About the site

Artillery Range means the vast area intended for practice shooting of field artillery units for improvement their fighting abilities and for probation and testing new and experimental artillery systems for Army and Navy...

12 inch artillery system

This site is devoted to the famous Rjevsky Artillery Range near to Saint-Petersburg, Russia. It was founded in 1854 as Commission of Sea Artillery experiments and situated at the Volkovo Field (there is the Volkovo cemetery nowadays). In 1863 the Fire Range was moved to the new place near to Okhtinsky Powder Plant.

There are many monuments of Russian artillery at the Firing Range territory. Most of them are abandoned and forgotten undeservedly. Some of them could be scarped because of lack of money for their preservation. The unique artillery systems of 12 and 16 inches caliber are in their number. They were made in early 20 AC for big battleships "Sebastopol", "Impress Maria" and "Soviet Union" type. During Second World War these guns were key elements of Soviet defense of Leningrad city.

Memorial desk on the 16 inch artillery system

Now the Rjevsky Firing Rang is the restricted and guarded area still. Unique artillery systems are in desolated condition and could be scarped in every moment because lack of money and will to preserve it. Removing the guns from the restricted area is a very expensive and Herculean task and military authorities of the Firing Range (Main Missile Artillery Department of the Ministry of Defense of Russian Federation) had no facilities and finances to do it.

To make the memorial and museum area near to the guns at the territory of Rjevsky Firing Range will be the best decision, because there is no more than 400 meters distance from the guns to the so called "Road of Life" - the supply way to Leningrad during blockade of 1941-1944. The 12 and 16 inches caliber gun could be main attractions of the place where the other artillery pieces from rich military Russian museums could be exposed.