the commander reported: the table setting and tall candelabra remained motionless as if in a calm, neither the soup in the bowls, nor the water in the glasses had ever spilled.
View of one of the bedrooms

How did the Livadia, led by experienced sailors, get into the very center of the storm, and even go against the wave? This is all the more incomprehensible, since there were shipbuilders on board who hinted, even during trials, that the yacht was good “with not too large waves”. As noted by a member admission committee Captain 2nd Rank V.P. Verkhovsky “the yacht was never intended for ocean navigation, and therefore the Black Sea is enough to judge its qualities ... in any case, there is no reason to expose it even on the Black Sea to the daily actions of a heavy storm. The largest passage from Odessa to Poti ... the yacht will easily make it in 30 or 35 hours, and of course there will be no extreme to leave the port in the very storm ... "
Reid refers directly to the Admiral General, who, in his words, believed that the opportunity should not be missed "to make a thorough test of the yacht, and therefore we headed into the very jaws of the Biscay storm." About the same, but more diplomatically, Verkhovsky writes: “there were those who wanted to meet ... a good storm, they wanted us to be shaken, so that the wind and excitement were stronger ... and without this ... a complete judgment about the qualities of a yacht is impossible ...". Whether the leader of the campaign himself decided on such a "test" or he was helped and advised remains unknown.
View of the boudoir

In the Ferrol Bay, divers found in the bow of the pontoon, on the left side, a 5-meter dent with tears and cracks in the skin sheets, bent and broken frames. Five side compartments and one double-bottom compartment were flooded. Initially, a collision with floating debris was considered the cause of the damage, about which a message was sent to the Government Gazette, but after a thorough examination, both Russian and foreign experts came to the unanimous opinion that the damage was caused by wave impacts! The repair had to be carried out afloat by a team led by ship's mechanical engineers: not a single European dock could accommodate the Livadia, and Standfilsky at that time was only being re-equipped in Sevastopol to receive the yacht.
Only seven and a half months later, the corrected yacht left the Spanish port, continuing its passage on April 26, 1881. Now they were led by Vice Admiral I. A. Shestakov. They walked slowly and carefully, hiding from the weather under the coast or in ports. On the morning of May 27, "Livadia" entered the Sevastopol Bay. She covered 3890 miles in 381 running hours, spending more than 2900 tons of coal. In a special note, I. A. Shestakov noted the ease of steering the yacht, the straightness of its course, comfort and the absence of pitching. However, he stated that regardless of the speed, even with a slight dead swell, “the blows to the cheekbones of the pancake twitched”, and in the oncoming wave “blows to the nose were very noticeable”, while the superstructures “walked” (vibrated). Nevertheless, the admiral considered the well and carefully made yacht "worthy of existence", but ... after testing "under all circumstances of the sea and weather."
View of the cabinet

While her fate was being determined, the Livadia completed its only, as it turned out, voyage across the Black Sea. On May 29, under the flag of the chief commander of the Black Sea Fleet, she crossed to Yalta and, taking on board the Admiral General and his brother, Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, headed for Batum, from where she returned three days later. The passengers were not very lucky: the sea was stormy and the superstructures were shaking from the impact of the waves on the pontoon.
In mid-June, the yacht was raised in the Standfilsky dock, where it was examined by members of the commission appointed by the new head of the maritime department, Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich. Confirming the opinion that had developed back in Ferrol, the commission recognized that the damage to the yacht was received from wave impacts and considered the design of the pontoon hull, especially in the bow, unsatisfactory to resist these impacts. The MTC agreed with these conclusions and prescribed "for safe navigation" to replace all damaged parts with new ones with a reinforcement of the set in the bow.
During the three weeks of docking, the underwater part of the pontoon was only cleared of shells and greenery, and then repainted. Repair work was not carried out, only three strips were put on the discovered cracks in the skin sheets. By this time, the leadership of the ministry decided to conduct repeated sea trials of the yacht according to specially developed instructions.
View of part of the living room

From 3 to 12 August "Livadia" 136 times passed the measured mile near Sevastopol. 312 diagrams were taken, the draft and trim were carefully kept constant. Before the test for the maximum speed, the yacht was prepared for several days, but it was not possible to achieve a 15-knot speed. With the highest power developed by machines (9837 hp) average speed was 14.46 knots. Such an affront caused confusion in the ranks of the commission, it came to accusations of the builders of deceit. However, a member of the commission, Captain 2nd Rank G. A. Vlasyev, thoroughly proved the inaccuracy of the test instructions and the lack of skills of the engine crew in maintaining the full steam output of the boilers. The MTK supported Vlasyev, noting, in addition, the low quality of the coal used. The manager of the Naval Ministry, drawing attention to the difference in power during tests in England and Russia, which reached 2500 liters. s., irritatedly noted that such a fact “completely destroys all sorts of calculations and technical considerations when designing new ships with a known task for us.”
On August 15, the yacht left for Nikolaev, where it was soon “disarmed”. In September, her team was sent back to the Baltic, replacing the Black Sea. Property and furniture began to be slowly brought to the warehouses of the port; in the press, the ship was delicately referred to as a "former ... yacht." The official conclusion about the weakness of the design of the underwater part of the hull served as a verdict for a new type of vessel. However, this "weakness" was only a consequence of the main drawback of the yacht: heavy hull blows in waves, noted in all voyages, but with the greatest force manifested in Biscay. It was this phenomenon, later called "slamming", that deprived the Livadia of seaworthiness.
The inventor himself was one of the first to realize this. Back in May, answering a note from Admiral I. A. Shestakov, he honestly admitted: “about this shortcoming ... I can positively say that the small deepening of the yacht, which was due to its limited displacement, is an error that I did not foresee in such the extent to which it has affected practice ... ". In a personal letter from A. A. Popov to the Admiral General, it was even more precisely stated: “the pitching of the yacht due to 1) a small depression 2) a flat bottom produces a phenomenon that is not found on other ships in the dimensions that the design of the yacht has ... with a keel rolling from angles of 3 1/4 ° and more to the stern, the bottom of the bow is exposed, which results in: a) the complete destruction of the buoyancy of the bow compartments, which generates tension in the entire system of fixing the hull of the yacht; b) the impact of the bottom on the waves ... so strong that both the convenience and the safety of navigation are completely violated ... "
View of the dining room

The era of experiments by Admiral A. A. Popov ended with the accession to Russian throne Alexander III, who for a long time treated Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich with hostility, and, accordingly, the leadership of the maritime department and the "restless admiral" A. A. Popov, who, according to the emperor, was engaged in "rounding off the domestic ship architecture." The emperor immediately put his brother at the head of the ministry. A. A. Popov was replaced by I. A. Shestakov, who became the next, in 1882, the manager of the Naval Ministry. But Andrei Alexandrovich continued to defend a new type of round vessel. According to E. E. Gulyaev, he even developed the “strongest unsinkable battleship” of the Livadia form; in a single-hull elliptical design with vertical sides, 8 305-mm guns were placed, the displacement was 11250 tons, the draft was 4.1 m. .".
Trying to save the yacht, A. A. Popov turned to the disgraced Konstantin Nikolayevich and I. A. Shestakov: go out to sea. She does not have to chase the enemy, she is not intended to cruise in the oceans, she does not need to be in hurricanes ... "However, according to I. A. Shestakov," The sovereign agreed to deal with the yacht at all costs. Even when I said that a prison was needed in Sevastopol, I expressed my readiness to give Livadia to this use. As a result, it was not possible to carry out new sea trials in 1882, which could be useful for the design, in the future, of new power plants. Moreover, A. A. Popov was offered to cover the amount of bonuses issued to British builders from his personal funds, allegedly without the knowledge of the leadership of the ministry! Only after four years of litigation did the treasury take over the "loss".
Blokshiv "Experience" (former yacht "Livadia") in Sevastopol. In the foreground - mine cruiser"Kazarsky"

In April 1883, the yacht turned into the Opyt steamer. For several years the ship stood idle: the MTC intended to use it as a transport, unique in terms of capacity, draft and speed, for transporting troops and equipment; it was planned to leave two side steam engines, and use the middle one on the new Baltic battleship. It was indeed removed, but installed on the Minin cruiser during its repair. The rest of the cars at the end of the century were also sent to the Baltic for the cruisers General-Admiral and Duke of Edinburgh. When unloading the machines, some of the wooden superstructures were dismantled; the huge rooms on the upper deck disappeared in the mid-80s. The steamer turned into a blockship "Experience", used both as a barracks and as a warehouse ... At the beginning of the 20th century, it was handed over to the port of Sevastopol, but in 1913 it was again included in the lists of the fleet as "Blokshiv No. 7". He stood in Sevastopol until 1926, when he was decommissioned completely. Black Sea veterans recalled that they saw its unusual skeleton back in the late 30s.

Rear Admiral (since 1873 Vice Admiral) Andrey Alexandrovich Popov, using the trust of the Admiral General, unofficially performed the functions of the general designer navy countries. This talented and energetic person, a competent sailor and shipbuilder, managed, relying on his own selected assistants, to implement most of his ideas embedded in the projects of ships of various purposes, including: the ocean-going armored cruiser General-Admiral, the seaworthy battleship Peter Veliky" and, finally, round ships: the battleships "Novgorod" and "Vice-Admiral Popov", the royal yacht "Livadia". Disputes over the merits of these round ships, which had no analogues in foreign fleets, continue to this day. The more interesting it will be for the reader to get acquainted with the actual side of the history of the creation of these ships, set out on the basis of the materials of the Russian state archive of the Navy (RGA of the Navy).

Imperial yacht "Livadia"

At the end of October 1878, the wheeled imperial yacht “Livadia” jumped out onto the rocks off the Crimean coast and sank. It was supposed to build a new one, similar to the deceased, increasing its speed and cruising range, but Vice Admiral A. A. Popov, who by that time had become the chairman of the ITC, put forward another option. On his instructions, E. E. Gulyaev developed a project for a yacht that has an elliptical shape in plan. Considering this form as the starting point for choosing the type of the future Black Sea battleship, Andrei Aleksandrovich decided on a full-scale experiment. This was understood by specialists not only in Russia, but also in England. Thus, The Times wrote in 1879: “... stability and comfort are the main qualities that were pursued in the design of the yacht, and if the maximum stability is provided in the yacht by a known form, then the addition of armor and possible changes can make it, on the basis of the same principle, no less stable artillery platform. It's no secret that a new yacht is an experience…”.

In addition to ensuring stability, comfort and safety of navigation, the main attention in the design was given to achieving a speed of 14 knots for the new vessel. According to the results of experiments with the second popovka on the Black Sea and model tests in England, the main dimensions of the future yacht were determined with a draft of 1.9 m, satisfying all the proposed requirements. To verify the data obtained, at the request of both the designers and future builders, the paraffin models of her hull were subjected at the beginning of 1879 to new tests in Amsterdam under the direction of Tiedemann. This very well-known shipbuilder and chief engineer of the Dutch Navy confirmed Froude's conclusions and guaranteed that the ship would achieve a speed of 14 knots with a propulsion power of more than 8500 hp. With. (in the project, the power was assumed to be 10,000-11,000 hp).

The construction period was short in English: until July 1 of the next, 1880. Moreover, during a personal audience with Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich after signing the contract, Pierce offered an early delivery of the yacht! Work at the shipyard, located in Ferrol (on the River Clyde, on the outskirts of Glasgow), began immediately after the signing of the documents. Appointed to oversee the construction, the author of the project, E. E. Gulyaev, reported a month later on the manufacture of templates for metal structures and the complete preparation of the slipway. By the beginning of November, two-thirds of the set of the second bottom had already been riveted ... Then A. A. Popov intervened again, who achieved the highest permission to decorate the yacht's premises in England, referring to the "desirability of testing the ship in its finished form" and the high cost of such work in the Nikolaev Admiralty. On November 10, another contract was signed: shipbuilders received, in addition to an additional fee, a real opportunity to postpone, if necessary, the yacht's readiness date. Nevertheless, the work continued according to the initial calculations.

1 - officer's quarters; 2 - pantries; 3 - the premises of the royal family; 4 - crew quarters; 5 - engine room; 6 - boiler room; 7 - coal pits; 8 - living rooms: 9 - office and commander's bedroom; 10 - front reception hall; 11 dining saloon; 12 - cabins; 13-machine hatch; 14 - servants' quarters; "5 - imperial bedroom; 16-imperial study; 17 - imperial salon; 18 - imperial galley; 19 - boiler hatch; 20 - command galley; 21-providing pantry

On January 5, 1880, the yacht was included in the lists of the ships of the fleet under the name "Livadia", and 10 days later received a commander - captain 1st rank I.K. Vogak (former first commander of both Novgorod and Peter the Great) ... March 25 the official laying of the vessel took place; at this time, the casing of the hulls was already mounted. Exactly four months later, on June 25, the yacht was launched. The ceremony was attended by Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich (the future Admiral General of the Russian Navy and a consistent detractor of A. A. Popova).

The Livadia, launched to a fairly high degree of readiness, with superstructures and a propeller-steering complex, had such an original look that the English Times, which traditionally did not place drawings of even domestic ships on its pages, made an exception for the yacht. This double-hulled vessel was figuratively described by newspapermen as a "bull on a halibut". Indeed, the yacht itself (upper hull) was a vessel 79.25 m long and 33.53 m wide, cut along the waterline, installed on a semi-submerged pontoon (lower hull), which had an elliptical shape in plan, 71.63 m long and maximum 46.63 m wide. Its height amidships did not exceed 5.49 m, the bottom was flat, with three keels: the middle one in the diametrical plane and the side ones, each of which was 5.49 m apart from the middle one.

According to E. E. Gulyaev “. . . the yacht could be somewhat longer… and narrower to suit the taste of the majority…”, but this would lead to the need to increase the power of the machines and reduce stability. Shallow draft was defined by the designer as an “outstanding feature” that made it possible to reduce wave resistance, which, according to Froude, was the most significant in wide ships, such as popovkas, at high speeds. From this it is clear that the design of two parts-hulls was actually applied from the desire to reduce the draft of the yacht as much as possible in order to achieve a given speed. In this form, the combination of the named design features of the Livadia really proves the complete originality of the ideas of its creators.

The design of the lower hull of the "Livadia" (the sailors called it "pancake") was unique. Developed taking into account the experience of building popovki, it provided an unprecedented, for that time, level of unsinkability. The second bottom stretched for the entire length, spaced from the skin to a height of 1.07 m at the midsection and 0.76 m at the ends and divided into 40 watertight compartments; along the entire side there were two longitudinal vertical bulkheads, the space between which and the side was also divided by transverse bulkheads into 40 compartments. Covered with a convex, in the form of an inverted saucer, deck, the pontoon served as a solid annular base for the upper part of the yacht, where all the living quarters and royal apartments were located, and the second bottom was the foundation for three vertical double-expansion steam engines with a design capacity of 3500 hp each. With. each and 10 cylindrical boilers. The pontoon also accommodated coal pits and auxiliary mechanisms and ship supplies ...

The issue of application of the driving force was given special attention. During the construction of the Livadia, by the end of 1879, they assembled and tested a self-propelled steel model of the yacht on a scale of 1: 10 by the spring of next year, on which they worked out the location of the propellers, their pitch and dimensions. The test methodology was developed by Tideman, and the experiments were carried out by both Russian and English engineers. As a result, the shafts of the yacht's shafts were brought out in such a way that the screws with most of their diameter were below the bottom, while the middle screw, as on the Vice-Admiral Popov, was placed 0.76 m further from the stern and deeper than the bow ones. The diameter of each four-blade propeller was 4.72 m, the pitch of the middle one was 3.81 m, the rest was 6.25 m; The material was manganese bronze.

The premises were illuminated with electric "Yablochkov's candles"; All electrical equipment was supplied from Russia. There was plumbing throughout the yacht and 23 auxiliary steam mechanisms, including a rudder drive. On the bridge, similarly to popovki, they put a device for maneuvering the direction of the vessel with the help of onboard vehicles. As raid boats, yachts in England ordered 3 large mahogany steam boats, respectively, 11.9, 9.8 and 8.5 m long. Rowing vessels were used old, from the first Livadia. The total volume of cabins, salons and halls intended for the king and retinue was 3950 m 3 - 6.7 times higher than that on the lost yacht. The huge "reception" of the emperor, about 4 m high, resembled the rooms of Louis XVI in Fontainebleau; there was also an active fountain surrounded by a flower bed... The living room on the middle deck was furnished in the Crimean Tatar spirit, the rest of the rooms were decorated in a modern English style. The decoration of officers' cabins and command rooms was not included in the contracts and was to be carried out after the arrival of the Livadia to the Black Sea.

Despite the “absolutely original design”, the ship looked great from the outside, the smooth hull was covered with a shiny black varnish, and the light gray pontoon almost merged into the water surface.

It took almost three months to complete the construction of the yacht afloat. In August, all the boilers were loaded (8 identical three-furnace boilers were installed across the pontoon, and two half-boilers were installed behind them along the sides), and in early September, the main machines, which were already tested on mooring lines from 10 to 19 of the same month. The most experienced mechanical engineers of the fleet, Major Generals A. I. Sokolov and I. I. Zarubin, who were called to England from the summer, took part in these works.

On September 24, the Livadia, led by the builder Pierce and the factory team, left the shipyard pool and passed down the river under the middle car to Greenock; just in case, she was taken by three tugboats. On the same day, the yacht entered the bay, easily reaching 12 knots.

On the 26th, Pierce invited on board the commission of the Naval Ministry, chaired by Vice Admiral I.F. Likhachev, for an official six-hour trial. "Livadia" showed an average speed of 14.88 knots. with a power of 10,200 liters. With.; the machines, due to the difference in the pitch of the propellers, worked with different speeds: the average was 90, the side ones were 84 rpm. The same Tideman noticed that when all three machines were operating, the circulation radius was “somewhat large,” but recognized this as insignificant, since it was possible to turn around “in a much smaller space” with the help of side propellers - like on priests. On September 27, the yacht was tested on a measured mile: according to the averaged data of six runs, its highest speed was equal to 15.725 knots, and the power plant power was 12,354 hp. With. And this despite the fact that the hull of the vessel during the completion of the construction was somewhat overgrown and sat deeper than expected, due to the heavier superstructure and interior decoration than in the calculations. The draft reached 2.1 m, and the displacement - 4420 tons.

Black Sea wheeled imperial yacht. The only one that directly participated in the hostilities and the only one that died in a shipwreck.

In the summer of 1825, Emperor Alexander I acquired the Oreanda estate not far from Yalta. The architect A. I. Stackenschneider built a magnificent palace there, completed in the spring of 1852. In the autumn of the same year, Nicholas I, with the Empress and younger children, rested in this palace for the only time, spending about a month and a half there. Naturally, the question arose of transporting the "August" family to a new building.
Since at that time there were no royal yachts on the Black Sea, an 18-oar boat specially built there in 1840, armed with one small carronade for salutes, was brought from Nikolaev. In 1860, Oreanda passed into the possession of Grand Duke Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich. He ordered the construction of a small wheeled 4-gun steamer for the voyages of the imperial family on the Black Sea, which became the first Black Sea royal yacht. The wooden steamship "Tiger" with a three-masted barquentine was built in the Nikolaev Admiralty in 1855-1858. Although the "Tiger" was listed as part of the Black Sea Fleet for 14 years (until 1872), almost no information was preserved about the voyages of the royal family on it, except for the mention of the transition in August 1861 of Alexander II with his family from Sevastopol to his new estate Livadia, from 1866 which became the favorite residence of Russian emperors in the Crimea. Since the trips of the imperial family to the Black Sea began to acquire a certain regularity, it became necessary to replace the old "Tiger" with a new comfortable yacht "for service off the coast of Crimea." Previously, in 1868, the issue of acquiring a steamship in England and “turning into a yacht for the sovereign emperor” was considered, but then a decision was made to build a yacht in the Nikolaev Admiralty. The construction of the yacht, named "Livadia", began at the end of 1869, but the official laying of the vessel took place on March 19, 1870.

The yacht was designed and built by the well-known Black Sea shipbuilder, Captain of the Corps of Ship Engineers L. G. Shvede, who completed the work by the summer of 1873. The new 4-gun wooden wheeled yacht was not inferior to the Baltic “Derzhava” in terms of comfort and decoration of the royal premises, and even surpassed the latter in the design of the “royal cabin” in the stern of the yacht and the dining room on the middle deck, designed by the architect Monighetti. During the construction of the Livadia, L. G. Shvede in 1872 made a drawing of the alleged bow decoration of the yacht in the form of an oval convex shield with the image of a double-headed eagle. The Livadia received a bow decoration in the form of a double-headed eagle crowned with a crown, similar to that installed on the Derzhava.

The design of the bike is distinguished by a greatly increased strength of the frame and fork, for reliability when performing tricks. Most BMX bikes have 20-inch wheels, although racing BMX bikes use 24-inch or larger wheels. Often, special tubes (pegs) are wound on the axle of the wheels, which allow you to perform various street tricks (for example, grinds) or flatland tricks. The small size of BMX bikes means high maneuverability, and the large gear ratio of the chainrings means more speed. Many BMX bikes are equipped with a gyro, which allows you to rotate the handlebar around its axis (or the frame around the handlebar) without restrictions, without tangling the brake cables, which gives you more freedom to perform various tricks (for example, barspin, tailwhip). Nowadays BMX has become very popular all over the world.

The three-year service of Livadia ended tragically. On the way from Sevastopol to Odessa, on a foggy night from October 21 to 22, 1878, she jumped onto a reef near the Tar-Khankut lighthouse on the western coast of Crimea. For 47 days, from October 22 to December 7, "Livadia" stood on the rocks. After a series of unsuccessful attempts by the command of the Black Sea Fleet to save the ship, everything of value that was possible was brought ashore, giving the hull to the sea waves.
It was supposed to build a new one, similar to the deceased, increasing its speed and cruising range, but Vice Admiral A. A. Popov, who by that time had become the chairman of the ITC, put forward another option. On his instructions, E. E. Gulyaev developed a project for a yacht that has an elliptical shape on the basis of Novgorod. Considering this form as the starting point for choosing the type of the future Black Sea battleship, Andrei Aleksandrovich decided on a full-scale experiment. This was understood by specialists not only in Russia, but also in England. Thus, The Times wrote in 1879: “... stability and comfort are the main qualities that were pursued in the design of the yacht, and if the maximum stability is provided in the yacht by a known form, then the addition of armor and possible changes can make it, on the basis of the same principle, no less stable artillery platform. It's no secret that a new yacht is an experience…”.
In addition to ensuring stability, comfort and safety of navigation, the main attention in the design was given to achieving a speed of 14 knots for the new vessel. According to the results of experiments on Vice-Admiral Popov in the Black Sea and model tests in England, the main dimensions of the future yacht were determined with a draft of 1.9 m, satisfying all the proposed requirements. To verify the data obtained, at the request of both the designers and future builders, the paraffin models of her hull were subjected at the beginning of 1879 to new tests in Amsterdam under the direction of Tiedemann. This highly renowned shipbuilder and chief engineer of the Dutch Navy confirmed Froude's conclusions and guaranteed that the ship would achieve a speed of 14 knots, with a propulsion power of more than 8500 hp. With. (in the project, the power was assumed to be 10,000-11,000 hp).

The design of the lower hull of the yacht (the sailors called it "pancake") was unique. Designed taking into account the experience of building Novgorod, it provided an unprecedented, for that time, level of unsinkability. The second bottom stretched for the entire length, spaced from the skin to a height of 1.07 m at the midsection and 0.76 m at the ends and divided into 40 watertight compartments; along the entire side there were two longitudinal vertical bulkheads, the space between which and the side was also divided by transverse bulkheads into 40 compartments. Covered with a convex, in the form of an inverted saucer, deck, the pontoon served as a solid annular base for the upper part of the yacht, where all the living quarters and royal apartments were located, and the second bottom was the foundation for three vertical double-expansion steam engines with a design capacity of 3500 hp each. With. each and 10 cylindrical boilers. The pontoon also accommodated coal pits and auxiliary mechanisms and ship supplies ...
Significant difficulties had to be overcome in determining the overall and local strength of the steel structures of the pontoon and the junction of the hulls (annular stringer), which, in turn, gave rise to technical problems in their provision. To the credit of Russian and British engineers, these difficulties were largely overcome. The entire set was made of mild "Simenson" steel, the pontoon lining and bulkheads were made of iron sheets; the decks and sheathing of the yacht itself are pine. The total height from the keels to the roof of the upper superstructures was 14 m. Special attention was paid to the application of the driving force. During construction, by the end of 1879, they assembled and tested a self-propelled steel model of a yacht on a scale of 1:10 by the spring of next year, on which they worked out the location of the propellers, their pitch and dimensions. The test methodology was developed by Tideman, and the experiments were carried out by both Russian and English engineers. As a result, the deadwood shafts of the yacht were brought out in such a way that the screws with most of their diameter were below the bottom, while the middle screw, as on Vice-Admiral Popov, was placed 0.76 m further from the stern and deeper than the side ones. The diameter of each four-blade propeller was 4.72 m, the pitch of the middle one was 3.81 m, the rest was 6.25 m; The material was manganese bronze.

The premises were illuminated with electric "Yablochkov's candles"; All electrical equipment was supplied from Russia. There was plumbing throughout the yacht and 23 auxiliary steam mechanisms, including a rudder drive. On the bridge, similarly to popovki, they put a device for maneuvering the direction of the vessel with the help of onboard vehicles. As raid boats, yachts in England ordered 3 large mahogany steam boats, respectively, 11.9, 9.8 and 8.5 m long. Rowing vessels were used old, from the first Livadia. The total volume of cabins, salons and halls intended for the king and retinue was 3950 m3 - 6.7 times higher than that on the lost yacht. The huge "reception" of the emperor, about 4 m high, resembled the rooms of Louis XVI in Fontainebleau; there was also an active fountain surrounded by a flower bed... The living room on the middle deck was furnished in the Crimean Tatar spirit, the rest of the rooms were decorated in a modern English style. The decoration of the officers' cabins and command rooms was not included in the contracts and had to be carried out after the vessel arrived at the Black Sea.
Despite the “absolutely original design”, the ship looked great from the outside, the smooth hull was covered with a shiny black lacquer, and the light gray pontoon almost merged with the water surface.
It took almost three months to complete the construction of the yacht afloat. In August, all the boilers were loaded (8 identical three-furnace boilers were installed across the pontoon, and two half-boilers were installed behind them along the sides), and in early September, the main machines, which were already tested on mooring lines from 10 to 19 of the same month. The most experienced mechanical engineers of the fleet, Major Generals A. I. Sokolov and I. I. Zarubin, who were called to England from the summer, took part in these works.
On September 24, the Livadia, led by the builder Pierce and the factory team, left the shipyard pool and passed down the river under the middle car to Greenock; just in case, she was taken by three tugboats. On the same day, the yacht entered the bay, easily reaching 12 knots.
The chief consultant Tiedeman noted that the ship kept well on course and obeyed the helm like a boat. The next day, factory tests took place. Several Russian officers and 12 sailors from the team assigned to the yacht were invited to the ship. According to A. I. Sokolov, it was possible to develop a speed of 15 knots, and with a headwind!
On the 26th, Pierce invited on board the commission of the Naval Ministry, chaired by Vice Admiral I.F. Likhachev, for an official six-hour trial. "Livadia" showed an average speed of 14.88 knots. with a power of 10200l. With.; the machines, due to the difference in the pitch of the propellers, worked with different speeds: the average was 90, the side ones were 84 rpm. The same Tideman noticed that when all three machines were operating, the circulation radius was “somewhat large,” but recognized this as insignificant, since it was possible to turn “in a much smaller space” with the help of side propellers - like on priests. On September 27, the yacht was tested on a measured mile: according to the averaged data of six runs, its highest speed was equal to 15.725 knots, and the power plant power was 12,354 hp. With. And this despite the fact that the hull of the vessel during the completion of the construction was somewhat overgrown and sat deeper than expected, due to the heavier superstructure and interior decoration than in the calculations. The draft reached 2.1 m, and the displacement -4420 tons.

Calculations and experiments brilliantly confirmed. Everyone was happy. The company received 2.7 million rubles, including 414 thousand rubles, premiums. About A. A. Popov and E. V. Gulyaev wrote in all European newspapers.
Upon completion of the tests, the Russian team, which arrived in August from the Baltic Fleet, switched to the yacht (it exceeded the staff and consisted of 24 officers and 321 lower ranks). On September 30, the yacht was received from the factory and on the same day, raising the flag, guis and pennant, she began the campaign.
The ferry to the Black Sea was also planned as a training voyage “with only such a development of the power of machines,” A. A. Popov reported back in August, “to enable all machine personnel to calmly look around and become well acquainted with the operation and control of machines.” After preparations, on October 3, the yacht left the Greenock raid. On board, as guests of honor, were the shipbuilders Pierce, Tiedeman and Reid, as well as the controller of the English fleet, Admiral Steward. In Brest, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich boarded and, under the flag of the Admiral General, the Livadia on October 7 went further, across the Bay of Biscay to Cadiz.
Until midnight on October 8, the campaign took place in favorable conditions, at a speed of 12-13 knots. The wind that rose at night quickly grew stronger, spreading a strong oncoming swell. From two o'clock in the morning on October 9, the waves began to hit the bow of the pontoon of the yacht - at first rare, these blows became more frequent with increasing wind and wave heights. The course had to be reduced to 4-5 knots, but the blows did not stop. Reed, who was very restrained in his assessments, wrote: “the blows of the waves into the flat bottom of the yacht were terrible at times ...” I.K. Vogak also reported the same in the report: “... one of them was especially strong, which impressed everyone as if about a solid object ... ”At 10 o’clock in the morning they discovered that the first double-bottom compartment was filled with water; urgently had to change course and head to the Spanish port of Ferrol.
According to eyewitnesses, the wave height reached 6-7 m, while the side roll did not exceed 3.5 ° on board, and the keel roll did not exceed 9 ° in a span of 5.5 ° forward and 3.5 ° aft. The screws were never exposed. “Nothing fell on the yacht,” the commander reported: the table setting and high candelabra remained motionless as if in a calm, neither the soup in the bowls, nor the water in the glasses had ever spilled.

The only yacht that participated in the hostilities and sank in a shipwreck was the Black Sea wheeled imperial "Livadia".

Its construction began at the end of 1869, but the official laying of the ship took place on March 19
1870.

The yacht was designed and built by the well-known Black Sea shipbuilder, Captain of the Corps of Ship Engineers L. G. Shvede, who completed the work by the summer of 1873. The new 4-gun wooden wheeled yacht in terms of comfort and decoration of the royal premises was not inferior to the Baltic "Derzhava", and in the design of the "royal cabin" in the stern of the yacht and the dining room on the middle deck, designed by the architect Monighetti, even surpassed the latter. During the construction of the Livadia, L. G. Shvede in 1872 made a drawing of the alleged bow decoration of the yacht in the form of an oval convex shield with the image of a double-headed eagle, the Livadia received a bow decoration in the form of a double-headed eagle topped with a crown, similar to that installed on the Derzhava .

It was supposed to build a new one, similar to the deceased, increasing its speed and cruising range, but Vice Admiral A. A. Popov, who by that time had become the chairman of the ITC, put forward another option. On his instructions, E. E. Gulyaev developed a project for a yacht that has an elliptical shape on the basis of Novgorod. Considering this form as the starting point for choosing the type of the future Black Sea battleship, Andrei Aleksandrovich decided on a full-scale experiment. This was understood by specialists not only in Russia, but also in England. Thus, The Times wrote in 1879: "... stability and comfort are the main qualities that were pursued in the design of the yacht, and if the maximum stability is provided in the yacht by a known form, then the addition of armor and possible changes can make it, on the basis of the same principle, no less stable artillery platform. It is no secret that the new yacht is an experience ... ".

In addition to ensuring stability, comfort and safety of navigation, the main attention in the design was given to achieving a speed of 14 knots for the new vessel. According to the results of experiments on Vice-Admiral Popov in the Black Sea and model tests in England, the main dimensions of the future yacht were determined with a draft of 1.9 m, satisfying all the proposed requirements. To verify the data obtained, at the request of both the designers and future builders, the paraffin models of her hull were subjected at the beginning of 1879 to new tests in Amsterdam under the direction of Tiedemann. This highly renowned shipbuilder and chief engineer of the Dutch Navy confirmed Froude's conclusions and guaranteed that the ship would achieve a speed of 14 knots, with a propulsion power of more than 8500 hp. With. (in the project, the power was assumed to be 10,000-11,000 hp).

General location of the imperial screw yacht "Livadia"

In the middle of the year, agreed with the English shipbuilding company John Elder & Co., the project was finally prepared. In August, after a written assurance from the chief builder of Pierce's company about the possibility of creating such a vessel, Alexander II's personal permission to build a new yacht in England followed. On September 5, Pierce and the famous Russian shipbuilder M.I. Kazi signed a contract. The terms of this document were not quite usual. Their essence was the obligation of shipbuilders not only to build the ship itself according to Russian drawings, with the installation of its own production of steam mechanisms, but also to guarantee that the yacht would reach a speed of 15 knots. For each undeveloped 0.1 knot, the company paid heavy fines, and if the ship sailed at a speed of less than 14 knots, the customer had the right not to accept it at all, but to take only the power plant, for which he was obliged to make contractual payments in the process the buildings. If the tests were successful, the payment for the yacht followed after its delivery. For exceeding the limits of speed (15 knots) and power (12,000 hp), builders received significant bonuses. The last condition was to stimulate the company to create perfect power plants, intended not only for the yacht, but also, with success, for future Russian ships and the battleship Peter the Great, whose machines, like those of the Novgorod series, did not develop their design capacity.

The construction period was short in English: until July 1 of the next, 1880. Moreover, during a personal audience with Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich after signing the contract, Pierce offered an early delivery of the yacht! Work at the shipyard, located in Ferrol (on the River Clyde, on the outskirts of Glasgow), began immediately after the signing of the documents. Appointed to oversee the construction, the author of the project, E. E. Gulyaev, reported a month later on the manufacture of templates for metal structures and the complete preparation of the slipway. By the beginning of November, two-thirds of the set of the second bottom had already been riveted ... Then A. A. Popov intervened again, having achieved the highest permission to decorate the yacht's premises in England, referring to "the desirability of testing the ship in its finished form" and the high cost of such work in the Nikolaev Admiralty. On November 10, another contract was signed: shipbuilders received, in addition to an additional fee, a real opportunity to postpone, if necessary, the yacht's readiness date. Nevertheless, the work continued according to the initial calculations.

On January 5, 1880, the yacht was included in the lists of the ships of the fleet under the name "Livadia", and 10 days later received a commander - captain 1st rank I.K. Vogak (former first commander of both Novgorod and Peter the Great) ... On March 25, the official laying of the vessel took place; at this time, the casing of the hulls was already mounted. Exactly four months later, on June 25, the yacht was launched. The ceremony was attended by Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich (the future Admiral General of the Russian Navy and a consistent detractor of A. A. Popova).

Yacht Livadia in the dock

"Livadia", launched to a fairly high degree of readiness, with superstructures and a propeller-steering complex, had such an original look that the English "Times", which traditionally did not place drawings even of domestic ships on its pages, made an exception for the yacht. This double-hulled vessel was figuratively described by newspapermen as a "bull on a halibut". Indeed, the yacht itself (upper hull) was a vessel 79.25 m long and 33.53 m wide, cut along the waterline, installed on a semi-submerged pontoon (lower hull), which had an elliptical shape in plan, 71.63 m long and maximum 46.63 m wide. Its height amidships did not exceed 5.49 m, the bottom was flat, with three keels: the middle one in the diametrical plane and the side ones, each of which was 5.49 m apart from the average one. According to E. E. Gulyaev "... the yacht could be somewhat longer ... and narrower, to satisfy the taste of the majority ...", but this would lead to the need to increase the power of the machines and reduce stability. Shallow draft was defined by the designer as an "outstanding feature" that made it possible to reduce the wave resistance, which, according to Froude, was the most significant in wide vessels, such as Novgorod, at high speeds. From this it is clear that the design of two parts-hulls was actually applied from the desire to reduce the draft of the yacht as much as possible in order to achieve a given speed. In this form, the combination of the named features of the Livadia design really proves the complete originality of the ideas of its creators.

Imperial yacht "Livadia" on the slipway

Imperial screw yacht "Livadia" after launching

Significant difficulties had to be overcome in determining the overall and local strength of the steel structures of the pontoon and the junction of the hulls (annular stringer), which, in turn, gave rise to technical problems in their provision. To the credit of Russian and British engineers, these difficulties were largely overcome. The entire set was made of mild "Siemenson" steel, the pontoon lining and bulkheads were made of iron sheets; the decks and cladding of the yacht itself are pine. The total height from the keels to the roof of the upper superstructures was 14 m. Special attention was paid to the application of the driving force. During construction, by the end of 1879, they assembled and tested a self-propelled steel model of a yacht on a scale of 1:10 by the spring of next year, on which they worked out the location of the propellers, their pitch and dimensions. The test methodology was developed by Tideman, and the experiments were carried out by both Russian and English engineers. As a result, the deadwood shafts of the yacht were brought out in such a way that the screws with most of their diameter were below the bottom, while the middle screw, as on Vice-Admiral Popov, was placed 0.76 m further from the stern and deeper than the side ones. The diameter of each four-blade propeller was 4.72 m, the pitch of the middle one was 3.81 m, the rest was 6.25 m; The material was manganese bronze.

Imperial yacht "Livadia" in Naples. May 1881

The premises were illuminated with electric "Yablochkov's candles"; All electrical equipment was supplied from Russia. There was plumbing throughout the yacht and 23 auxiliary steam mechanisms, including a rudder drive. On the bridge, similarly to popovki, they put a device for maneuvering the direction of the vessel with the help of onboard vehicles. As raid boats, yachts in England ordered 3 large mahogany steam boats, respectively, 11.9, 9.8 and 8.5 m long. Rowing vessels were used old, from the first Livadia. The total volume of cabins, salons and halls intended for the king and retinue was 3950 m3 - 6.7 times higher than that on the lost yacht. The huge "reception" of the emperor, about 4 m high, resembled the rooms of Louis XVI in Fontainebleau; there was also an active fountain surrounded by a flower bed... The living room on the middle deck was furnished in the Crimean Tatar spirit, the rest of the rooms were decorated in a modern English style. The decoration of the officers' cabins and command rooms was not included in the contracts and had to be carried out after the vessel arrived at the Black Sea.

General view of the yacht Livadia at the pier

Despite the "absolutely original design", the ship looked great from the outside, the smooth hull was covered with a shiny black lacquer, and the light gray pontoon almost merged with the water surface.
It took almost three months to complete the construction of the yacht afloat. In August, all boilers were loaded (8 identical three-furnace boilers were installed across the pontoon, and two half-boilers were installed behind them along the sides), and in early September, the main machines, which were already tested on mooring lines from 10 to 19 of the same month. The most experienced mechanical engineers of the fleet, Major Generals A.I. Sokolov and I.I. Zarubin, who were called to England in the summer, took part in these works.
On September 24, the Livadia, led by the builder Pierce and the factory team, left the shipyard pool and passed down the river under the middle car to Greenock; just in case, she was taken by three tugboats. On the same day, the yacht entered the bay, easily reaching 12 knots.

On the 26th, Pierce invited on board the commission of the Naval Ministry, chaired by Vice Admiral I.F. Likhachev, for an official six-hour trial. "Livadia" showed an average speed of 14.88 knots. with a power of 10200l. With.; the machines, due to the difference in the pitch of the propellers, worked with different speeds: the average was 90, the side ones were 84 rpm. The same Tidemann noticed that when all three machines were operating, the circulation radius was "somewhat large", but recognized this as insignificant, since it was possible to turn around "in a much smaller space" with the help of side propellers - like on priests. On September 27, the yacht was tested on a measured mile: according to the averaged data of six runs, its highest speed was equal to 15.725 knots, and the power plant power was 12,354 hp. With. And this despite the fact that the hull of the vessel during the completion of the construction was somewhat overgrown and sat deeper than expected, due to the heavier superstructure and interior decoration than in the calculations. The draft reached 2.1 m, and the displacement -4420 tons.

Boudoir table in one of the rooms

The ferry to the Black Sea was also planned as a training voyage "with only such a development of the power of machines," A. A. Popov reported back in August, "to enable all machine personnel to calmly look around and get well acquainted with the operation and control of machines." After preparations, on October 3, the yacht left the Greenock raid. On board, as guests of honor, were the shipbuilders Pierce, Tiedeman and Reid, as well as the controller of the English fleet, Admiral Steward. In Brest, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich boarded and, under the flag of the Admiral General, the Livadia on October 7 went further, across the Bay of Biscay to Cadiz.

View of the cabinet

Until midnight on October 8, the campaign took place in favorable conditions, at a speed of 12-13 knots. The wind that rose at night quickly grew stronger, spreading a strong oncoming swell. From two o'clock in the morning on October 9, the waves began to hit the bow of the pontoon of the yacht - at first rare, these blows became more frequent with increasing wind and wave heights. The course had to be reduced to 4-5 knots, but the blows did not stop. Reed, who was very restrained in his assessments, wrote: “the impacts of waves on the flat bottom of the yacht were terrible at times ...” I.K. Vogak also reported the same in the report: “... one of them was especially strong, impression as from a blow on a solid object ... "At 10 o'clock in the morning they discovered that the first double-bottom compartment was filled with water; urgently had to change course and head to the Spanish port of Ferrol.
According to eyewitnesses, the wave height reached 6-7 m, while the side roll did not exceed 3.5 ° on board, and the keel roll did not exceed 9 ° in a span of 5.5 ° forward and 3.5 ° aft. The screws were never exposed. “Nothing fell on the yacht,” the commander reported: the table setting and high candelabra remained motionless as if in a calm, neither the soup in the bowls, nor the water in the glasses had ever spilled.

One of the bedrooms

Reid refers directly to the Admiral General, who, in his words, believed that the opportunity should not be missed "to make a thorough test of the yacht, and therefore we headed into the very jaws of the Biscay storm." About the same, but more diplomatically, Verkhovsky writes: “there were those who wanted to meet ... a good storm, they wanted us to be shaken, so that the wind and excitement were stronger ... and without this ... a complete judgment about the qualities of a yacht is impossible ...". Whether the leader of the campaign himself decided on such a "test" or he was helped and advised remains unknown.

View of the boudoir

In the Ferrol Bay, divers found in the bow of the pontoon, on the left side, a 5-meter dent with tears and cracks in the skin sheets, bent and broken frames. Five side compartments and one double-bottom compartment were flooded. Initially, a collision with floating debris was considered the cause of the damage, about which a message was sent to the Government Gazette, but, after a thorough examination, both Russian and foreign experts came to the unanimous opinion that the damage was caused by wave impacts! The repair had to be carried out afloat by a team led by ship's mechanical engineers: not a single European dock could accommodate the Livadia, and Standfilsky at that time was only being re-equipped in Sevastopol to receive the yacht.

Only seven and a half months later, the corrected yacht left the Spanish port, continuing its passage on April 26, 1881. Now they were led by Vice Admiral I. A. Shestakov. They walked slowly and carefully, hiding from the weather under the coast or in ports. On the morning of May 27, "Livadia" entered the Sevastopol Bay. She covered 3890 miles in 381 running hours, spending more than 2900 tons of coal. In a special note, I. A. Shestakov noted the ease of steering the yacht, the straightness of its course, comfort and the absence of pitching. However, he stated that regardless of the speed, even with a slight dead swell, “the blows to the cheekbones of the pancake twitched”, and in the oncoming wave, “the blows to the nose were very noticeable”, while the superstructures “walked” (vibrated). Nevertheless, the admiral considered the well and carefully made yacht "worthy of existence", but ... after testing "under all circumstances of the sea and weather."

While her fate was being determined, the Livadia completed its only, as it turned out, voyage across the Black Sea. On May 29, under the flag of the chief commander of the Black Sea Fleet, she crossed to Yalta and, taking on board the Admiral General and his brother, Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, headed for Batum, from where she returned three days later. The passengers were not very lucky: the sea was stormy and the superstructures were shaking from the impact of the waves on the pontoon.

In mid-June, the yacht was raised in the Standfilsky dock, where it was examined by members of the commission appointed by the new head of the maritime department, Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich. Confirming the opinion that had developed back in Ferrol, the commission recognized that the damage to the yacht was received from wave impacts and considered the design of the pontoon hull, especially in the bow, unsatisfactory to resist these impacts. The MTC agreed with these conclusions and prescribed "for safe navigation" to replace all damaged parts with new ones with a reinforcement of the set in the bow.

During the three weeks of docking, the underwater part of the pontoon was only cleared of shells and greenery, and then repainted. Repair work was not carried out, only three strips were put on the discovered cracks in the skin sheets. By this time, the leadership of the ministry decided to conduct repeated sea trials of the yacht according to specially developed instructions.

From 3 to 12 August "Livadia" 136 times passed the measured mile near Sevastopol. 312 diagrams were taken, the draft and trim were carefully kept constant. Before the test for the maximum speed, the yacht was prepared for several days, but it was not possible to achieve a 15-knot speed. With the highest power developed by the machines (9837 hp), the average speed was 14.46 knots. Such an affront caused confusion in the ranks of the commission, it came to accusations of the builders of deceit. However, a member of the commission, Captain 2nd Rank G. A. Vlasyev, thoroughly proved the inaccuracy of the test instructions and the lack of skills of the engine crew in maintaining the full steam output of the boilers. The MTK supported Vlasyev, noting, in addition, the low quality of the coal used. The manager of the Naval Ministry, drawing attention to the difference in power during tests in England and Russia, which reached 2500 liters. s., irritably noted that such a fact "completely destroys all sorts of calculations and technical considerations in the design of our new ships with a known task."

On August 15, the yacht left for Nikolaev, where it was soon "disarmed". In September, her team was sent back to the Baltic, replacing the Black Sea. Property and furniture began to be slowly brought to the warehouses of the port; in the press, the ship was delicately referred to as a "former ... yacht." The official conclusion about the weakness of the design of the underwater part of the hull served as a verdict for a new type of vessel. However, this "weakness" was only a consequence of the main drawback of the yacht: heavy hull blows in waves, noted in all voyages, but with the greatest force manifested in Biscay. It was this phenomenon, later called "slamming", that deprived the Livadia of seaworthiness.

The inventor himself was one of the first to realize this. Back in May, answering a note from Admiral I. A. Shestakov, he honestly admitted: “about this shortcoming ... I can positively say that the small deepening of the yacht, which was due to its limited displacement, is an error that I did not foresee in such the extent to which it has affected practice ... ". In a personal letter from A. A. Popov to the Admiral General, it was even more precisely stated: "the pitching of the yacht due to 1) a small depression 2) a flat bottom, produces a phenomenon that is not found on other ships in the dimensions that the design of the yacht has ... with a keel rolling from angles of 3 1/4 ° and more to the stern, the bottom of the bow is exposed, which results in: a) the complete destruction of the buoyancy of the bow compartments, which generates tension in the entire system of fastenings of the hull of the yacht; b) bottom impacts on the waves, .. so strong that both the comfort and safety of navigation are completely violated ... "

The era of experiments by Admiral A. A. Popov ended with the accession to the Russian throne of Alexander III, who had long been hostile to Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich, and, accordingly, to the leadership of the naval department and to the "restless admiral" A. A. Popov , who, according to the emperor, was engaged in "rounding off the domestic ship architecture." The emperor immediately put his brother at the head of the ministry. A. A. Popov was replaced by I. A. Shestakov, who became the next, in 1882, the manager of the Naval Ministry. But Andrei Alexandrovich continued to defend a new type of round vessel. According to E. E. Gulyaev, he even developed "the strongest unsinkable battleship" of the Livadia form; in a single-hull elliptical design with vertical sides, 8 305-mm guns were placed, the displacement was 11250 tons, the draft was 4.1 m. .".

Trying to save the yacht, A. A. Popov turned to the disgraced Konstantin Nikolaevich and I. A. Shestakov: "... the disadvantage of its special purpose is not something significant, because to destroy the blows you can always change course or even not at all She does not have to chase the enemy, she is not intended to cruise in the oceans, she does not need to be in hurricanes ... " However, according to I. A. Shestakov, "The sovereign agreed to deal with the yacht at all costs Even when I said that a prison was needed in Sevastopol, I expressed my readiness to give Livadia to this use. As a result, it was not possible to carry out new sea trials in 1882, which could be useful for the design, in the future, of new power plants. Moreover, A. A. Popov was offered to cover the amount of bonuses issued to British builders from his personal funds, allegedly without the knowledge of the leadership of the ministry! Only after four years of litigation did the treasury take over the "loss".

Blokshiv "Experience" (former yacht "Livadia") in Sevastopol. In the foreground is the mine cruiser "Kazarsky"

Black Sea wheeled imperial yacht. The only one that directly participated in the hostilities and the only one that died in a shipwreck.
In the summer of 1825, Emperor Alexander I acquired the Oreanda estate not far from Yalta. The architect A. I. Stackenschneider built a magnificent palace there, completed in the spring of 1852. In the autumn of the same year, Nicholas I, with the Empress and younger children, rested in this palace for the only time, spending about a month and a half there. Naturally, the question arose of transporting the "August" family to a new building.
Since at that time there were no royal yachts on the Black Sea, an 18-oar boat specially built there in 1840, armed with one small carronade for salutes, was brought from Nikolaev. In 1860, Oreanda passed into the possession of Grand Duke Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich. He ordered the construction of a small wheeled 4-gun steamer for the voyages of the imperial family on the Black Sea, which became the first Black Sea royal yacht. The wooden steamship "Tiger" with a three-masted barquentine was built in the Nikolaev Admiralty in 1855-1858. Although the "Tiger" was listed as part of the Black Sea Fleet for 14 years (until 1872), almost no information was preserved about the voyages of the royal family on it, except for the mention of the transition in August 1861 of Alexander II with his family from Sevastopol to his new estate Livadia, from 1866 which became the favorite residence of Russian emperors in the Crimea. Since the trips of the imperial family to the Black Sea began to acquire a certain regularity, it became necessary to replace the old "Tiger" with a new comfortable yacht "for service off the coast of Crimea." Previously, in 1868, the issue of acquiring a steamship in England and “turning into a yacht for the sovereign emperor” was considered, but then a decision was made to build a yacht in the Nikolaev Admiralty. The construction of the yacht, named "Livadia", began at the end of 1869, but the official laying of the vessel took place on March 19, 1870.
The yacht was designed and built by the well-known Black Sea shipbuilder, Captain of the Corps of Ship Engineers L. G. Shvede, who completed the work by the summer of 1873. The new 4-gun wooden wheeled yacht was not inferior to the Baltic “Derzhava” in terms of comfort and decoration of the royal premises, and even surpassed the latter in the design of the “royal cabin” in the stern of the yacht and the dining room on the middle deck, designed by the architect Monighetti. During the construction of the Livadia, L. G. Shvede in 1872 made a drawing of the alleged bow decoration of the yacht in the form of an oval convex shield with the image of a double-headed eagle. The Livadia received a bow decoration in the form of a double-headed eagle crowned with a crown, similar to that installed on the Derzhava.
Imperial steam wheeled yacht "Livadia" after commissioning. 1873

In the summer of 1873, a new yacht, having become part of the Black Sea Fleet, came to Sevastopol, from where it delivered the Empress and her family to Yalta.
In March 1874, the Livadia went into practical navigation. In the western part of the Mediterranean Sea, the yacht successfully withstood an 11-point storm, showing excellent seaworthiness. It should be noted that the Livadia is the only one of the imperial yachts that participated in the hostilities of the Russian fleet. During the Russian-Turkish war of 1877-1878, under the command of Captain 1st Rank F.E. Kroun, she cruised off the Romanian and Bulgarian coasts and sank a Turkish two-masted kocherma on August 21. Seen by two Turkish armored ships, the yacht withstood an 18-hour chase and safely left under the protection of the Sevastopol batteries.
The three-year service of Livadia ended tragically. On the way from Sevastopol to Odessa, on a foggy night from October 21 to 22, 1878, she jumped onto a reef near the Tar-Khankut lighthouse on the western coast of Crimea. For 47 days, from October 22 to December 7, "Livadia" stood on the rocks. After a series of unsuccessful attempts by the command of the Black Sea Fleet to save the ship, everything of value that was possible was brought ashore, giving the hull to the sea waves.
It was supposed to build a new one, similar to the deceased, increasing its speed and cruising range, but Vice Admiral A. A. Popov, who by that time had become the chairman of the ITC, put forward another option. On his instructions, E. E. Gulyaev developed a project for a yacht that has an elliptical shape on the basis of Novgorod. Considering this form as the starting point for choosing the type of the future Black Sea battleship, Andrei Aleksandrovich decided on a full-scale experiment. This was understood by specialists not only in Russia, but also in England. Thus, The Times wrote in 1879: “... stability and comfort are the main qualities that were pursued in the design of the yacht, and if the maximum stability is provided in the yacht by a known shape, then the addition of armor and possible changes can make it, on the basis of the same principle, no less stable artillery platform. It's no secret that a new yacht is an experience...”.
In addition to ensuring stability, comfort and safety of navigation, the main attention in the design was given to achieving a speed of 14 knots for the new vessel. According to the results of experiments on Vice-Admiral Popov in the Black Sea and model tests in England, the main dimensions of the future yacht were determined with a draft of 1.9 m, satisfying all the proposed requirements. To verify the data obtained, at the request of both the designers and future builders, the paraffin models of her hull were subjected at the beginning of 1879 to new tests in Amsterdam under the direction of Tiedemann. This highly renowned shipbuilder and chief engineer of the Dutch Navy confirmed Froude's conclusions and guaranteed that the ship would achieve a speed of 14 knots, with a propulsion power of more than 8500 hp. With. (in the project, the power was assumed to be 10,000-11,000 hp).
General location of the imperial screw yacht "Livadia"

In the middle of the year, agreed with the English shipbuilding company John Elder and Co., the project was finally prepared. In August, after a written assurance from the chief builder of Pierce's company about the possibility of creating such a vessel, Alexander II's personal permission to build a new yacht in England followed. On September 5, Pierce and the famous Russian shipbuilder M.I. Kazi signed a contract. The terms of this document were not quite usual. Their essence was the obligation of shipbuilders not only to build the ship itself according to Russian drawings, with the installation of its own production of steam mechanisms, but also to guarantee that the yacht would reach a speed of 15 knots. For each undeveloped 0.1 knot, the company paid heavy fines, and if the ship sailed at a speed of less than 14 knots, the customer had the right not to accept it at all, but to take only the power plant, for which he was obliged to make contractual payments in the process the buildings. If the tests were successful, the payment for the yacht followed after its delivery. For exceeding the limits of speed (15 knots) and power (12,000 hp), builders received significant bonuses. The last condition was to stimulate the company to create perfect power plants, intended not only for the yacht, but also, with success, for future Russian ships and the battleship Peter the Great, whose machines, like those of the Novgorod series, did not develop their design capacity.
The construction period was short in English: until July 1 of the next, 1880. Moreover, during a personal audience with Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich after signing the contract, Pierce offered an early delivery of the yacht! Work at the shipyard, located in Ferrol (on the River Clyde, on the outskirts of Glasgow), began immediately after the signing of the documents. Appointed to oversee the construction, the author of the project, E. E. Gulyaev, reported a month later on the manufacture of templates for metal structures and the complete preparation of the slipway. By the beginning of November, two-thirds of the set of the second bottom had already been riveted ... Then A. A. Popov intervened again, who achieved the highest permission to decorate the yacht's premises in England, referring to the "desirability of testing the ship in its finished form" and the high cost of such work in the Nikolaev Admiralty. On November 10, another contract was signed: shipbuilders received, in addition to an additional fee, a real opportunity to postpone, if necessary, the yacht's readiness date. Nevertheless, the work continued according to the initial calculations.
On January 5, 1880, the yacht was included in the lists of the ships of the fleet under the name "Livadia", and 10 days later received a commander - captain 1st rank I.K. Vogak (former first commander of both Novgorod and Peter the Great) ... On March 25, the official laying of the vessel took place; at this time, the casing of the hulls was already mounted. Exactly four months later - on June 25, the yacht was launched. The ceremony was attended by Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich (the future Admiral General of the Russian Navy and a consistent detractor of A. A. Popova).
Yacht Livadia in the dock

"Livadia", launched in a fairly high degree of readiness, with superstructures and a propeller-steering complex, had such an original look that the English "Times", which traditionally did not place drawings even of domestic ships on its pages, made an exception for the yacht. This double-hulled vessel was figuratively described by newspapermen as a "bull on a halibut". Indeed, the yacht itself (upper hull) was a vessel 79.25 m long and 33.53 m wide, cut along the waterline, installed on a semi-submerged pontoon (lower hull), which had an elliptical shape in plan, 71.63 m long and maximum 46.63 m wide. Its height amidships did not exceed 5.49 m, the bottom was flat, with three keels: the middle one in the diametrical plane and the side ones, each of which was 5.49 m apart from the average one. According to E. E. Gulyaev "... the yacht could be somewhat longer ... and narrower, to satisfy the taste of the majority ...", but this would lead to the need to increase the power of the machines and reduce stability. Shallow draft was defined by the designer as an “outstanding feature” that made it possible to reduce wave resistance, which, according to Froude, was the most significant for wide vessels, such as Novgorod, at high speeds. From this it is clear that the design of two parts-hulls was actually applied from the desire to reduce the draft of the yacht as much as possible in order to achieve a given speed. In this form, the combination of the named features of the Livadia design really proves the complete originality of the ideas of its creators.
Imperial yacht "Livadia" on the slipway

The design of the lower hull of the yacht (the sailors called it "pancake") was unique. Designed taking into account the experience of building Novgorod, it provided an unprecedented, for that time, level of unsinkability. The second bottom stretched for the entire length, spaced from the skin to a height of 1.07 m at the midsection and 0.76 m at the ends and divided into 40 watertight compartments; along the entire side there were two longitudinal vertical bulkheads, the space between which and the side was also divided by transverse bulkheads into 40 compartments. Covered with a convex, in the form of an inverted saucer, deck, the pontoon served as a solid annular base for the upper part of the yacht, where all the living quarters and royal apartments were located, and the second bottom was the foundation for three vertical double-expansion steam engines with a design capacity of 3500 hp each. With. each and 10 cylindrical boilers. Coal pits and auxiliary mechanisms and ship supplies fit in the pontoon ...
Imperial screw yacht "Livadia" after launching

Significant difficulties had to be overcome in determining the overall and local strength of the steel structures of the pontoon and the junction of the hulls (annular stringer), which, in turn, gave rise to technical problems in their provision. To the credit of Russian and British engineers, these difficulties were largely overcome. The entire set was made of mild "Simenson" steel, the pontoon lining and bulkheads were made of iron sheets; the decks and sheathing of the yacht itself are pine. The total height from the keels to the roof of the upper superstructures was 14 m. Special attention was paid to the application of the driving force. During construction, by the end of 1879, they assembled and tested a self-propelled steel model of a yacht on a scale of 1:10 by the spring of next year, on which they worked out the location of the propellers, their pitch and dimensions. The test methodology was developed by Tideman, and the experiments were carried out by both Russian and English engineers. As a result, the deadwood shafts of the yacht were brought out in such a way that the screws with most of their diameter were below the bottom, while the middle screw, as on Vice-Admiral Popov, was placed 0.76 m further from the stern and deeper than the side ones. The diameter of each four-blade propeller was 4.72 m, the pitch of the middle one was 3.81 m, the rest was 6.25 m; The material was manganese bronze.
Imperial yacht "Livadia" in Naples. May 1881

The premises were illuminated with electric "Yablochkov's candles"; All electrical equipment was supplied from Russia. There was plumbing throughout the yacht and 23 auxiliary steam mechanisms, including a rudder drive. On the bridge, similarly to popovki, they put a device for maneuvering the direction of the vessel with the help of onboard vehicles. As raid boats, yachts in England ordered 3 large mahogany steam boats, respectively, 11.9, 9.8 and 8.5 m long. Rowing vessels were used old, from the first Livadia. The total volume of cabins, salons and halls intended for the king and retinue was 3950 m3 - 6.7 times higher than that on the lost yacht. The huge "reception" of the emperor, about 4 m high, resembled the rooms of Louis XVI in Fontainebleau; there was also an active fountain surrounded by a flower bed... The living room on the middle deck was furnished in the Crimean Tatar spirit, the rest of the rooms were decorated in a modern English style. The decoration of the officers' cabins and command rooms was not included in the contracts and had to be carried out after the vessel arrived at the Black Sea.
General view of the yacht Livadia at the pier

Despite the “absolutely original design”, the ship looked great from the outside, the smooth hull was covered with a shiny black lacquer, and the light gray pontoon almost merged with the water surface.
It took almost three months to complete the construction of the yacht afloat. In August, all the boilers were loaded (8 identical three-furnace boilers were installed across the pontoon, and two half-boilers were installed behind them along the sides), and in early September, the main machines, which were already tested on mooring lines from 10 to 19 of the same month. The most experienced mechanical engineers of the fleet, Major Generals A. I. Sokolov and I. I. Zarubin, who were called to England from the summer, took part in these works.
On September 24, the Livadia, led by the builder Pierce and the factory team, left the shipyard pool and passed down the river under the middle car to Greenock; just in case, she was taken by three tugboats. On the same day, the yacht entered the bay, easily reaching 12 knots.
General view of the dining room

The chief consultant Tiedeman noted that the ship kept well on course and obeyed the helm like a boat. The next day, factory tests took place. Several Russian officers and 12 sailors from the team assigned to the yacht were invited to the ship. According to A. I. Sokolov, it was possible to develop a speed of 15 knots, and with a headwind!
living room corner

On the 26th, Pierce invited on board the commission of the Naval Ministry, chaired by Vice Admiral I.F. Likhachev, for an official six-hour trial. "Livadia" showed an average speed of 14.88 knots. with a power of 10200l. With.; the machines, due to the difference in the pitch of the propellers, worked with different speeds: the average was 90, the side ones were 84 rpm. The same Tideman noticed that when all three machines were operating, the circulation radius was “somewhat large,” but recognized this as insignificant, since it was possible to turn “in a much smaller space” with the help of side propellers - like on priests. On September 27, the yacht was tested on a measured mile: according to the averaged data of six runs, its highest speed was equal to 15.725 knots, and the power plant power was 12,354 hp. With. And this despite the fact that the hull of the vessel during the completion of the construction was somewhat overgrown and sat deeper than expected, due to the heavier superstructure and interior decoration than in the calculations. The draft reached 2.1 m, and the displacement -4420 tons.
Boudoir table in one of the rooms

Calculations and experiments brilliantly confirmed. Everyone was happy. The company received 2.7 million rubles, including 414 thousand rubles, premiums. About A. A. Popov and E. V. Gulyaev wrote in all European newspapers.
Upon completion of the tests, the Russian team, which arrived in August from the Baltic Fleet, switched to the yacht (it exceeded the staff and consisted of 24 officers and 321 lower ranks). On September 30, the yacht was received from the factory and on the same day, raising the flag, guis and pennant, she began the campaign.
Corner of one of the living rooms (smoking room),

The ferry to the Black Sea was also planned as a training voyage “with only such a development of the power of machines,” A. A. Popov reported back in August, “to enable all machine personnel to calmly look around and become well acquainted with the operation and control of machines.” After preparations, on October 3, the yacht left the Greenock raid. On board, as guests of honor, were the shipbuilders Pierce, Tiedeman and Reid, as well as the controller of the English fleet, Admiral Steward. In Brest, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich boarded and, under the flag of the Admiral General, the Livadia on October 7 went further, across the Bay of Biscay to Cadiz.
View of the cabinet

Until midnight on October 8, the campaign took place in favorable conditions, at a speed of 12-13 knots. The wind that rose at night quickly grew stronger, spreading a strong oncoming swell. From two o'clock in the morning on October 9, the waves began to hit the bow of the pontoon of the yacht - at first rare, these blows became more frequent with increasing wind and wave heights. The course had to be reduced to 4-5 knots, but the blows did not stop. Reed, who was very restrained in his assessments, wrote: “wave impacts on the flat bottom of the yacht were terrible at times ...” I.K. Vogak also reported the same in the report: “... one of them was especially strong, impression as from a blow on a solid object ... ”At 10 o’clock in the morning they discovered that the first double-bottom compartment was filled with water; urgently had to change course and head to the Spanish port of Ferrol.
According to eyewitnesses, the wave height reached 6-7 m, while the side roll did not exceed 3.5 ° on board, and the keel roll did not exceed 9 ° in a span of 5.5 ° forward and 3.5 ° aft. The screws were never exposed. “Nothing fell on the yacht,” the commander reported: the table setting and high candelabra remained motionless as if in a calm, neither the soup in the bowls, nor the water in the glasses had ever spilled.
View of one of the bedrooms

How did the Livadia, led by experienced sailors, get into the very center of the storm, and even go against the wave? This is all the more incomprehensible, since there were shipbuilders on board who hinted, even during trials, that the yacht was good “with not too large waves”. As a member of the selection committee, Captain 2nd Rank V.P. Verkhovsky, “the yacht was never intended for ocean navigation, and therefore the Black Sea is enough to judge its qualities ... in any case, there is no reason to expose it even on the Black Sea to the daily actions of a heavy storm . The largest passage from Odessa to Poti ... the yacht will easily make it in 30 or 35 hours, and of course there will be no extreme to leave the port in the very storm ... "
Reid refers directly to the Admiral General, who, in his words, believed that the opportunity should not be missed "to make a thorough test of the yacht, and therefore we headed into the very jaws of the Biscay storm." About the same, but more diplomatically, Verkhovsky writes: “there were those who wanted to meet ... a good storm, they wanted us to be shaken, so that the wind and excitement were stronger ... and without this ... a complete judgment about the qualities of a yacht is impossible ...". Whether the leader of the campaign himself decided on such a "test" or he was helped and advised remains unknown.
View of the boudoir

In the Ferrol Bay, divers found in the bow of the pontoon, on the left side, a 5-meter dent with tears and cracks in the skin sheets, bent and broken frames. Five side compartments and one double-bottom compartment were flooded. Initially, a collision with floating debris was considered the cause of the damage, about which a message was sent to the Government Gazette, but after a thorough examination, both Russian and foreign experts came to the unanimous opinion that the damage was caused by wave impacts! The repair had to be carried out afloat by a team led by ship's mechanical engineers: not a single European dock could accommodate the Livadia, and Standfilsky at that time was only being re-equipped in Sevastopol to receive the yacht.
Only seven and a half months later, the corrected yacht left the Spanish port, continuing its passage on April 26, 1881. Now they were led by Vice Admiral I. A. Shestakov. They walked slowly and carefully, hiding from the weather under the coast or in ports. On the morning of May 27, "Livadia" entered the Sevastopol Bay. She covered 3890 miles in 381 running hours, spending more than 2900 tons of coal. In a special note, I. A. Shestakov noted the ease of steering the yacht, the straightness of its course, comfort and the absence of pitching. However, he stated that regardless of the speed, even with a slight dead swell, “the blows to the cheekbones of the pancake twitched”, and in the oncoming wave “blows to the nose were very noticeable”, while the superstructures “walked” (vibrated). Nevertheless, the admiral considered the well and carefully made yacht "worthy of existence", but ... after testing "under all circumstances of the sea and weather."
View of the cabinet

While her fate was being determined, the Livadia completed its only, as it turned out, voyage across the Black Sea. On May 29, under the flag of the chief commander of the Black Sea Fleet, she crossed to Yalta and, taking on board the Admiral General and his brother, Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, headed for Batum, from where she returned three days later. The passengers were not very lucky: the sea was stormy and the superstructures were shaking from the impact of the waves on the pontoon.
In mid-June, the yacht was raised in the Standfilsky dock, where it was examined by members of the commission appointed by the new head of the maritime department, Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich. Confirming the opinion that had developed back in Ferrol, the commission recognized that the damage to the yacht was received from wave impacts and considered the design of the pontoon hull, especially in the bow, unsatisfactory to resist these impacts. The MTC agreed with these conclusions and prescribed "for safe navigation" to replace all damaged parts with new ones with a reinforcement of the set in the bow.
During the three weeks of docking, the underwater part of the pontoon was only cleared of shells and greenery, and then repainted. Repair work was not carried out, only three strips were put on the discovered cracks in the skin sheets. By this time, the leadership of the ministry decided to conduct repeated sea trials of the yacht according to specially developed instructions.
View of part of the living room

From 3 to 12 August "Livadia" 136 times passed the measured mile near Sevastopol. 312 diagrams were taken, the draft and trim were carefully kept constant. Before the test for the maximum speed, the yacht was prepared for several days, but it was not possible to achieve a 15-knot speed. With the highest power developed by the machines (9837 hp), the average speed was 14.46 knots. Such an affront caused confusion in the ranks of the commission, it came to accusations of the builders of deceit. However, a member of the commission, Captain 2nd Rank G. A. Vlasyev, thoroughly proved the inaccuracy of the test instructions and the lack of skills of the engine crew in maintaining the full steam output of the boilers. The MTK supported Vlasyev, noting, in addition, the low quality of the coal used. The manager of the Naval Ministry, drawing attention to the difference in power during tests in England and Russia, which reached 2500 liters. s., irritatedly noted that such a fact “completely destroys all sorts of calculations and technical considerations when designing new ships with a known task for us.”
On August 15, the yacht left for Nikolaev, where it was soon “disarmed”. In September, her team was sent back to the Baltic, replacing the Black Sea. Property and furniture began to be slowly brought to the warehouses of the port; in the press, the ship was delicately referred to as a "former ... yacht." The official conclusion about the weakness of the design of the underwater part of the hull served as a verdict for a new type of vessel. However, this "weakness" was only a consequence of the main drawback of the yacht: heavy hull blows in waves, noted in all voyages, but with the greatest force manifested in Biscay. It was this phenomenon, later called "slamming", that deprived the Livadia of seaworthiness.
The inventor himself was one of the first to realize this. Back in May, answering a note from Admiral I. A. Shestakov, he honestly admitted: “about this shortcoming ... I can positively say that the small deepening of the yacht, which was due to its limited displacement, is an error that I did not foresee in such the extent to which it has affected practice ... ". In a personal letter from A. A. Popov to the Admiral General, it was even more precisely stated: “the pitching of the yacht due to 1) a small depression 2) a flat bottom produces a phenomenon that is not found on other ships in the dimensions that the design of the yacht has ... with a keel rolling from angles of 3 1/4 ° and more to the stern, the bottom of the bow is exposed, which results in: a) the complete destruction of the buoyancy of the bow compartments, which generates tension in the entire system of fixing the hull of the yacht; b) the impact of the bottom on the waves ... so strong that both the convenience and the safety of navigation are completely violated ... "
View of the dining room

The era of experiments by Admiral A. A. Popov ended with the accession to the Russian throne of Alexander III, who had long been hostile to Admiral General Konstantin Nikolayevich, and, accordingly, to the leadership of the naval department and to the "restless admiral" A. A. Popov , who, according to the emperor, was engaged in "rounding off domestic naval architecture." The emperor immediately put his brother at the head of the ministry. A. A. Popov was replaced by I. A. Shestakov, who became the next, in 1882, the manager of the Naval Ministry. But Andrei Alexandrovich continued to defend a new type of round vessel. According to E. E. Gulyaev, he even developed the “strongest unsinkable battleship” of the Livadia form; in a single-hull elliptical design with vertical sides, 8 305-mm guns were placed, the displacement was 11250 tons, the draft was 4.1 m. .".
Trying to save the yacht, A. A. Popov turned to the disgraced Konstantin Nikolayevich and I. A. Shestakov: go out to sea. She does not have to chase the enemy, she is not intended to cruise in the oceans, she does not need to be in hurricanes ... "However, according to I. A. Shestakov," The sovereign agreed to deal with the yacht at all costs. Even when I said that a prison was needed in Sevastopol, I expressed my readiness to give Livadia to this use. As a result, it was not possible to carry out new sea trials in 1882, which could be useful for the design, in the future, of new power plants. Moreover, A. A. Popov was offered to cover the amount of bonuses issued to British builders from his personal funds, allegedly without the knowledge of the leadership of the ministry! Only after four years of litigation did the treasury take over the "loss".
Blokshiv "Experience" (former yacht "Livadia") in Sevastopol. In the foreground is the mine cruiser "Kazarsky"

In April 1883, the yacht turned into the Opyt steamer. For several years the ship stood idle: the MTC intended to use it as a transport, unique in terms of capacity, draft and speed, for transporting troops and equipment; it was planned to leave two side steam engines, and use the middle one on the new Baltic battleship. It was indeed removed, but installed on the Minin cruiser during its repair. The rest of the cars at the end of the century were also sent to the Baltic for the cruisers General-Admiral and Duke of Edinburgh. When unloading the machines, some of the wooden superstructures were dismantled; the huge rooms on the upper deck disappeared in the mid-80s. The steamer turned into a blockship "Experience", used both as a barracks and as a warehouse ... At the beginning of the 20th century, it was handed over to the port of Sevastopol, but in 1913 it was again included in the lists of the fleet as "Blokshiv No. 7". He stood in Sevastopol until 1926, when he was decommissioned completely. Black Sea veterans recalled that they saw its unusual skeleton back in the late 30s.

Imperial yacht "Livadia"

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