Battle of Tsushima - May 27, 1905

On this day in 1905, the Battle of Tsushima, part of the Russo-Japanese war, began. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. Greetings everyone, Welcome to this Day in History Class,
where we learn a smidgen of history every day. Today
it's made seven nineteen. The day was made seven nineteen

(00:25):
o five. The Battle of Sushima, a major naval battle
during the Russo Japanese War of nineteen o four to
nineteen o five, began. By the end of battle the
next day, the Japanese had defeated the Russian navy. Russia
and Japan had been fighting for control in Korea and Manchuria.

(00:46):
When Russia reneged on an agreement to pull its troops
from Manchuria, Japan decided to attack. So the Russo Japanese
War began in nineteen o four when Japan attacked Russian
warships at Port Arthur on the Dung Peninsula in southern Manchuria.
The last major battle of the land war was fought
in February. In March of nineteen oh five and what

(01:09):
was then Mukden, Manchuria. In the Battle of Mukden, Russian
forces retreated to northern Manchuria and the Japanese occupied all
of southern Manchuria, but the Battle of Sishima was the
fight that secured Japanese dominance in the conflict. The Russian
Baltic Fleet, commanded by Admiral Zenovi Rajastinsky, had sailed from

(01:31):
Leepia in October nineteen o four. In early May, the
fleet reached the China Sea and was headed for Vladivostok,
a port city near Russia's borders with China and Korea
via the Sishima Strait, but Admiral Togo Hahachio, the commander
of the Japanese Combined Fleet, was preparing his fleet for

(01:52):
battle on the Korean coast near Poussan. Togo's fleet consisted
of four battleships, twenty seven cruisers and may need destroyers
and torpedo boats. While Togo's fleet was thoroughly trained and
used high explosive shells, the Russians used armor piercing rounds
and had a fleet that was largely old and not
in the greatest shape. The crews also were not as

(02:15):
experienced as the Russians tried to go through the strait.
At around four am on May seven h five, the
picket cruiser Shinano Madu sent a wireless message to Togo
regarding the fleet's position. Intercepted wireless signals informed the Russians
that they have been discovered in that Japanese scouting cruisers

(02:38):
were shadowing them. The wireless reports that Japanese scouting vessels
sent gave the Japanese an advantage in the foggy conditions.
Around one PM, the Japanese spotted the Russians as the
battle ensued. Command on the Russian side went to rear
Admiral Nikolai Nearbagata. The next morning, as Togo proceeded to

(03:01):
inflict damage on the Russian fleet, Nibogatov signaled a surrender
at ten thirty four in the morning. The Japanese continued
to sink Russian ships. Through the speed of his fleet
and competence of his crews, Toga was able to defeat
the Russians. The battle was the only decisive fleet action
fought by steel battleships. The Russian fleet was basically destroyed,

(03:24):
with twenty one ships sunk, several captured and interned in
neutral ports, and three ships escaped to Vladivostok. On the
Russian side, four thousand, three hundred and eighty people were
killed and five thousand, nine hundred and seventeen were captured.
On the Japanese side, three torpedo boats were destroyed, five

(03:44):
hundred and eighty three people were wounded, and one hundred
and seventeen people were killed. Japan grew in prominence as
a naval power, while Russia declined as a naval power.
The Japanese victory at Tsushima and political unrest in Russia
led to a peace treaty signed in September of nineteen
o five that formally ended the Russo Japanese War. In

(04:08):
the Treaty of Portsmouth, which was mediated by US President
Theodore Roosevelt, Russia recognized Japan as the dominant power in
Korea and gave Port Arthur the seven portion of Sakaleine
Island and the Laotong Peninsula to Japan. In nineteen o five,
the Russian Revolution broke out throughout the Russian Empire and

(04:29):
cited by the defeat in the Russo Japanese War and
the desire for reform. I'm Eve Jeffcote, and hopefully you
know a little more about history today than you did yesterday.
And if you haven't gotten your fill of history after
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and Facebook. At t d i h C podcast. Thank

(04:54):
you so much for listening and I hope to see
you again tomorrow for more tidbits of history. Yeah. For
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