Battle flags streaming from the main and gaff, the armored cruiser Bayan heads through the narrow Port Arthur harbor mouth for the open sea; behind her in port, the battleships of the First Pacific Squadron are evidently raising steam to follow her in a sortie. This view is taken from the heights east of the city (Golden Hill), where the main defensive batteries were constructed. The peninsula closing the harbor, known as the Tiger's Tail, is directly behind the cruiser; site of the naval base is to the right out of the picture. This may be the sortie to Adm. Makaroff's fiery demise, or to the Battle of the Yellow Sea. Or it could be any of a number of unsung wartime operations. Compare landscape to current photo of the same features and see how the Tiger's Tail got its name. Enlarge picture above.
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The city of Port Arthur (Lüshunkou), a Russian colony on Chinese soil from 1897 forward, was the linchpin of Russian imperial power in Manchuria, and the key to its fabulous mineral wealth. In 1894 - 95 Japan had fought China in a short, bloody war and obtained rights to occupy Port Arthur. Thereupon Germany, Russia, and France stepped in and sheared the territorial concessions out of the peace treaty, citing "concern for China's sovereignty."
Russia soon demonstrated the sincerity of her concern for Chinese sovereignty by moving into Port Arthur herself and attaching it to the Trans-Siberian Railway by spur line. Russia then penetrated the surrounding territory. The nearby harbor of Dalien was occupied and built up (named Dalny in Russian). Thanks to a nearby coal mine linked by the railway, the colony's industry was largely independent. The port cities were electrified, and the Russian Pacific Squadron's fuel supply was bountiful. Japan well remembered her own bloody battle to gain Port Arthur in 1894, before this plum was reassigned to Russia. Not content with actual possession of the territory, Russia made a practice of poking the Japanese in the eye gratuitously whenever the situation offered. The Tsar had been a committed Japanophobe ever since an assassin made an attempt during a state visit he conducted as tsarevich. Attitudes toward the Japanese in his domain showed little understanding, comingling fear and condescension -- the Japanese were commonly called "yellow monkeys" and widely presumed to be subhuman. Fighting a war at such a distance would put an enormous strain on the just-built Trans-Siberian Railway, especially on the sections where the rail line had not been completed yet. Troops and supplies heading east had to be transshipped to the railhead in oxcarts and on foot through the wrath of a Siberian winter. In another sector, tracks were laid across the ice of Lake Baikal during the winter months. In summer, troops had to be ferried across or march around the lake to pick up the line.
So it was a grudge match when Japan went to war with Russia ten years later. At some point Japan's tolerance for being poked in the eye ran out. And on considering, the Japanese reckoned they could take Russia -- or at least, Russia's colonies and forces in the Far East. Japan's war aims were to recapture the coveted port -- a port that the Russians had fortified so heavily it was considered impregnable -- and to run the Russians out of Manchuria, replacing them as imperial masters. Port Arthur thus became the object of one of the first great campaigns of modern, mechanized warfare. In 1904 the Japanese invested, besieged, and captured the strategic fortress and its surrounding railway corridor in mineral-rich Manchuria. They won a resounding victory, but at the expense of nearly half a million casualties.
Click on any thumbnail or the text below it for actual photos and eyewitness illustrations of the monumental siege of Port Arthur.
Click here for a detailed map of Port Arthur, circa 1905. Click here for a brief narrative of the siege.
- Narrative of the Port Arthur Siege
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