Russian Faith, Honour, & Courage Displayed in a Faithfull Narrative of the Russian Expedition by Sea (1769 & 1770)

NY : Boydell and Brewer Ltd, 2024.

Leikin J., Elena Smilianskaia

Academic editor: J. M. Hartley

Volume 44 in the Hakluyt Society Third Series is Russian Faith, Honour & Courage Displayed in a Faithfull Narrative of the Russian Expedition by Sea in the Years 1769 & 1770, British Captain John Elphinstone’s four-volume account of his two years in the Russian navy, serving the Russian Empress Catherine the Great. The Faithfull Narrative contains descriptions of his voyage from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, movements through the Aegean Sea, and commentary on the activities of the Imperial Russian Navy during the Russian-Ottoman War of 1768-74. Elphinstone offers one of the few first-hand accounts of the expedition and the celebrated Battle of Chesme (1770), which gave the Russian empire its maritime credentials. The text covers the squadron’s movements around the Aegean Sea, including the major events and incidents of 1770: the Battle of Chesme, the siege of Lemnos, the loss of Elphinstone’s flagship, Sviatoslav. The final part of the text sees Elphinstone return to St Petersburg in 1771 and then to London at the end of that year, to deal with the repercussions of the voyage to the Mediterranean.

Keywords: Екатерина II, Catherine the Great, Russo-Turkish wars, Русско-турецкая война 1768 – 1774 гг., Russia-Britain relations, Archipelago expedition 1769-1775, Российско-британские отношения, Первая Архипелагская экспедиция, Russian Fleet, Российский флот