perseus
Active member
I was wondering if anyone had read about this little known episode, one of the greatest massacres in naval history. It is hardly fair to call the Tallinn disaster Dunkirk however, since it was a near complete disaster for the Russians, with Axis forces co-ordinating themselves far better than at Dunkirk.
As German land forces closed in on the Estonian capital of Tallinn in August 1941, the bulk of the Baltic Soviet navy lay moored in the port of Tallinn. An hasty evacuation had to be organised, due to the reluctance of senior naval personnel to mention this possibility to Stalin. However by this time, the exits to the passable channels were heavily mined. The Germans and Finns had put down most of the parallel rows of naval mines - contact mines, and magnetic, acoustic, and pressure mines - in the course of August. According to a volume on the history of the Finnish Navy, a staggering total of 1,787 mines and 771 anti-sweeping devices had been laid before the evacuation began.
In addition, the Luftwaffe, Eboats and naval guns were stationed to intervene and contributed to the massacre. The Soviets had minesweepers but the low Sun and Surf made any swept mines difficult to see.
Approximately 30,000 Soviet Red Army soldiers and thousands of civilians were packed into more than 200 vessels for the evacuation. However, the fast Soviet warships eventually cut and run from the German bombers so the troopships and merchantmen were left to their own devices.
The largest estimates of casualties in August 1941 run to more than 100 ships lost and as many as 25,000 killed, but these figures admittedly take in vessels that were sunk during the previous week and into early September. Approximately 15,000 or 16,000 people made it back to Kronstadt near Leningrad.
Some data taken from here
http://www.hs.fi/english/article/Ju...the+drowned+-+all+12000+of+them/1135259946924
As German land forces closed in on the Estonian capital of Tallinn in August 1941, the bulk of the Baltic Soviet navy lay moored in the port of Tallinn. An hasty evacuation had to be organised, due to the reluctance of senior naval personnel to mention this possibility to Stalin. However by this time, the exits to the passable channels were heavily mined. The Germans and Finns had put down most of the parallel rows of naval mines - contact mines, and magnetic, acoustic, and pressure mines - in the course of August. According to a volume on the history of the Finnish Navy, a staggering total of 1,787 mines and 771 anti-sweeping devices had been laid before the evacuation began.
In addition, the Luftwaffe, Eboats and naval guns were stationed to intervene and contributed to the massacre. The Soviets had minesweepers but the low Sun and Surf made any swept mines difficult to see.
Approximately 30,000 Soviet Red Army soldiers and thousands of civilians were packed into more than 200 vessels for the evacuation. However, the fast Soviet warships eventually cut and run from the German bombers so the troopships and merchantmen were left to their own devices.
The largest estimates of casualties in August 1941 run to more than 100 ships lost and as many as 25,000 killed, but these figures admittedly take in vessels that were sunk during the previous week and into early September. Approximately 15,000 or 16,000 people made it back to Kronstadt near Leningrad.
Some data taken from here
http://www.hs.fi/english/article/Ju...the+drowned+-+all+12000+of+them/1135259946924
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