Name Mercury Decommissioned 1857 Class and type 20-gun brig | Launched May 7 (May 19), 1820 Fate dismantled Length 29 m | |
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Laid down January 28 (O.S. February 9), 1819 | ||
Mercury (Russian: Меркурий) was a Russian navy 18 gun and two masts warship. It is famous for its unequal battle with two Turkish ships, which took place on May 14, 1829.
Contents
The name Pamiyat Mercuriya (literally In Memory of Mercury) was given to a number of ships of the Russian Baltic Fleet.
Summary
Pursued by the Turkish Fleet (6 ships of the line, 2 frigates, 2 corvettes), Russian brig Mercury engaged in unequal battle with line ships Selimiye (110 guns) and Real-bei (74 guns) near the Strait of Bosphorus. After damaging the ships one by one, the brig escaped pursuit.
Officers
Seamen
Damage and casualties
As a result of the battle, the brig lost 4 men and 6 more were injured. Damage to the ship included:
By official information, neither Turkish ships lost crew as the brig's main objective was to achieve spar and rigging damage.
In art
Ivan Aivazovsky created 3 paintings:
There were notable paintings by other artists:
Critics of Aivazovsky painting
The position of the ships taken by Aivazovsky for his work was claimed as historically doubtful because of the brig's position between two significantly larger Turkish ships.
Still, it's possible that Aivazovsky's artistic impression simply heightened the tension in the painting by accentuating the hopelessness of the situation for the brig.
Paintings by of other artists (Krasovskiy, Barri, Pechatin) of the same battle, though less known, portray a more realistic sketch of a battle.