Chapter 15

The time was August 1942 and the Great Patriotic War was a year old. Admiral Gorshin stood contemplating the sea from the dockside at Murmansk. Beside him was Commander Neville Callender of the Royal Navy, his Liaison Officer and assistant.

"The ice will be early this year, don't you think, Admiral?" the younger British Officer asked the Admiral in clear, crisp, Russian.

"I do, Commander, and I think we'll be lucky to see any more convoys beyond the end of the month."

"How's your bunker oil at the moment?" asked the Englishman.

"Perhaps enough for some limited operations as far as Kirkenes? Why do you ask?"

"The Shell Athol might have a bit to spare?" the Commander dropped his voice as if the crates on the wharf contained spies.

"Won't your Ministry notice a few hundred tons missing? Why would you do this?"

"I know your situation, Admiral. I realise you can only do so much with..."

"With Stalin rationing our oil, Commander? C'mon, you know me well enough to know that such talk no-longer frightens me. Can you spare some Diesel? Those big K boats of ours gobble the stuff."

"Possibly. I'll make some enquiries." The Admiral nodded and continued to look out to sea.

A young Russian Officer in a long dark blue greatcoat and fur hat marched smartly up to the pair and saluted. He paused respectfully until the Admiral turned around.

"What is it?" the Admiral asked.

"Message, sir, from the convoy."

"Read it to me, Lieutenant."

"Sir!" he pulled the paper from his pocket and brandished it with a flourish. "Message reads; 'SS Stormont Castle to ComEsFor, AAA, 69' 20" North by..."

"Good God, Commander, haven't your merchant ships heard of radio discipline? Every U Boat, every Bomber, will be down on the silly fucker within hours."

"It sounds like they're down on the poor bastard already, Admiral. 'AAA' means they're being attacked by aircraft."

"Lieutenant, pass the message to Air Operations, for all the good it will do. Ask them if they can get something into the air to see what's going on."

"Sir!" the Lieutenant saluted smartly and marched away.

"Have you anything out there?" asked the English Officer, concern in his voice.

"K117 is operating in the area between Kirkenes and Bear Island. I'll see if they're on the surface, but I doubt they'll be in a position to assist. In any case, what can a submarine do against aircraft? I'll send the standing patrol, but I doubt they'll be anywhere near that position before it's all over."

"Well, perhaps they might find a few survivors, Admiral?"

"Yes, I'm sorry, Neville. It's tough being a spectator... to have nothing to do while seamen are out there fighting for their lives. Knowing that in 8 minutes a sailor in the water is dead. Knowing we lack the resources to take the Germans on. No long range fighter aircraft, no bombers to take out their airfields, no oil for our Destroyers, no Battleships or Heavy Cruisers to deal with the German surface raiders..."

"Come, Admiral, everyone understands your position."

"Perhaps, but I find it difficult to look those poor seamen in the eye. I feel they blame me for every bomb, every torpedo..."

"Yes, I get an earful from them as well."

"Perhaps we should introduce ourselves to a bottle of Vodka and discuss how we're to steal some fuel for my ships?"

"Excellent suggestion, Admiral!"

When Yvgeny arrived at Murmansk he found the Northern Fleet, or what it was then being called, the Arctic Flotilla, severely run down. It had no heavy ships, and just seven Novik class destroyers. 16 Submarines were on the inventory, but 5 of these were antiques used for training. A further sixteen 700 ton Escort ships of the Uraga class rounded off the list of effective warships. There were no aircraft at all except the Government mailplane.

He found his boss, Admiral Golovko, an amiable character but he had what Yvgeny described as 'the Stalin twitch.' He was so terrified of the Party Chairman that he refused to do anything without express approval from Moscow.

This meant, sadly, nothing at all, for Stalin was not interested in the Navy. The Red Army had priority over everything and the Navy had to beg for even the smallest item. When Allied convoys began to arrive at Murmansk, Britain used aid as a lever to force Stalin to increase Northern Naval Defences. German U Boats and aircraft had free rein in Northern waters and the overstretched escort vessels of the Royal Navy found it hard to compete.

Britain donated 8 of her 'Town' class Destroyers. These were some of the 50 American 'four pipers' that Roosevelt lent to the Royal Navy in 1940. They were old and unsuitable as anti-submarine vessels. Nevertheless, the British ripped out half their boilers, and two of their four 'pipes', and bolted on a few 20mm anti-aircraft guns. Their bridges were fully enclosed and the foc'sles raised to cope with the extreme weather in the Barents sea.

Gorshin regarded them only as a stop gap, but, he found them better sea boats than Russia's own Noviks. These big, 2,500 ton, destroyers were over-gunned and top heavy, in the Admiral's opinion. Based on Italian designs, they were nominally fast but too lightly built. Their 'superfiring'# main turrets made the superstructure too high and heavy for the narrow hull. Consequently they rolled heavily in the pounding Barents swell.

#(One turret on the maindeck and one a deck higher firing over the top of it)

The Admiral preferred to use the smaller Uragas for regular patrols. They had the added benefit of being more economical to operate.

All the Russian ships had reinforced hulls and steam heating throughout. Steam pipes ran along just under the decks to prevent ice forming. The rigging and superstructure were kept free of ice by seamen with flexible hoses blasting hot water from high-speed pumps. The heavy ice forming on the deck of a vessel had been responsible for capsizing more then a few ships and Yvgeny was surprised to see British ships arriving looking like moving icebergs.

Yvgeny acquired responsibility for the Arctic Flotilla's submarines. Golovko was fond of delegating, a technique, Yvgeny believed, to avoid taking responsibility for anything. He found, though, that the Sub squadron's Commander, Rear Admiral Bulyanin, was an experienced and capable Officer. Just as well, as Gorshin's lifelong claustrophobia caused him to detest Submarines with a passion.

"Bulyanin, the scheming arsehole, insisted I go for a short voyage in one of the damned things," Gorshin recalled, "only he picks the smallest one in the fleet, a little 'M' class. He said it would be good for morale, the lying bastard," he chuckled. "Once in the control room, I had all these hardened 'mudsharks', that's what we called the Submariners, looking at me and saying to themselves, 'ok, bigshot Admiral Gorshin, let's see what you're made of!'"

"Could I admit to these men that I was terrified? Here's me shedding rivers of sweat and pissing my pants and this smartarse Lieutenant, half my age, says, 'shall we go down now, Admiral Sir?' He was looking straight into my eyes, watching if I was going to blink, and I say to myself, 'steady, Gorshin old boy, you've survived the Japanese at Tsushima. They're only going to take you for a little paddle in the Arctic.'"

"'Secure hatches, ' he says, 'blow forward and aft tanks, down planes 45 degrees.' The boat lurches, I can hear the swishing of the water moving over the hull. The metal walls seemed so thin, all that stops tons of freezing water from snuffing out our lives. I'm shivering and sweating all at once. I mop my brow, hoping the crew don't notice my distress. I try to move my feet but they remain welded to the deck. 'Stop engine, secure exhaust valve, start motors, 30 revolutions, Engineer, up scope, do you want to have a look, Admiral, sir?'"

"The Skipper motioned me over to the periscope, but I was unable to move. 'Thank you, no, Lieutenant, I wish to observe the control room, ' I tell him and he smiles and peers through the scope himself. I then look around me as if I'm inspecting the actions of the control room staff. In 15 minutes we go up again and they open the hatch above us. I watch the circle of blue sky, feel the cool draft on my face... then bolt for the ladder."

"I remained on the conning tower all the way back to dock. No way were they going to persuade me to go back below. I told them I wished to observe the way the boat cuts through the sea, and they accepted that. Rank carries some privileges, I suppose, but I made sure I never set foot on a Submarine again."

"I didn't speak to Bulyanin for weeks, afterwards."

When Katka arrived at Murmansk, Yvgeny was concerned about the look of her. Painfully thin, she seemed to have aged and had acquired a cough.

She joined the Naval Auxiliary and Yvgeny conspired to have her posted to his department. There she reorganised the filing system, even though Yvgeny was already highly organised. He believed all Destroyer men were tidy as there was little spare room for mess.

At least Yvgeny was able to keep watch on her. Katka was apt to skip meals. She and Yvgeny had offered their children to the armed forces, and the Admiral knew she constantly feared for each of them, every hour of the day.

Rolf, the youngest, was a pilot with the AV-VMF, based not far away at Polyarnyy. Mika, the next up, elected for the Red Army's Air Force, the VVS. He now had a squadron of Il2 'sturmaviki' somewhere on the Southern Front. Two daughters were in the Army and their remaining two sons both served in the same Tank Battalion.

Katka seized on every letter from them. It buoyed her for days afterwards and she would tell Yvgeny excitedly about the latest news, often repeating the letter over and over. Yvgeny worried that the stress was killing her.

Kronshtadt, nearby Leningrad and the extensive shipyards on the lower Neva had been heavily attacked by German Dive Bombers in the first few days of the war. Losses among the Baltic fleet had been heavy, particularly the larger vessels. German air superiority, and Stalin's lack of interest, confined the fleet to the role of floating batteries for the defense of Russia's second city.

Naval Battalions were formed out of the unemployed crews and sent to the front. Unlike in Tsarist times, there were no mutinies. By 1941, sailors had learned to do what they were told without argument.

The only exception was the Baltic Fleet's Submarine Flotillas. The workhorse, 'Shch' (Shchuka = pike) class Subs and the smaller 'M' (Malyutka = marlin) class made the Baltic their own and mercilessly harried the convoy traffic between Germany and Sweden. Stalin was suitably impressed by their efforts and began to talk of the postwar fleet being a submersible one.

"We gave two sons to the Motherland," Admiral Gorshin continued to the young Ensign, "both on the same day, at the battle of Kursk. Katka's heart dimmed when she heard the news. As if two candles were extinguished from the flickering glow of her spirit. I grieved for them myself, of course, but no-one mourns like a Mother."

"The incandescence of our love settled to a comforting warmth as we left the war behind us. I called it a day when peace was declared and we retired to my dacha on the Black Sea. She liked it there, and our remaining children came to visit us with our Grandchildren. The climate revitilised Katka. She had cancer, of course, but never told me till the day she died. She lived to a good age until it returned. When she went, I returned to Kronshtadt. I couldn't stand the Black Sea without her."

Admiral Gorshin stared for a long while at the empty bottle of vodka on the table. The interview had plainly exhausted him and his hovering orderly suggested, pointedly, that it was time for him to rest.

"Look at me," he suddenly said, "I'm 88 years old and I'm still being pushed around by the Navy. You're a fucking bully, Yvgeny," he told his orderly.

"I'm sorry, Great Grandfather, sir," replied the young man.

Postscript

Immediately following the end of the war in Europe the Trans-Siberian Railway became a hive of activity. Long trains steamed along it at intervals of barely 20 minutes. The wagons carried tons and tons of war materiel, tanks, guns, aircraft, and thousands upon thousands of the toughest, most experienced and battle-hardened soldiers. The trains disgorged their cargoes into the fertile Amur River region of Eastern Siberia.

Over 2000 T34 tanks rolled into the forests just North of the Chinese border and waited. Behind them, 1700 aircraft of all types were being assembled at improvised airfields cut out of farmland by thousands of women labourers. This impressive airforce was spearheaded by the Ilyushin Il2m Shturmavik ground assault aircraft. Their 30mm cannons had blasted the heart out of Hitler's armour some short months before.

This massive army built to a force in excess of half a million men and women.

Across the border in China, the Japanese Manchurian Army was completely unaware of the force gathering to the North. But then, this was no-longer the confident army that had stormed across that bridge near Peking in 1937.