Russian monitor Rusalka

Rusalka in drydock, 1868
History
Russian Empire
Name	Rusalka
Namesake	Rusalka
Ordered	26 January 1865[Note 1]
Builder	Admiralty Shipyard, St. Petersburg
Cost	762,000 rubles
Laid down	6 June 1866
Launched	12 September 1867
In service	1869
Reclassified	As coast-defense ironclad, 13 February 1892
Stricken	26 October 1893
Fate	Sank in the Gulf of Finland, 7 September 1893
General characteristics (as completed)
Class and type	Charodeika-class monitor
Displacement	2,100 long tons (2,134 t)
Length	206 ft (62.8 m) (waterline)
Beam	42 ft (12.8 m)
Draft	12 ft 7 in (3.8 m)
Installed power	875 ihp (652 kW) 2 rectangular boilers
Propulsion	2 shafts, 2 Horizontal direct-action steam engines
Speed	8 knots (15 km/h; 9.2 mph)
Complement	172 officers and crewmen
Armament	2 × 9-inch (229 mm) Smoothbore guns 2 × 15-inch (381 mm) Rodman guns
Armor	Belt: 3.25–4.5 in (83–114 mm) Gun turrets: 5.5 in (140 mm) Conning tower: 4.5 in (114 mm) Deck: 1 in (25 mm)

Rusalka (Russian: Русалка, Mermaid), was one of two Charodeika-class monitors built for the Imperial Russian Navy in the 1860s. She served for her entire career with the Baltic Fleet. Aside from hitting an uncharted rock not long after she was completed in 1869, she had an uneventful career. Rusalka sank in a storm in 1893 with the loss of all hands in the Gulf of Finland. In 1902, a memorial was built in Reval (Tallinn) to commemorate her loss. Her wreck was rediscovered in 2003, bow-down in the mud, which has prompted a new theory regarding her loss.
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