Where the Iron Crosses Grow

In Sevastopol, Vice-Admiral Levchenko was out of touch with events at the front, and futilely attempted to direct Petrov and Batov by radio to form defensive positions, unaware that the Germans had already occupied them. Soon, Levchenko lost all radio contact with both armies, and became unable to exercise any kind of command and control over Soviet ground forces in the Crimea. Panic began to set in as the local Soviet military leadership came to realize the extent of the defeat at Ishun and the obvious fact that the Red Army was on the run. Vice-Admiral Oktyabrsky wasted little time, hoisting his flag on the destroyer Boiky in Sevastopol on the evening of October 28 and sailing for the port of Poti, with the battleship Parizhskaya Kommuna and the heavy cruiser Molotov. It was a sauve qui peut moment, like that the French army experienced at Sedan in 1940, with little thought for the consequences. Despite the fact that the Black Sea Fleet had already demonstrated an ability to conduct evacuations under fire at Odessa, which could have saved some of Petrov’s and Batov’s troops who were already cut off by German advances, only a feeble effort was made to save a few troops from Yevpatoriya. Similarly, naval gunfire might have delayed the German advance guard from entering Yevpatoriya and Feodosiya, but aside from two light cruisers and a handful of elderly destroyers, the rest of the fleet was running for cover in the Caucasian ports. Oktyabrsky was finally ordered to return to Sevastopol five days later, but the failure of the fleet to act contributed to the unfolding Soviet debacle in the Crimea.

Nor was there was any unity of command in Sevastopol during the critical days after Ishun. Instead, the newly formed Sevastopol City Defense Committee (Komitet oborana Sevastopolya or KOS) headed by SimferopolCommunist Party boss Boris A. Borisov concerned itself with local defense measures directed by the party, while the Military Council of the Black Sea Fleet (Voyenniy Sovyet Chernomorskogo flota), normally headed by Oktyabrsky, was temporarily headed by his deputy Rear-Admiral Gavrill B. Zhukov, who did little more than proclaim the city to be in a “state of siege.” Yet not everyone in Sevastopol lost their heads. Colonel Pavel P. Gorpishchenko, an iron-willed instructor at the Black Sea Fleet’s Mine Warfare School, formed an ad hoc defense unit from his cadets, then began recruiting sailors from several dry-docked warships in Sevastopol. In short order, Gorpishchenko organized several thousand armed sailors under his command, which was designated as the 1st Naval Infantry Regiment. The 6ft-tall Gorpishchenko was an experienced combat veteran of the Russian Civil War and a charismatic leader who instilled confidence in his sailors-turned-infantrymen. Three other naval infantry battalions, numbered 15, 16, and 17, were formed on October 29 from naval reservists, crewmen from ships under repair, and VVS base personnel. Soon thereafter, 18th and 19th Battalions were formed as well. General-Major Petr A. Morgunov, commander of all the coastal artillery batteries around Sevastopol, did not have the option of running, and put his batteries on full alert to fire on any approaching enemy ground forces.