PHOTOGRAPH OF THE DAY: BRAZILIAN DREADNOUGHT MINAS GERAES, 1913

Minas Geraes was built by Armstrong Whitworth & Company shipyards in Newcastle-on-Tyne, Britain for the Brazil. It entered service in the Brazilian Navy in April 18, 1910. When launched, the Minas Geraes was the most powerful warship ever built. In South America, Minas Geraes and her sister ship São Paulo kindled a naval arms race among Brazil, Argentina, and Chile that lasted until WW1.  

Photo taken during the Battleship’s visit of the U.S. in June-July 1913.  

U.S. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Shortly after entering commission, in November 1910, both Dreadnoughts experienced widespread racial mutinies among the crewmen stationed at Rio de Janeiro. The mutiny that lasted 5 days, involving 2,000 crewmen, was called “Revolta da Chibata”, Revolt of the Lash. On the Minas Geraes, João Batista das Neves the Captain of the ship and other officials were killed. The two battleships and 7 other warships were then used by the rebels to bombard Brazilian Army forts, the Naval Arsenal, naval bases and even the Presidential Palace, causing panic and consternation. Only by offering general amnesty did the Brazilian government reclaim the warships. Fear of new rebellions paralyzed the entire fleet for months.

PHOTOGRAPH OF THE DAY: BATTERY OF JAPANESE 280 mm HOWITZERS IN ACTION, RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR (1904-1905)

 The 28 cm (11 in) Howitzer L/10 was designed in 1884 by the British Armstrong company and 220 built by the Osaka Artillery Arsenal. It fired a 217 kg shell at a maximum range of 7,800 m. The howitzer entered service in 1892 and was installed in shore batteries in forts overlooking Tokyo Bay and Osaka Bay, when the Meiji "Static Defense" policy of the 1870s and 1880s emphasized coastal defenses.

The L/10 was thus primarily intended for anti-ship operations and remained in use until the end of WW2. It saw use as a siege gun during the Russo-Japanese War due to a lack of heavy siege guns. Requested by General Nogi Maresuke, a battery of L/10 was transported and assembled for the siege of Port Arthur. 

The huge shells were nicknamed "roaring trains" by the Russian troops, and during their period at Port Arthur over 16,949 of these shells were fired. In December 1904, using artillery observers on 203 m Hill, the howitzers were able to sink the Russian warships one after the other:

-The battleship Poltava was sunk on December 5, 1904,

-The battleship Retvizan was sunk on December 7, 1904,

-The battleships Pobeda and Peresvet and the cruisers Pallada and Bayan on December 9, 1904.

All six would be raised, repaired, renamed, and recommissioned by the Japanese after the war.

-The battleship Sevastopol, although hit five times by the 280 mm shells, managed to move out of range of the guns.

-Russo-Japanese War Photo Album of the 3rd Army, No. 3, Meiji 38.4, Japanese National Institute for Defense Studies (NIDS).

 

CRIMEA IS ANNEXED BY CATHERINE THE GREAT, April 8, 1783 (O.S.), SECURING ACCESS TO THE BLACK SEA

 

In 1774, Sultan Mustafa III was defeated by Catherine the Great. The Russian fleet had destroyed the Ottoman navy and the Russian army had inflicted heavy defeats on the Ottoman land forces. The ensuing Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca forced the Sublime Porte to recognize the Tatars of the Crimea as politically independent.

According to the treaty, the Crimean Khanate formally gained its independence (but in reality made the Crimea a protectorate of Russia). The Porte also ceded to Russia two key seaports, Azov and Kerch, obtaining freedom of navigation for the Russian Navy and the merchant fleet in the Black Sea, allowing Catherine II to start a policy of control and hegemony over that sea. The treaty also granted to Russia the position of protector of Orthodox Christians in the Ottoman Empire. Ottoman loss of the Crimea and the end of the Crimean Khanate caused Muslims everywhere to question the sultans' legitimacy as defenders of Islam.

After the failure of the Crimean revolts of 1777-1782, in March 1783, Prince Grigory Potemkin made a rhetorical push to encourage Empress Catherine to annex Crimea. Having just returned from Crimea, he told her that many Crimeans would happily submit to Russian rule. Encouraged by these news, Empress Catherine issued a formal proclamation of annexation on 19 April [O.S. 8 April] 1783. The Tatars did not resist the annexation. Crimea was incorporated into the Empire as "Taurida Governorate". Catherine the Great's incorporation of the Crimea into the Russian Empire increased Imperial Russia's power in the Black Sea area. 

In 1787, Catherine conducted a triumphal procession in the Crimea. Sultan Abdül Hamid I restarted hostilities in the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–92. Emperor Joseph II of Austria joined the war on the side of the Russian Empire. This conflict turned into another catastrophe for the Ottomans, ending with the Treaty of Jassy (1792), which legitimized the Russian claim to the Crimea and granted the Yedisan region to Russia. The Crimea was the first Muslim territory to slip from the sultan's suzerainty. The Ottoman Empire's frontiers would gradually shrink for another two centuries, and Russia would proceed to push her frontier westwards to the Dniester.

-Painting: The Triumph of Catherine the Great by Vassily Nesterenko, Tavrichesky Hall of the Grand Palace in Tsaritsyno, 2007.

-Further reading: Antoine-Ignace Anthoine, Essai historique sur le commerce et la navigation, 1805; I also advise the reading of Brian L. Davies' The Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774 Catherine II and the Ottoman Empire, 2016 and Eugene Miakinkov's War and Enlightenment in Russia: Military Culture In The Age Of Catherine II, 2020.

ART OF THE DAY: KNIGHTS HOSPITALLER VS SARACENS BY MARK STACEY

The origins of the Hospital in Jerusalem goes back to around 600 AD, when Abbot Probus of Ravenna was commissioned by Pope Gregory the Great to build a hospital in Jerusalem to treat and care for Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land. This hospice was destroyed fourteen years later when Jerusalem fell to the Persian – Jewish armies: The Christian population was slaughtered, and their churches and monasteries destroyed. Rebuilt after the Byzantine reconquest, it was enlarged by Charlemagne. In 1009, Fatimid caliph Al Hakim destroyed the hostel again and a large number of other buildings in Jerusalem. In 1048, the Fatimid Caliph Al-Mustansir Billah gave permission to merchants from the Republic of Amalfi to rebuild a hospital in Jerusalem on the site of the monastery of St John the Baptist. The hospital was run under the auspices of the Benedictines monks of the Latin Church of Santa Maria Latina in Jerusalem. Throughout the new persecutions against the Christians after the conquest of Jerusalem by the Seljuk Turks in 1078, the Hospital continued to operate. 

The community which ran the hospital became independent during the First Crusade in around 1099, under the leadership of a monk called Gerard. After Jerusalem was taken by the First Crusade, Gerard adopted the policy of receiving all needy patients, irrespective of religion. He organized the Fratres Hospitalarii into a regularly constituted Religious Order under the protection of saint John the Baptist. The members of the Order became known as Knights of St. John or Hospitallers. The formal establishment of the Knights Hospitallers under Brother Gerard was confirmed by the Papal bull Pie postulatio voluntatis of Pope Paschal II in February 1113. All the Knights were religious, bound by the three monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.

By then, the Hospital was an already wealthy and powerful organization within the kingdom of Jerusalem, and Gerard expanded its operations far beyond the limits of the city, establishing daughter hospitals at Bari, Otranto, Taranto, Messina, Pisa, Asti and Saint-Gilles, placed strategically along the pilgrim route to Jerusalem.

It was his successor, Grand Master Raymond du Puy (1083-1060), who militarized the Order. He organized the Order into three classes: To the nobles he assigned the profession of arms, for the protection of pilgrims; the ecclesiastics were to exercise the religious functions; the lay-brothers were to take care of the pilgrims and the sick. The military role of the Hospitallers really began in 1137 when Foulques I, king of Jerusalem, transferred possession of the castle of Bath-Gibelin in the east of Gaza to the Order.

From then on, the Order appears in all the wars that the armies of the kingdom of Jerusalem fights against the Saracens. Under siege, the Kingdom of Jerusalem found it increasingly difficult to stand against its enemies. Following the example of the Templars, Raymond du Puy then developed a system of protection for the pilgrims by providing them with security in their travels to the Holy Places. Little by little, knights and men of arms were hired and participated in the defense of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

-The artist’s website: http://www.markstaceyart.co.uk/

GUNBOAT DIPLOMACY: U.S. INVASION OF MEXICO AND OCCUPATION OF VERACRUZ, 1914

"Poor Mexico! So far from God and so near the United States!" - Historian Nemesio Garcia Naranjo.

On April 9, 1914, in the midst of the Mexican Civil War (with the U.S. backing revolutionary factions led by Venustiano Carranza), nine U.S. sailors that had gone ashore to buy gasoline in Tampico, Mexico, were detained for 1h30 by Mexican colonel Ramón Hinojosa. Although the sailors were immediately freed, and general Morelos Zaragoza formally apologized, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson gave the go-ahead for an already planed invasion of Mexico targeting Veracruz, the largest port in that country. The ultimate goal was to overthrow the government of Victoriano Huerta. Meanwhile, 20,000 U.S. Army soldiers were being mobilized at the U.S.-Mexican border.

 

On April 21-24, a mighty fleet of 22 U.S. Navy warships bombarded the city and landed 7,000 Blue Jackets and Marines, securing Veracruz after five days of sporadic fighting and seizing $1 million from the Custom House, along with the cash register of the local administration. Although unopposed by Mexican regulars, the U.S. officially lost 22 killed and 70 wounded, the Mexicans had about 300 killed and 250 wounded (militia, students of the Naval school and civilians). The occupation of Veracruz would last until November 1914. 

 

This imperialist show of force provoked anti-American demonstrations throughout Mexico, forcing tens of thousands of U.S. citizens to cross the border in haste or to be evacuated by U.S. Navy ships and given shelter in refugee camps set up in San Diego, Texas, and New Orleans. Even revolutionary leader Venustiano Carranza denounced the “Second North American Invasion” and called for war. Widespread anti-American riots also broke out in Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Uruguay. 

 

After the actions at Veracruz, the U.S. changed their plans from a full invasion of Mexico, including taking the capital, to simply keeping the city of Veracruz, where Robert J. Kerr, a lawyer from Chicago, was appointed governor. Wilson had him replaced by Major General Frederick Funston who implemented martial law and mandatory vaccinations on the entire population. Keeping discipline among the occupation troops in a foreign land proved more delicate: 2,400 U.S. troops were court-martialed, although only 83 were convicted.

 

The Navy ordered 56 Medals of Honor awarded for “heroism” for the brief Veracruz Expedition, more than any other military operation to date! Major Smedley Butler demanded that he be allowed to return his, seeing as he had done little to deserve it. The Navy ordered him not only to keep it, but also to wear it. 

 

Anti-American sentiment in Mexico from the Tampico incident and the Occupation of Veracruz was the chief reason that the government kept Mexico neutral during WW1. President Wilson considered another military invasion of Veracruz and Tampico in 1917–1918, to take control of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the shortest overland route between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and the Tampico oil fields. In 1916, Wilson also sent a punitive expedition led by General John J. Pershing deep into Mexico that failed to capture Pancho Villa.

 

 

-More on the topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZQGt83w28Q&t=151s this series https://cimsec.org/100-years-ago-veracruz-1914-part-2/ , https://cimsec.org/100-years-ago-veracruz-1914-part-3/ and https://www.usni.org/magazines/naval-history-magazine/2014/march/take-veracruz-once , (in Spanish): https://www.google.fr/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwiO3_O40qHvAhWLERQKHWmqDLc4ChAWMAR6BAgIEAM&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsemar.gob.mx%2Funhicun%2Flibros%2FLa%2520Invasion%2520a%2520Veracruz%2520de%25201914%2520Enfoques%2520Multidisciplinarios.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1kMmw5IJQe0oZW8l4QsDke

See also Jack London’s photographic Album, Veracruz 1914: https://hdl.huntington.org/digital/collection/p16003coll7/id/8822/