Sometimes tourists of Sevastopol may just walk and admire views of the Sevastopol bay when suddenly they see a yellowish building with many windows that stands on the opposite shore of the bay. It is very surprising but when locals are asked about this building, they say that there is nothing interesting. Today we’ll find out whether it is true or not.
The Mikhailovskaya casemated battery is located on the northern side of the Sevastopol bay. The battery was part of the so-called fortress of Sevastopol and existed before its construction that began in 1834. For the first time it was the 2nd earth battery, but later it was reconstructed in a three-tier stone fortification during the construction of a second defense line of Sevastopol Bay. This place still keeps bloody wounds of WWII both outside and inside. Traces of shells and bombs are seen everywhere: on facades, walls, roofs and loopholes.
One of shells stuck in a wall.
A casemate. The thickness of a loophole wall is 1.8 meter.
Recoiling tholes. Ropes holding guns during recoils after a shot were fixed on them.
Gunners put out fuses in buckets concreted into the floor.
Curved arches of galleries.
Somewhere under the ceiling even electric and telephone wires remained.
This is the result of a collapse made by a direct hit of an aerial bomb near the northern tower. Workers of the Sheremetyev’s museum are engaged in restoration works of the Michaylovskaya battery, they dig in this place, removing stone by stone.
Recently decomposed human remains were recovered from this debris. According to the museum director, two men were lying in a bed and they died instantly after a bomb hit. Nobody knows what else could appear here, so excavation works are made very carefully.
There is a safe under this log.
Officer’s boots, parts of a service cap and respirator.
All walls have such plates with the inscription “Rack №42″ and with other numbers.
Bags with lime lay here from time immemorial. It is difficult to sort them out: it’s actually a solid pressed stone.
Pay attention to a brickwork. It was changed at least 5 times and 5 different types of bricks can be counted in breaks.
There is a deep niche behind walls. The director said, there are reasons to believe that here was a hiding place. May be that is why walls were always rebuilt.
These beds stood here from the war times. Mattresses, blankets and pillows decayed long time ago.
The 3rd tier of the north tower. These corridors have terrifying walls with scary inscriptions.
Most impressive ones: “Only three of us left”, “We are dying for the homeland”.
“The eternal memory”.
Traces of high-caliber shots.
And this is a post-war inscription, 1946.
An arch of the tower. An access to the roof is behind it. It was called “firing”, because fascists shot Soviet prisoners here.
The northern wall. Most probably, Soviet soldiers held here the line of Sevastopol for a long time.
The battery plan.
Location:Sevastopol
via aquatek_filips
Pretty cool place. Reminds me a little of Ft Sumter in Charleston harbor
Que awesome.
They died but never surendered!
Surrender or retreat in those days equalled death before the firing squad.
No soviet soldier ever thought about surrenderring , since the tought alone could mean firing squad.
The inscriptions left by people during times of war just before they knew they would be killed, is… I don’t know the best word that would describe it, it always gets to me. Most of them were still kids when they gave their lives to help save their country. I hope they all rest in peace now.
At one point in this post you say, “These beds stood here from the war times.” and then you state, “Mattresses, blankets and pillows decayed a long time ago.” And the following photo is of beds with mattresses, blankets and maybe some pillows.
So this leads me to believe this place was also used after the war by Soviet Military. If this is true, for how long? How long has it been vacant? More information would be nice.
Little words are better than no words, yes but many times these posts leaves me with more questions than answers.
It looks fascinating and I would love to visit but I’m assuming it’s off limits to tourists at this time.
If anyone else knows anything more about this place, please say so.
Thank you.
It was used by Soviet Military till the fall of USSR. And after Ukraine became independent state was given to Ukrainian Naval Forces, but stay abandoned. In 2010 they decided to make there Museum of Naval forces
first!!!
Wow, i’ve been in Sevastopol few years ago but i had no idea of such place existing !
I salute the men that held the line.
Great pictures and a good article.This site should be commended on their research and for posting interesting features.
Find the secret room plz!
“It was called “firing”, because fascists shot Soviet prisoners here.” – So there were Italians in Sevastopol? :O
Just FYI the forces that invaded the Sovjet union during WWII came from Germany, Italy, Austria, Hungary and Finland among others. There were also Volenteers from France, Spain, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Norway and Sweden and a few other countries. But unlike us West Europeans the Russians never distinguished between the different sorts of Right-wing nuts in Germany, Italy and Spain at the time, to the Russians they were all Fascists
Fascists are not just Italians.
It is a common mistake in the Russian speaking countries to call the invaders “fascists”. In fact, the expeditionary Italian corps was only 62 000 men strength in comparison with 3,9 million Germans involved in the initial Barbarossa plan. so the real invaders were “nazis”, but here was a problem. Nazi is the short for “National Socialist German Workers’ Party”. So a socialist worker party was attacking another communist worker party? this was no good for the propaganda. So they chose “fascist” as an attribute for the invaders even real fascist were only 1,5% of the attackers. The complete irony is that the fascists were members of the National Fascist Party led by Benito Mussolini which was almost identical with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union led by Joseph Stalin.
^Stalinism was socialism gone wrong, however it was nothing at all like fascism as you say. Mussolini was a self confessed imperialist and corporatist, whereas Stalin was trying to achieve his twisted interpretation of socialism by authoritarian means. The two are opposites, not the same. They only had authoritarianism in common. Nazism is racist and nationalistic which is also the opposite to true socialism which promotes solidarity between ordinary people of all races and cultures, is non-authoritarian and a much purer form of democracy than the Western Powers promote. The correct definition of Socialism is that it is the transition to a fully communistic society, something that has never been achieved anywhere. People who judge communism by the standards of the Socialist Eastern Block are either ignorant of what communism is really supposed to be or they are being devious in their promoting of capitalism or worse.