Odd Historic Moments that Are Almost too Weird to Handle

1. The Russians Could Tried to Palm this Bizarre Ship Off on the Bulgarians, but they Were Not Interested

The Novgorod and other round hulls were summarized thus by a naval historian: “they were a dismal failure. They were too slow to stem the current in the Dniepr and proved very difficult to steer. In practice the discharge of even one gun caused them to turn out of control and even contra-rotating some of six propellers was unable to keep the ship on the correct heading. Nor could they cope with the rough weather which is frequently encountered in the Black Sea. They were prone to rapid rolling and pitching in anything more than a flat calm, and could not aim or load their guns under such circumstances“.

During the Russo-Turkish War of 1877 – 1878, the Novgorod was assigned to the defense of Odessa in the Black Sea. It was discovered that her outer engines contributed little to her performance, so they were removed. The modifications brought her already low speed lower down still, to a mere 6 knots (6.9 miles per hour). After the war, she was stationed in Sevastopol, where she deteriorated and gathered rust until she was finally stricken from the Navy list in 1903. The Russians tried to sell her to Bulgaria in 1908, but the Bulgarians were uninterested in the bizarre ship, so it was sold for scrap in 1911.

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Where Did We Find This Stuff? Some Sources and Further Reading

Booth, Martin – A Magick Life: The Biography of Aleister Crowley (2000)

Curious Rambler – Boney Napoleon Scares British Children

Encyclopedia Britannica – Bela I, King of Hungary

Gerard, Frances – The Romance of King Ludwig II of Bavaria: His Relations With Wagner and His Bavarian Fairy Palaces (1901)

History Answers – Napoleon’s Battle Against Rabbits

History Collection – Mass Hysteria Outbreaks

Independent, The, January 5^th, 2015 – Nazi Super Cows: British Farmer Forced to Destroy Half His Murderous Herd of Bio-Engineered Heck Cows After They Try to Kill Staff

Jewish Encyclopedia – Eleazar

Mental Floss – The Time Napoleon Was Attacked by Rabbits

Military Factory – Novgorod: Circular Monitor Ironclad Warship, 1874