The Siege of Izmail was a military investment fought in 1790 on the Black Sea during the Russo-Turkish war of 1787–1792. The Russians were led by Alexander Suvorov, who had defeated the Ottomans at Kinburn, Ochakov, and Focsani. The Black Sea flotilla was commanded by the Spanish admiral José de Ribas.
In March 1790, the Russians began besieging Izmail, in the region of Budjak (now in Ukraine), which had a garrison of 40,000 soldiers. Suvorov had 31,000 troops and on the morning of 22 December 1790, the Russians began attacking the city. They bombarded Izmail until 3:00 A.M. And then stormed it at 5:30 A.M. The Russians advanced on the north, east, and west. The walls were weaker there than in other places, where it took Russian troops longer to attack. By 8:00 A.M. the Russians had entered the city. In total the Ottoman forces had more than 26,000 killed with the whole garrison being killed, wounded or captured. The Russian forces suffered only 4,330 casualties, out of which 1,815 were killed.
To the victory was dedicated the anthem "Grom pobedy, razdavaysya!" (Let the thunder of victory sound!) which was an unofficial Russian national anthem in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Today it is commemorated as a Day of Military Honour in Russia.
One of the most famous Suvorov's victories became the storm of the very strong Turkish fortress Ismail. This stronghold of the Ottoman Porte on the river Danube banks build by French and German fortificators was considered unassailable. In Turkish it was called "Ordu Kalesi" because this fortress could accomodate a whole army. It had the shape of an irregular triangle adjacent to the river bank. The length of the earthen rampart was more than 6 kilometers and the height was 6 - 8 meters with t earthen and stone bastions. The width of the fortress moat was about 12 meters with the depth of 6 - 10 meters. In many places the moat was filled with water. There were many stone buildings inside the fortress adapted to defensive actions.
The Ismain garrison was 35 thousand men and 256 guns. The commandant of Ismail was one of the most skilled Turkish commanders Aydos Mekhmet Pasha. The numerous Turkish Danube flotilla was based near the fortress walls. Russian troops (31 thousand men and more than 500 field guns) blocked Ismail and tried to capture it twice but without any success.
Under Suvorov's plan Ismail was stormed by 9 assault columns, three of that were based on the island Chatal and landed to the city from boats of the rowing flotilla. From dry land two groups of troops under Lieutenant-Generals P.S.Potemkin and A.N.Samoylov and Major-General M.I.Kutuzov attacked the fortress. Each column had its own reserves. To avoid bloodshed Russian commander sent a letter to Aydos Mekhmet Pasha with the demand to surrender the fortress, but he refused decidedly.
On December,10,1790 Russian field and ship artillery bombarded the fortress. Next day (December,11) at 3 a.m. the assault columns began moving to their initial positions and at 5.30 a.m.the storm began. The Russians could not began storm in surprise and the attacking troops were met with strong artillery and rifle fire from the rampart. The Turks made a sortie. This fighting was especially hard for Don Cossacks armed with shortened lances. After Russian troops had taken the fortress wall a heated hand-to-hand fight developed on the streets of Ismail. All the city was enveloped in flames. And at last after very hard and bloody battle Ismail was captured at about 4 p.m.
The Turkish losses were 26 thousand killed and 9 thousand wounded men, the Russian losses were 1815 killed and 2445 wounded men and the biggest losses were among officers because commanders went in front of the assault columns. The winners captured 265 guns (large-caliber in main), 42 river boats, 345 colours and bunchuks (Turkish standards).
The capture of Ismail brought Suvorov the glory of a great Russian commander, but he did not get the Field-Marshal baton, he got only the rank of colonel of the Leib-Guards Preobrazhensky regiment (in Russia in was a very high rank, Empress Catherine II herself had the rank of colonel of this Guards regiment too). The reason of this was Suvorov's terms with Prince Potemkin-Tavrichesky were very complicated.
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