On Friday the squadron appeared under Admiral Krieger. And those who saw its approach and its discomfiture will never forget the sight. As the five battleships steamed up slowly over the blue sunlit waters the flagship signalled to the Potemkin ╤
╥Madmen, you have mutinied and become traitors to your Tsar and your fatherland. Surrender!╙
The Potemkin, still anchored off Odessa, replied,
╥We have no Tsar, and we understand the word fatherland in a different sense. We will not surrender!╙
And the flags on Admiral Krieger╒s ship spelled out,
╥If you will not surrender you must fight.╙
╥We are ready to fight,╙ replied the Potemkin, ╥and we are waiting for you to come.╙
╥Oh, mad Potemkin,╙ signalled the flagship, ╥we shall not fight you near the town, for peaceful inhabitants would suffer. Come out to sea!╙
╥I will come out,╙ said the Potemkin, and immediately steamed out to meet the squadron. The squadron came on, and when well within range prepared to fire. The Potemkin directed her guns on her opponents, but, to the amazement of all spectators, not a shot was fired, and the squadron steamed away to a safe distance. Then Admiral Krieger sent destroyers towards the Potemkin, but after steaming half the distance they retired in obedience to signals made, not by the flagship, but by the Potemkin. And in the end the whole squadron turned to the south and steamed off ignominiously to Sebastopol, their task unaccomplished. The Georgiy Pobyedonosets, the last battleship in the retreating line, began signalling to the Potemkin, and, slowing down until she was well in the rear, suddenly turned about, joined the Potemkin, and steamed back with her to Odessa. There was only one conclusion to be drawn from all these remarkable manoeuvres. The whole squadron had caught the infection of mutiny, and the men had refused to fire. And this was to those on land the source at once of hope and of fear.
On Saturday the two battleships lay off Odessa until the evening. During the day, with a fine coolness, the Potemkin╒s crew sent ashore two of their number to ask the commandant for medicine and provisions. The men marched resolutely up from the port, passing soldiers and officers without saluting or showing any sign of respect, and the officers, furious at this breach of discipline, could but let them pass and grind their teeth in helpless rage. They made their way into the room of the commandant╒s aide-de-camp, and having communicated their errand and received from the irate officer a forced promise that everything would be sent, they returned quietly to the ship.
In the evening the Georgiy Pobyedonosets proved unfaithful, and cautiously steaming around until a wharf lay between herself and the Potemkin, and she was thus safe from the Potemkin╒s torpedoes, she began negotiating with the authorities ashore. The authorities were not too ready to believe in the crew╒s willingness to surrender, and it was only on the following day that General Karangazoff, who seems to have been braver than the rest, ventured to board the Georgiy and arrange the terms of surrender. The Potemkin, perhaps in sorrow or in anger at the desertion of her comrade, left Odessa on Sunday, taking with her her destroyer, the Ismailia. On Sunday evening the Prefect of Odessa issued a notice declaring that the danger was over, and that residents might resume their normal occupations. And with the publication of the notice this most dramatic episode in the history of Odessa may be said to have come to an end.
