I would say these that were lost in war against Russia/Sweden and maybe some more, but Germany would like to get back voyevodships of Chelm and Inowroclaw.
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No GNW (or “Peter goes South”)
- Thread starter alexmilman
- Start date
I would say these that were lost in war against Russia/Sweden and maybe some more, but Germany would like to get back voyevodships of Chelm and Inowroclaw.
IIRC, Sweden now has more territory around Danzig but an extended corridor looks reasonably small not to look as a major power grab. But it would be helpful to have some more or less reasonable excuse because the historic claim does look somewhat fishy: after all the territory was Polish for much longer time than Prussian. Some excesses targeting the local German speakers or whatever including a big state debt which PLC can’t pay in time. Not sure how fantastic would be a loan for xyz years with a temporary Prussian control of a territory as a collateral? After all, the OTL arrangement regarding Kiev started with a temporary Russian possession which later was changed into a permanent one. The parallel is questionable but some kind of a precedent and the PLC would be hard pressed to arrange for the international loan because repayment as going to be problematic. So it gets loan, it can’t repay it on time, and Willy (being such a nice guy 😉) is calling for international arbitration instead of just claiming possession. He gets land but the debt is written off and perhaps extra money change hands as a compensation. Lodz, mining and oil industries are saved and the major crisis is averted so, in general, things are not exclusively bad. Or some other idea.
I edited the maps so that they are more understandable but idea is to get lands lost to Poland in Great Polish War (not to be confused it was mostly Austria and Prussia vs Sweden and Russia with Poland contributing a little).
Otherwise debt schema looks good , it worked for otl France when it invaded Mexico.
I wonder if Germany has any revanchist wishes for West Bank of the Rhine.
In general, an assumption that this period was all nice, peaceful an peachy is, IMO, a little bit optimistic. Prussia just united Germany “with iron and blood” without having any legal right to do so and grabbed Alsace and Lorraine from France. Piedmont kept consuming other Italian states, for all practical purposes the OE was dismembered (and in 1877-78 Austria was planning to get Bosnia as a result of the Russian-Ottoman war) , and the same goes for the US slightly later dealing with the Spanish colonial empire and “promoting” creation of a brand new Panama Republic to allow lease of a territory to build the Panama canal.
More than a little bit too late for the revenge: territory is French for approximately 8 decades and thoroughly integrated. Not to mention that France is much stronger and Germany is weaker than in OTL, the good relations between France and Prussia are going way back and there are mutual colonial interests.
I mean my idea is for Willy to call the Baltic Conference (Saint Petersburg conference as Russia doesn't have any potential terrorial disputes with any involved party ) to resolve any potentially disputes between the involved powers and promote peace and then kindly notify PLC that Germany will take some border lands for monetary compensation and also that it should drop Lithuania from its name as those regions are part of Sweden and Russia now and it should be just Kingdom of Poland with kindly predetermined territories with German Empire ready to back those decisions via force (Berlin Conference was called to settle the disputes between colonial powers in Africa and it ended in partition, nothing new there).
I could see Amsterdam conference being called to settle the disputes in South East Asia in which everyone confirm their borders and agree to cooperate in South East Asia. Germany guarantees that it doesn't have any claims to HRE lands and Dutch get the similar treaty to Belgium otl with France and Germany as guarantors of its independence while Germany gets Siam recognized as its own sphere of influence.
France really loses, or sacrifices nothing. Otl Siam was a buffer between its and British zones of interests (otl treaty was signed 1896 which means that France isn't breaking any agreement ITTL) , gets Germany to recognize its European border (which Germany is doing anyway as it cannot win major war) and gets Germany to recognize its sphere in South East Asia and accept status quo in western Europe.
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Getting oily
293. Getting oily
Naval developments. Some of the ideas preached by the Jeune École became quite popular in the Russian navy and one of them was principle “the highest speed connected to the smallest displacement of the vessel”. Of all the types of ships of that time, the “minonoska” most met these requirements.
Minonoska was a special mine vessel with a displacement of 20 to 35 tons, the main armament of which is mines or torpedoes. The main quality of it was a high speed. The increase in speed was achieved by facilitating the hull of the vessel, which was built of thin sheets of the best steel. The unsinkability of the vessel was ensured by the division of the hull by waterproof bulkheads into seven compartments: ramming, bow, mine, burnout, fire, machine and stern. A commander was in the stern compartment, the steering wheel was also placed in it, and above the compartment, above the upper deck, there was a tower. The hull was covered with a convex steel deck at the top. A high speed was achieved through the use of special system engines (due to the light weight of parts, their relative power was 10-20 times higher than that of battleship engines), as well as specially designed propeller and shaft. One of the main proponents of these ships was Admiral Dubasov who was on the earlier stage of his career in charge of the “minonoska” squadron. He was underscoring speed, maneuverability combined with extreme insignificance as a target, special shape of the hull and its division into waterproof compartments, as well as local armor protection. However, the obvious weak side was a low seaworthiness. The obvious solution was to increase size but this would invalidate an advantage of being a very small target. Another disadvantage of the new class of ships was the unreliability of their main weapon - a self-propelled mine. She had a low speed, short range and did not stay well on the course, which was decreasing ship’s value as an attacking tool. Only later this problem was more or less fixed by torpedo’s improvements. As for insufficient seaworthiness, in the end, thanks to the adoption of rational hull bypasses, it was possible to find a compromise between sufficiently large displacement and invisibility.
There was a successful experiment with bigger seaworthy minonoska “Batum”: it was built in Britain and successfully sailed from Glasgow to Nikolaev (the construction company actually cheated making it smaller and running the tests with a lesser load than required thus showing a greater speed) causing a lot of enthusiasm in European navies. According to Admiral Lihachev, “Before Batumi could reach its destination, attentive naval nations were already in a hurry to start getting the same ships.” Eventually, this concept evolved into a more practical destroyer combining guns and torpedos with a high speed and the torpedo boats remained mostly a part of a coastal defense. What was important is that in 1882-83 “Batum” was refitted to sail on mazut.
Mazut (fuel oil). On the initial stages of the Baku oil boom the only thing everybody was interested in was kerosine. All other products of the refining had been dumped either directly into the Caspian Sea or into the lakes or specially excavated ponds. Which was extremely wasteful taking into an account that out of 40 buckets of oil, as many as 20 buckets of mazut were obtained and only 16 - kerosene. The main problem was the thick consistency of fuel oil, which caused it to burn poorly. In 1866, engineer and inventor A. I. Shpakovsky came up with an pulverizer for supplying liquid fuel.
In 1880, another Russian engineer - V. G. Shukhov - invented a special nozzle, in which the fuel flowing through a narrow channel by the force of water vapor turned into the smallest dust.
This dust, getting into the combustion chamber, evaporated, mixed with air and burned well.
The first consumer was Branobel company, which had the biggest refinery, a fleet of the ships specially constructed for carrying oil products (the Brits criticized idea as impractical for the open seas 😂) and so far was dumping more refining byproducts than anybody else. At some point it was even caused an official reprimand from the state commission led by Mendeleev [2]. However, the fact remained that without a backing technology the lighter and heavier refining products were of a little market value. In 1881 [3] Ludwig Nobel bought from Shukhov a patent on production of his device and started retrofitting the company’s tankers. The new fuel proved to be more efficient than coal and soon enough not just most of the merchant ships on the Caspian but even some ships of the Caspian flotilla switched to mazut and the pattern started spreading to the river ships operating on Volga and then on the major rivers, including Amur and gradually it became a popular fuel on the industrial plants.
Gasoline
In 1891, the Shukhov cracking process became the world's first commercial method to break down heavier hydrocarbons in crude oil to increase the percentage of lighter products compared to simple distillation this enabling industrial production of gasoline.
Intermission. In OTL Shukhov was renowned for his pioneering works on new methods of analysis for structural engineering that led to breakthroughs in industrial design of the world's first hyperboloid structures, diagrid shell structures, tensile structures, gridshell structures, oil reservoirs, pipelines, boilers, ships and barges. He is also the inventor of the first cracking method.
The engine power was 80 hp with an engine weight of 240 kg, which significantly exceeded the indicators of the engine G. Daimler, created a year later. However, Kostovich applied for his engine only on May 14, 1888, and received the patent in 1892, i.e. later than G. Daimler and V. Maybach, who developed a carburetor engine in parallel and independently of O. Kostovich. The reason for the delayed application was that the engine was intended for the dirigable on which he was working and he was quite busy designing all other parts and mechanisms (and finding the funds). In a process he designed an improved version of a plywood and later founded a plant producing variety of items from that material. By the time Russian Department of Trade finally approved his patent, it was already approved in the US and Britain. The engines of the type he invented became quite popular (including “classic” Volkswagen) but he never found funds to finish his dirigible. In the early XX he built few airplanes. Well, anyway, in 1885 Benz Patent-Motorwagen, the first car with the internal combustion engine had been built and the new era officially started.
Back to the naval issues. Besides the torpedo-related issues, the cruiser war on enemy’s communication also was a part of Jeune École program that became popular among the Russian sailors. In a reality, very little had been done but there was an intensive discussion regarding all aspects of its implementation. The main aspects of the discussion were:
On the Pacific - the options were Vladivostok and Petropavlovk-on-Kamchatka. In the case of Vladivostok the plus was infrastructure in progress, railroad, closeness to the industrial facilities of Eastern Siberia, good climate, greater population, frequent fogs (which would help to avoid a blockade) and a relatively thin ice even in the coldest winters; disadvantage was closeness to the border. Petropavlovsk was safely away from the border but maintenance of a major naval base could be problematic due to the absence of a reliable link to more developed areas. There was also a plausible option - port Lazarev located on the west bank of the Amur estuary opposite to the Sakhalin.
A popular alternative, backed up by Admiral-General Alexey Alexandrovich, was to keep these ships abroad permanently. There were somewhat overly-optimistic ideas regarding the US ports but some other options in the Americas had been considered as well. The prime candidate was San Francisco - it was already frequently visited by the Russian ships and there was a nearby Russian settlement actively engaged in trade so the friendly attitude of the local Mexican authorities could be expected. Brazil and Argentine also were considered based upon the friendly receptions given to the visiting Russian ships but there were no formal inquires about the permanent arrangements. There was a proposal regarding “brotherly” Ethiopia but, unfortunately, at the moment it had only a claim to the Red Sea coast (well, there was more than one way to address this issue, perhaps with the French help).
One by one, ships of the Russian “home fleet” had been retrofitted to the new system.
____________
[1] At that time the term meant, torpedo, pole mines (explosives placed on a long pole and exploded by a contact or electric detonator) and those thrown into water by special apparatus and moving by inertia.
[2] One of the Periodic Table and the vital research on vodka.
[3] Wiki is not the only source of the “jewels”. The article from which I got information states that the nuzzle was invented in 1880 and Ludwig Nobel bought it in “the late 70’s”. 😂
“The mine [1] is scary only when it hits the target. However, at present it is very rare”
“Naval Almanac”, 1880s
“The word "mazut" comes from Turkish mazot and Arabic mahzūlāt, which means 'waste'.”
Z. Slukovsky, ‘Warm, smoke and pollute: the history of mazut in Russia’
“The Patent Cazeline Oil, safe, economical, and brilliant [...] possesses all the requisites which have so long been desired as a means of powerful artificial light.”
John Cassel, advertisement in The Times, 27 November 1862
“Naval Almanac”, 1880s
“The word "mazut" comes from Turkish mazot and Arabic mahzūlāt, which means 'waste'.”
Z. Slukovsky, ‘Warm, smoke and pollute: the history of mazut in Russia’
“The Patent Cazeline Oil, safe, economical, and brilliant [...] possesses all the requisites which have so long been desired as a means of powerful artificial light.”
John Cassel, advertisement in The Times, 27 November 1862
Naval developments. Some of the ideas preached by the Jeune École became quite popular in the Russian navy and one of them was principle “the highest speed connected to the smallest displacement of the vessel”. Of all the types of ships of that time, the “minonoska” most met these requirements.
Minonoska was a special mine vessel with a displacement of 20 to 35 tons, the main armament of which is mines or torpedoes. The main quality of it was a high speed. The increase in speed was achieved by facilitating the hull of the vessel, which was built of thin sheets of the best steel. The unsinkability of the vessel was ensured by the division of the hull by waterproof bulkheads into seven compartments: ramming, bow, mine, burnout, fire, machine and stern. A commander was in the stern compartment, the steering wheel was also placed in it, and above the compartment, above the upper deck, there was a tower. The hull was covered with a convex steel deck at the top. A high speed was achieved through the use of special system engines (due to the light weight of parts, their relative power was 10-20 times higher than that of battleship engines), as well as specially designed propeller and shaft. One of the main proponents of these ships was Admiral Dubasov who was on the earlier stage of his career in charge of the “minonoska” squadron. He was underscoring speed, maneuverability combined with extreme insignificance as a target, special shape of the hull and its division into waterproof compartments, as well as local armor protection. However, the obvious weak side was a low seaworthiness. The obvious solution was to increase size but this would invalidate an advantage of being a very small target. Another disadvantage of the new class of ships was the unreliability of their main weapon - a self-propelled mine. She had a low speed, short range and did not stay well on the course, which was decreasing ship’s value as an attacking tool. Only later this problem was more or less fixed by torpedo’s improvements. As for insufficient seaworthiness, in the end, thanks to the adoption of rational hull bypasses, it was possible to find a compromise between sufficiently large displacement and invisibility.
There was a successful experiment with bigger seaworthy minonoska “Batum”: it was built in Britain and successfully sailed from Glasgow to Nikolaev (the construction company actually cheated making it smaller and running the tests with a lesser load than required thus showing a greater speed) causing a lot of enthusiasm in European navies. According to Admiral Lihachev, “Before Batumi could reach its destination, attentive naval nations were already in a hurry to start getting the same ships.” Eventually, this concept evolved into a more practical destroyer combining guns and torpedos with a high speed and the torpedo boats remained mostly a part of a coastal defense. What was important is that in 1882-83 “Batum” was refitted to sail on mazut.
Mazut (fuel oil). On the initial stages of the Baku oil boom the only thing everybody was interested in was kerosine. All other products of the refining had been dumped either directly into the Caspian Sea or into the lakes or specially excavated ponds. Which was extremely wasteful taking into an account that out of 40 buckets of oil, as many as 20 buckets of mazut were obtained and only 16 - kerosene. The main problem was the thick consistency of fuel oil, which caused it to burn poorly. In 1866, engineer and inventor A. I. Shpakovsky came up with an pulverizer for supplying liquid fuel.
In 1880, another Russian engineer - V. G. Shukhov - invented a special nozzle, in which the fuel flowing through a narrow channel by the force of water vapor turned into the smallest dust.
This dust, getting into the combustion chamber, evaporated, mixed with air and burned well.
The first consumer was Branobel company, which had the biggest refinery, a fleet of the ships specially constructed for carrying oil products (the Brits criticized idea as impractical for the open seas 😂) and so far was dumping more refining byproducts than anybody else. At some point it was even caused an official reprimand from the state commission led by Mendeleev [2]. However, the fact remained that without a backing technology the lighter and heavier refining products were of a little market value. In 1881 [3] Ludwig Nobel bought from Shukhov a patent on production of his device and started retrofitting the company’s tankers. The new fuel proved to be more efficient than coal and soon enough not just most of the merchant ships on the Caspian but even some ships of the Caspian flotilla switched to mazut and the pattern started spreading to the river ships operating on Volga and then on the major rivers, including Amur and gradually it became a popular fuel on the industrial plants.
Gasoline
In 1891, the Shukhov cracking process became the world's first commercial method to break down heavier hydrocarbons in crude oil to increase the percentage of lighter products compared to simple distillation this enabling industrial production of gasoline.
Intermission. In OTL Shukhov was renowned for his pioneering works on new methods of analysis for structural engineering that led to breakthroughs in industrial design of the world's first hyperboloid structures, diagrid shell structures, tensile structures, gridshell structures, oil reservoirs, pipelines, boilers, ships and barges. He is also the inventor of the first cracking method.
- In 1878 the Bari company in which he was Chief Engineer built the 1st pipeline (12 km long) in the Russian Empire and by 1883 length of the pipelines built by that company exceeded 94 km, transporting 30,000 barrels of oil per day. In 1894, a similar pipeline network was built in Grozny. Shukhov designed the first Trans-Caucasian kerosene pipeline between Baku and Batumi (835 km long) and Grozny-Tuapse pipeline(618 km long).
- Shukhov designed complete water-supply systems for the cities of Cherkassy, Tambov, Kharkov, Voronezh and many others.
- He designed 84 150-meters long oil-tanker barges ( mostly for the Volga river) as well as the first Russian seaworthy oil tanker ship. Innovative design required less than half of the metal previously used.
- By 1881 130 inexpensive oil tanks with the bottom calculated as a membrane on elastic foundation had been built in Baku alone.
- His oil pump revolutionized Baku's oil industry allowing to increase its oil output.
- He designed one of the first furnaces that used residual oil: before his work residual oil was considered a waste and was discarded, due to his work it became recognized as an important technical product known as mazut (fuel oil).
- He also built a huge number of the original metallic structures the most famous being the 160-meter-high Shukhov Tower in Moscow.
The engine power was 80 hp with an engine weight of 240 kg, which significantly exceeded the indicators of the engine G. Daimler, created a year later. However, Kostovich applied for his engine only on May 14, 1888, and received the patent in 1892, i.e. later than G. Daimler and V. Maybach, who developed a carburetor engine in parallel and independently of O. Kostovich. The reason for the delayed application was that the engine was intended for the dirigable on which he was working and he was quite busy designing all other parts and mechanisms (and finding the funds). In a process he designed an improved version of a plywood and later founded a plant producing variety of items from that material. By the time Russian Department of Trade finally approved his patent, it was already approved in the US and Britain. The engines of the type he invented became quite popular (including “classic” Volkswagen) but he never found funds to finish his dirigible. In the early XX he built few airplanes. Well, anyway, in 1885 Benz Patent-Motorwagen, the first car with the internal combustion engine had been built and the new era officially started.
Back to the naval issues. Besides the torpedo-related issues, the cruiser war on enemy’s communication also was a part of Jeune École program that became popular among the Russian sailors. In a reality, very little had been done but there was an intensive discussion regarding all aspects of its implementation. The main aspects of the discussion were:
- Type of a ship. Taking into an account that pretty much everybody worth mentioning in the terms of potential opponents had a greater naval trade and, as a result, more merchant and warships, the requirement to the Russian cruisers was formulated by vice-admiral Chihachev as “Should... in size, speed and strength of their artillery surpass most of the military cruisers of other powers and, in any case, exceed the size or speed of commercial steamers.” Unfortunately, by his opinion none of the Russian cruisers satisfied these criteria and Russia needed completely new types of cruisers having “Strong armor, strong artillery, place for shelter numerous crews from the prizes taken and, finally, able to stay at sea for a long time without needing replenishment.” His ideal was something like Italian protected cruiser “Lepanto” (speed over 18 knots, displacement over 13,000 tons, 4 huge 17 inch guns, armored deck, barbettes and conning tower but no armor on the sides, just “cellular protection”). However, another enthusiast of the theory, Dmitriev, while agreeing on everything else, was insisting that these cruisers must have a strong armor as well. Only construction of a number of such cruisers “is able to help us to establish friendly relations with England, and even if this had not happened, proud Britt would not have made difficulties for Russia everywhere with such confidence as it used to be, now it will continue if no action is taken to do so...” Their opponents still insisted on practicality of using armed commercial ships.
- Targets. There were two different concepts: (a) attacking opponent’s merchant ships and (b) in the case of Britain, destruction of the coaling stations because ability to get coal was the only British strength while sinking and capturing the British ship is pointless due to their huge number.
- Main bases.On the Russian territory the options were limited.
On the Pacific - the options were Vladivostok and Petropavlovk-on-Kamchatka. In the case of Vladivostok the plus was infrastructure in progress, railroad, closeness to the industrial facilities of Eastern Siberia, good climate, greater population, frequent fogs (which would help to avoid a blockade) and a relatively thin ice even in the coldest winters; disadvantage was closeness to the border. Petropavlovsk was safely away from the border but maintenance of a major naval base could be problematic due to the absence of a reliable link to more developed areas. There was also a plausible option - port Lazarev located on the west bank of the Amur estuary opposite to the Sakhalin.
A popular alternative, backed up by Admiral-General Alexey Alexandrovich, was to keep these ships abroad permanently. There were somewhat overly-optimistic ideas regarding the US ports but some other options in the Americas had been considered as well. The prime candidate was San Francisco - it was already frequently visited by the Russian ships and there was a nearby Russian settlement actively engaged in trade so the friendly attitude of the local Mexican authorities could be expected. Brazil and Argentine also were considered based upon the friendly receptions given to the visiting Russian ships but there were no formal inquires about the permanent arrangements. There was a proposal regarding “brotherly” Ethiopia but, unfortunately, at the moment it had only a claim to the Red Sea coast (well, there was more than one way to address this issue, perhaps with the French help).
- Coaling - the ideas were falling into 3 main categories:
- Finding “nobody’s” remote islands and setting the secret bases there or if they were …er… “relatively civilized”, make arrangements with the local rulers. The candidates included Bonin Islands, Hawaii, Sandwich Islands, and even some lagoon on New Guinea populated by the nice stone-age natives.
- Make arrangements with the friendly European colonial powers, for example, with Spain regarding establishing a coaling base on one of the Philippines islands. On the Atlantic there was an idea to buy St. Thomas from Denmark or to make arrangements with Germany about using its coaling station in its South-Western Africa colony.
- Finally, there was a “technological” option - to build the new cruisers running on mazut and retrofit the existing ones to use it, which would both increase their range and allow loading fuel in the open sea.
One by one, ships of the Russian “home fleet” had been retrofitted to the new system.
____________
[1] At that time the term meant, torpedo, pole mines (explosives placed on a long pole and exploded by a contact or electric detonator) and those thrown into water by special apparatus and moving by inertia.
[2] One of the Periodic Table and the vital research on vodka.
[3] Wiki is not the only source of the “jewels”. The article from which I got information states that the nuzzle was invented in 1880 and Ludwig Nobel bought it in “the late 70’s”. 😂
The environmental impact of not dumping that crude oil is huge, but Im not sure the larger number of CO2 wont be a disaster. Or is Oil because its more efficient less poluting? Probably right?
Anyway, good to see them go ahead with the combustion engine, now if only we can add trucks and tractors, we'd truly have a game changer in the vast lands of Russia.
Anyway, good to see them go ahead with the combustion engine, now if only we can add trucks and tractors, we'd truly have a game changer in the vast lands of Russia.
Tad earlier though. Small request, can you avoid Thomas Midgley Jr.?
Why should I mention him to start with? Anyway, I’m not planning to get into the environmental & climate issues: they are for a different forum.
I was thinking more along the lines of French and German Empire giving guarantees to the Dutch similar to the ones that were given to the Belgium otl.
Yea, I just added different shapes of blue to signify the difference between Empire proper (northern Germany) and autonomous southern states. They are still one big happy Empire.
Edit: Otherwise there's a mistake at German/Danish border with Danish Holenstain going a little to far south and I believe that Sweden has a conclave in Mecklenburg as well. I'll correct those later.
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Miracles and other things
294. Miracles and other things
October 17 (29), 1888. Kursk-Kharkov-Azov Railroad. Near Borki station. 2:45PM. The Imperial Train carrying Alexander III and his family was going from the Crimea to St.-Petersburg.
The technical condition of the cars was excellent, they worked for 10 years without accidents. In violation of the railway rules of that period, which limited the number of axles in the passenger train to 42, there were 64 axles in the imperial train, consisting of 15 cars. The weight of the train was within the limits established for the freight, but the speed corresponded to the express. In violation of the rules, the train was conducted by two steam locomotives, the cargo locomotive T.164 (38 tons, design speed 58 km/h) and passenger P.41 (32 tons, design speed 82 km/h). This had been done against protest of the manager of the South-Western Railways Society, S.Y.Witte, who in presence of the emperor was trying to prove to the railroad officials that it is dangerous to use two locomotives to bring the imperial train up to a high speed. He was overruled. Pulling rank on him was plain stupid: unlike his opponents, he was a railroad specialist with the European reputation who already had a very impressive track record both in a narrow area of their exploitation and general organization (under his management between 1881 and 1885 the net income of the South-Western Railways Society, increased more than three times).
Steam locomotives galloping at different rhythms at a speed of 68 km/h shattered the weak upper structure of the railway track, the second locomotive actually fell between the diverged rails. Under such conditions, 10 cars derailed. And the path at the crash site passed through a high embankment - about 5 fathoms high (approximately 10.7 m). Heavy imperial cars crushed with their mass ordinary cars with servants placed in the head of the train. A strong push dropped all those traveling on the train. After the first push, a terrible crackle followed, then there was a second push, even stronger than the first, and after the third, quiet, push, the train stopped.
A terrible picture of destruction appeared before the eyes of the survivors of the crash. Everyone rushed to look for the imperial family and soon saw the emperor and his family alive and unharmed.
Just few minutes before the crash the imperial family left the dinner car and proceeded to their compartments at the end of a train which remained on the rails: in the entire train, consisting of 15 cars, only five that were stopped by the action of Westinghouse automatic brakes survived. Both locomotives also remained intact. The car, which contained court officials and buffet servants, was completely destroyed, all those in it died and were found disfigured - 13 mutilated corpses were raised on the left side of the embankment from the remnants of this car. According to the materials of the investigation, it was established that 21 people were killed and 24 injured during the disaster. Later, two of the wounded died.
Most of the passengers of the imperial car got off with light bruises, abrasions and scratches, with the exception of aide-de-camp Count Sheremetev, who had crushed his finger and the Empress who got hit at the arm. The news of the collapse of the imperial train quickly spread along the line, and the help hurried from all sides. Alexander III personally took charge of the removal of the wounded from under the wreckage of broken cars. “The Empress with medical staff went to the wounded, helped them, trying in every possible way to alleviate the patients of their suffering, despite the fact that she herself had a damaged arm above her elbow.” Only at dusk, when all the dead were identified and not left without the help of a single wounded, the royal family sat down on the second imperial train (Svitsky) that arrived here and left for Lozovaya station, where the first thanksgiving prayer was served at night for the miraculous deliverance of the tsar and his family from mortal danger.
There were two aspects of the disaster:
1st, celebration of a miracle - saving the Imperial family clearly was a sign of a direct divine intervention. For a generally religious majority of the Russian population, this was definitely the case worthy of the special prayers which were conducted throughout the empire. A hermitage called Spaso-Svyatogorsky was soon arranged at the crash site. In few fathoms from the embankment, a temple was built in the name of Christ the Savior of the Glorious Transfiguration.
2nd, to find who is at fault and here the interesting part started.
With the knowledge of the tsar, the investigation of the causes of the disaster in Borki was entrusted to the prosecutor of the criminal cassation department of the Senate A. F. Koni [1]. The main version was the train crash as a result of a number of technical factors: poor track condition and increased train speed.
Immediately after the accident, the chief inspector of the railways, Baron Shernval, who was traveling on the imperial train and broke his leg in the accident, summoned the manager of the Society of South-Western Railways S. Y. Witte and the director of the Kharkov Polytechnic Institute Viktor Kirpichev to lead the investigation on the spot. Later, the above-mentioned Anatoly Koni joined them in St. Petersburg. At that point CYA circus started:
In parallel with the official investigation a semi-official one had been carried by a different “institution” that was not generally specializing in the subjects like the rotten sleepers, trains speed and other technicalities but was quite skilled in finding “who did what, when and how”. This investigation was conducted discretely not to give the creative ideas to some other potential culprits. Few unimportant people, like helper to the cook of imperial train, simply were not seen anymore but perhaps they just moved elsewhere. After all, Russian Empire was a big country.
The new broom
On March 10, 1889, Witte was appointed director of the newly formed Department of Railway Affairs of the Ministry of Finance and promoted to full state councillor [3] . He started with buying out numerous private railroads and creating the unified state-owned railroad system that was going to operate more efficiently. As a part of this program he was hiring the best people from the private companies, treated them well and encouraged the initiative.
Not limiting himself to the scope of his direct functions, in 1889 he published a work in which justified the need to create a powerful national industry, initially protected from foreign competition by a customs barrier, an idea near and dear to Alexander’s heart since he was a heir to the throne. In 1891, working together with Mendeleev, he introduced a new tariff designed along the protectionist lines.
In February 1892 he was made Minister of the Transportation in which capacity he served for only few month but managed to eliminate common large accumulations of untransported cargo and reformed railway tariffs. The longest surviving part of his activities was introduction of the metal cup holders in Russian passenger trains.
In August 1892 he was made Russian Finances Minister and in this capacity was, to put it mildly, all over the place. This was not a shock therapy but something close….
Ethiopia 1889.
On 2 May 1889 King Menelik II of Shewa, acting as Emperor of Ethiopia, and Count Pietro Antonelli representing Italy, signed Treaty of Wuchale that ended undeclared was that started in 1887. Ethiopia was generally successful but it had simultaneously to fight the Mahdist state on the West and In the vacuum that followed the death of Yohannes IV in the Battle of Gallabat against the Mahdists on 10/11 March 1889, General Oreste Baratieri occupied the highlands along the Eritrean coast and Italy proclaimed the establishment of the new colony of Italian Eritrea. The new Emperor, Menelik II, who was in communications with the Italians even during Yohannes reign, decided to deal with one problem at a time and made peace with the Italians to stop their further expansion. Ethiopia lost access to the sea and had to pay an eight percent port duty to import or export goods through Italian-held port of Massawa but could transport the army from and through Massawa free of charge. The travel and trade exchanges between the two countries were allowed. The rest of the treaty guaranteed freedom of religion and equal rights for the Italian and Ethiopian subjects, extradition rights and some other technicalities.
There was, however, a “time bomb”. The treaty was written in two languages. In the Amharic version of the treaty, Article 17 states that “His Majesty the King of Kings of Ethiopia can use the Government of His Majesty the King of Italy for all business with other powers or governments.” In the Italian version it was “obliged”, which was making Ethiopia an Italian protectorate. Menelik II was not in favor of this and rejected protection from Italy. However, in October 1889, the Italians informed all other European governments that Ethiopia was now an Italian protectorate because of the Treaty of Wuchale and therefore other European nations could not conduct diplomatic relations with Ethiopia. With the exceptions of the Ottoman Empire, which still maintained its claim to Eritrea, and Russia, all of the European powers accepted the Italian claim to a protectorate.
Well, it was one thing for Menelik, as King of Shewa no negotiate neutrality in Italo-Ethiopian conflict in exchange for 5,000 Remington rifles and quite another for him, as an emperor to acknowledge himself an Italian vassal. As far as Alexander was involved, his reasons boiled down to the following:
To expand “platform”, Berlin was contacted. Neither Wilhelm II nor Bismarck favored Italy by three reasons: (a) it was too close to Britain, (b) its colonial ambitions were too big and soon enough could get into conflict with those of Germany and (c) a single Italian port on the Red Sea was tolerable but the whole Eritrea was putting it in too favorable position in the terms of controlling the traffic and this may impede the German access to its East Africa colony in the case of colonial dispute with Britain, which already controlled important port there. Anyway, why let Italians (who were so far beaten not only by the Austrians but even the Ethiopians) to imagine themselves equal to the Great Powers? Who do they think they are?
Within few months, the Italian government got diplomatic messages from the numerous countries informing that, due to the well-founded protest of Ethiopia, validity of which was confirmed by the distinguished linguists, acceptance of the Italian claim is being withdrawn. None of the messages contained explicit demand of the Italian withdrawal from the Eritrean territories after Yohannes’ death. Retaining freedom of action was one thing but getting directly into a conflict quite another: situation could easily evolve into a major conflict and why would anybody want to go into a war, even with Italy, on Ethiopian behalf? Menelik was a big boy and presumably knew what he was doing when signing a treaty. Now he is unhappy with it, the Mahdist invasions dwindled to the routine border skirmishes and he is free to act whichever way he wants. Of course, no direct involvement did not mean no help with the “materials”. The railroad from Djibouti was functioning and under the French control. Menelik had coffee, gold and other valuable commodities and his European friends had the weapons to sell and, in the case of Russia, a few people deeply interested in studying Ethiopian culture and, if asked, to share their own knowledge in some aspects of the European culture, for example, usage of certain modern devices (below the most prominent of these enthusiasts with his Ethiopian squire).
___________
[1] GT did a wonderful job by converting his last name into “Horses” («Кони» is literally “the horses”). 😂 This aside, he was one of the Russian top and most respected legal figures so at some point he was made a presiding judge on a trial of terrorist Vera Zasulich and, being a liberal, he directed process in such a way that she was acquitted. After which he acknowledged that he made some procedural errors but refused to retire (arguing that a judge can’t be dismissed) and the only way of dealing with him was to keep him upstairs. He was made a head of the civic department of the St-Petersburg court (another judicial position from which he could not be fired) and then appointed Chief Prosecutor of the Senate’s Criminal Department, he highest prosecutorial position in the Russian Empire (from which he could be fired at any moment).
[2] This position was within the Finances Ministry and accepting the offer Witte got a serious financial hit: his annual salary went from 40,000 rubles down to 3,000. To partially compensate for the loss, AIII added 9,600 from his own funds and 5,000 for the living expenses. The financial loss remained considerable but Witte looked for “visibility”, power and future career. As the future events demonstrated, he made the right choice.
[3] And has to be referenced “Your Excellency”. In the bureaucratic state like Russian Empire this was a big deal but being personally known to the Emperor was even a bigger deal especially when it was “known and valued”.
“Our earthly life is like a railway trip. You go fast and see neither what's ahead nor - most importantly - the locomotive."
Vincent Van Gogh
“In all countries, railways serve for movement, and in Russia for theft as well.”
Saltykov-Schedrin
“The next train departed ten minutes ago.”
Punch Magazine, 1871.
“Nothing is more tiring than waiting for the train, especially when you are lying on the rails.”
Don Aminado
“The only way to catch the train is to be late for the previous one.”
Gilbert Chesterton
“Remember: in five out of six cases, the light at the end of the tunnel is the light of an approaching train.”
Paul Dixon
“Rhinos are trampling our sorghum,
Monkeys are tearing off the figs,
Worse than the monkeys and the rhinos
Are the white Italian tramps.”
N.Gumilev, “Military Abissinian song”
This country is mine and no other nation can have it”
Menelik II
Russia. Vincent Van Gogh
“In all countries, railways serve for movement, and in Russia for theft as well.”
Saltykov-Schedrin
“The next train departed ten minutes ago.”
Punch Magazine, 1871.
“Nothing is more tiring than waiting for the train, especially when you are lying on the rails.”
Don Aminado
“The only way to catch the train is to be late for the previous one.”
Gilbert Chesterton
“Remember: in five out of six cases, the light at the end of the tunnel is the light of an approaching train.”
Paul Dixon
“Rhinos are trampling our sorghum,
Monkeys are tearing off the figs,
Worse than the monkeys and the rhinos
Are the white Italian tramps.”
N.Gumilev, “Military Abissinian song”
This country is mine and no other nation can have it”
Menelik II
October 17 (29), 1888. Kursk-Kharkov-Azov Railroad. Near Borki station. 2:45PM. The Imperial Train carrying Alexander III and his family was going from the Crimea to St.-Petersburg.
The technical condition of the cars was excellent, they worked for 10 years without accidents. In violation of the railway rules of that period, which limited the number of axles in the passenger train to 42, there were 64 axles in the imperial train, consisting of 15 cars. The weight of the train was within the limits established for the freight, but the speed corresponded to the express. In violation of the rules, the train was conducted by two steam locomotives, the cargo locomotive T.164 (38 tons, design speed 58 km/h) and passenger P.41 (32 tons, design speed 82 km/h). This had been done against protest of the manager of the South-Western Railways Society, S.Y.Witte, who in presence of the emperor was trying to prove to the railroad officials that it is dangerous to use two locomotives to bring the imperial train up to a high speed. He was overruled. Pulling rank on him was plain stupid: unlike his opponents, he was a railroad specialist with the European reputation who already had a very impressive track record both in a narrow area of their exploitation and general organization (under his management between 1881 and 1885 the net income of the South-Western Railways Society, increased more than three times).
Steam locomotives galloping at different rhythms at a speed of 68 km/h shattered the weak upper structure of the railway track, the second locomotive actually fell between the diverged rails. Under such conditions, 10 cars derailed. And the path at the crash site passed through a high embankment - about 5 fathoms high (approximately 10.7 m). Heavy imperial cars crushed with their mass ordinary cars with servants placed in the head of the train. A strong push dropped all those traveling on the train. After the first push, a terrible crackle followed, then there was a second push, even stronger than the first, and after the third, quiet, push, the train stopped.
A terrible picture of destruction appeared before the eyes of the survivors of the crash. Everyone rushed to look for the imperial family and soon saw the emperor and his family alive and unharmed.
Just few minutes before the crash the imperial family left the dinner car and proceeded to their compartments at the end of a train which remained on the rails: in the entire train, consisting of 15 cars, only five that were stopped by the action of Westinghouse automatic brakes survived. Both locomotives also remained intact. The car, which contained court officials and buffet servants, was completely destroyed, all those in it died and were found disfigured - 13 mutilated corpses were raised on the left side of the embankment from the remnants of this car. According to the materials of the investigation, it was established that 21 people were killed and 24 injured during the disaster. Later, two of the wounded died.
Most of the passengers of the imperial car got off with light bruises, abrasions and scratches, with the exception of aide-de-camp Count Sheremetev, who had crushed his finger and the Empress who got hit at the arm. The news of the collapse of the imperial train quickly spread along the line, and the help hurried from all sides. Alexander III personally took charge of the removal of the wounded from under the wreckage of broken cars. “The Empress with medical staff went to the wounded, helped them, trying in every possible way to alleviate the patients of their suffering, despite the fact that she herself had a damaged arm above her elbow.” Only at dusk, when all the dead were identified and not left without the help of a single wounded, the royal family sat down on the second imperial train (Svitsky) that arrived here and left for Lozovaya station, where the first thanksgiving prayer was served at night for the miraculous deliverance of the tsar and his family from mortal danger.
There were two aspects of the disaster:
1st, celebration of a miracle - saving the Imperial family clearly was a sign of a direct divine intervention. For a generally religious majority of the Russian population, this was definitely the case worthy of the special prayers which were conducted throughout the empire. A hermitage called Spaso-Svyatogorsky was soon arranged at the crash site. In few fathoms from the embankment, a temple was built in the name of Christ the Savior of the Glorious Transfiguration.
2nd, to find who is at fault and here the interesting part started.
With the knowledge of the tsar, the investigation of the causes of the disaster in Borki was entrusted to the prosecutor of the criminal cassation department of the Senate A. F. Koni [1]. The main version was the train crash as a result of a number of technical factors: poor track condition and increased train speed.
Immediately after the accident, the chief inspector of the railways, Baron Shernval, who was traveling on the imperial train and broke his leg in the accident, summoned the manager of the Society of South-Western Railways S. Y. Witte and the director of the Kharkov Polytechnic Institute Viktor Kirpichev to lead the investigation on the spot. Later, the above-mentioned Anatoly Koni joined them in St. Petersburg. At that point CYA circus started:
- Witte insisted that this was caused by speeding, which exempted the railway administration from responsibility;
- Kirpichev accused rotten wooden sleepers, which moved the blame to the construction company;
- Kony shifted the blame to the railway management, which exempted state officials from liability for their idiotic overriding of Witte’s objections.
In parallel with the official investigation a semi-official one had been carried by a different “institution” that was not generally specializing in the subjects like the rotten sleepers, trains speed and other technicalities but was quite skilled in finding “who did what, when and how”. This investigation was conducted discretely not to give the creative ideas to some other potential culprits. Few unimportant people, like helper to the cook of imperial train, simply were not seen anymore but perhaps they just moved elsewhere. After all, Russian Empire was a big country.
The new broom
On March 10, 1889, Witte was appointed director of the newly formed Department of Railway Affairs of the Ministry of Finance and promoted to full state councillor [3] . He started with buying out numerous private railroads and creating the unified state-owned railroad system that was going to operate more efficiently. As a part of this program he was hiring the best people from the private companies, treated them well and encouraged the initiative.
Not limiting himself to the scope of his direct functions, in 1889 he published a work in which justified the need to create a powerful national industry, initially protected from foreign competition by a customs barrier, an idea near and dear to Alexander’s heart since he was a heir to the throne. In 1891, working together with Mendeleev, he introduced a new tariff designed along the protectionist lines.
In February 1892 he was made Minister of the Transportation in which capacity he served for only few month but managed to eliminate common large accumulations of untransported cargo and reformed railway tariffs. The longest surviving part of his activities was introduction of the metal cup holders in Russian passenger trains.
In August 1892 he was made Russian Finances Minister and in this capacity was, to put it mildly, all over the place. This was not a shock therapy but something close….
Ethiopia 1889.
On 2 May 1889 King Menelik II of Shewa, acting as Emperor of Ethiopia, and Count Pietro Antonelli representing Italy, signed Treaty of Wuchale that ended undeclared was that started in 1887. Ethiopia was generally successful but it had simultaneously to fight the Mahdist state on the West and In the vacuum that followed the death of Yohannes IV in the Battle of Gallabat against the Mahdists on 10/11 March 1889, General Oreste Baratieri occupied the highlands along the Eritrean coast and Italy proclaimed the establishment of the new colony of Italian Eritrea. The new Emperor, Menelik II, who was in communications with the Italians even during Yohannes reign, decided to deal with one problem at a time and made peace with the Italians to stop their further expansion. Ethiopia lost access to the sea and had to pay an eight percent port duty to import or export goods through Italian-held port of Massawa but could transport the army from and through Massawa free of charge. The travel and trade exchanges between the two countries were allowed. The rest of the treaty guaranteed freedom of religion and equal rights for the Italian and Ethiopian subjects, extradition rights and some other technicalities.
There was, however, a “time bomb”. The treaty was written in two languages. In the Amharic version of the treaty, Article 17 states that “His Majesty the King of Kings of Ethiopia can use the Government of His Majesty the King of Italy for all business with other powers or governments.” In the Italian version it was “obliged”, which was making Ethiopia an Italian protectorate. Menelik II was not in favor of this and rejected protection from Italy. However, in October 1889, the Italians informed all other European governments that Ethiopia was now an Italian protectorate because of the Treaty of Wuchale and therefore other European nations could not conduct diplomatic relations with Ethiopia. With the exceptions of the Ottoman Empire, which still maintained its claim to Eritrea, and Russia, all of the European powers accepted the Italian claim to a protectorate.
Well, it was one thing for Menelik, as King of Shewa no negotiate neutrality in Italo-Ethiopian conflict in exchange for 5,000 Remington rifles and quite another for him, as an emperor to acknowledge himself an Italian vassal. As far as Alexander was involved, his reasons boiled down to the following:
- Catholic country was trying to take control over an Orthodox nation.
- A minor European state, like Italy, is trying to break existing diplomatic communications of the Russian Empire with an independent state.
- The same minor state is getting a hold on a territory, which puts it in a control of the communications through Suez greater than Russia, one of the big shareholders, has.
- Admiral-General was very convincing in advocating advantages of having a fueling base on the Red Sea and convenience of having it in one of the Ethiopian ports.
To expand “platform”, Berlin was contacted. Neither Wilhelm II nor Bismarck favored Italy by three reasons: (a) it was too close to Britain, (b) its colonial ambitions were too big and soon enough could get into conflict with those of Germany and (c) a single Italian port on the Red Sea was tolerable but the whole Eritrea was putting it in too favorable position in the terms of controlling the traffic and this may impede the German access to its East Africa colony in the case of colonial dispute with Britain, which already controlled important port there. Anyway, why let Italians (who were so far beaten not only by the Austrians but even the Ethiopians) to imagine themselves equal to the Great Powers? Who do they think they are?
Within few months, the Italian government got diplomatic messages from the numerous countries informing that, due to the well-founded protest of Ethiopia, validity of which was confirmed by the distinguished linguists, acceptance of the Italian claim is being withdrawn. None of the messages contained explicit demand of the Italian withdrawal from the Eritrean territories after Yohannes’ death. Retaining freedom of action was one thing but getting directly into a conflict quite another: situation could easily evolve into a major conflict and why would anybody want to go into a war, even with Italy, on Ethiopian behalf? Menelik was a big boy and presumably knew what he was doing when signing a treaty. Now he is unhappy with it, the Mahdist invasions dwindled to the routine border skirmishes and he is free to act whichever way he wants. Of course, no direct involvement did not mean no help with the “materials”. The railroad from Djibouti was functioning and under the French control. Menelik had coffee, gold and other valuable commodities and his European friends had the weapons to sell and, in the case of Russia, a few people deeply interested in studying Ethiopian culture and, if asked, to share their own knowledge in some aspects of the European culture, for example, usage of certain modern devices (below the most prominent of these enthusiasts with his Ethiopian squire).
___________
[1] GT did a wonderful job by converting his last name into “Horses” («Кони» is literally “the horses”). 😂 This aside, he was one of the Russian top and most respected legal figures so at some point he was made a presiding judge on a trial of terrorist Vera Zasulich and, being a liberal, he directed process in such a way that she was acquitted. After which he acknowledged that he made some procedural errors but refused to retire (arguing that a judge can’t be dismissed) and the only way of dealing with him was to keep him upstairs. He was made a head of the civic department of the St-Petersburg court (another judicial position from which he could not be fired) and then appointed Chief Prosecutor of the Senate’s Criminal Department, he highest prosecutorial position in the Russian Empire (from which he could be fired at any moment).
[2] This position was within the Finances Ministry and accepting the offer Witte got a serious financial hit: his annual salary went from 40,000 rubles down to 3,000. To partially compensate for the loss, AIII added 9,600 from his own funds and 5,000 for the living expenses. The financial loss remained considerable but Witte looked for “visibility”, power and future career. As the future events demonstrated, he made the right choice.
[3] And has to be referenced “Your Excellency”. In the bureaucratic state like Russian Empire this was a big deal but being personally known to the Emperor was even a bigger deal especially when it was “known and valued”.
Italy will have it's hour one day!
Though yeah this move was quite risky and better it fails now than later.
Interesting seeing how Russia's industrialization progress slowly but steadily, luckily disaster was averted with the train crash.
Though yeah this move was quite risky and better it fails now than later.
Interesting seeing how Russia's industrialization progress slowly but steadily, luckily disaster was averted with the train crash.