Fort "grey horse". Fort "Gray Horse": description, history, how to get Forts gray horse and red hill

November 5, 2017 we made a one-day trip to the western part of the Leningrad region. The main goal of our trip was the cape Gray Horse and an antiamphibious battery on it, created to protect the Russian coastal fortress - Fort Krasnaya Gorka. Since the Gray Horse and Krasnaya Gorka are inextricably linked historically, our campaign began precisely with a visit to Krasnaya Gorka, where we went for a short time, for a general acquaintance and understanding of what it is (the fort itself is very large, and you can fully explore it only for a long summer day, or even two). In the first part of the story about our journey, I will describe what we saw at the Krasnaya Gorka fort, which is a valuable historical monument of the fortification of the times recent years Russian Empire.

BRIEF HISTORICAL SUMMARY. Fort Krasnaya Gorka was built on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland, like its counterpart on the northern coast, Fort Ino, to protect Kronstadt and St. Petersburg from possible attacks from the sea. The old defensive structures - the forts of Kronstadt and various coastal batteries - no longer met the requirements of the time, when the seas were cut through by mighty battleships, almost unsinkable, with monstrous artillery. For reliable protection seas needed modern powerful coastal guns, with fortifications and a large garrison to protect them. In 1909, on a high bank near the village of Krasnaya Gorka, they began to build a fort of the same name. His armament was more than impressive - many batteries with guns various types, later added huge guns on railway platforms, moving along rails, and capable of firing all the time from different positions. On the territory of the fort, there were many underground passages connecting batteries, command and observation posts, searchlight and mine stations, earthen ramparts and ditches, a powerful land defense belt - all this made the fortress impregnable, and passage by sea to St. Petersburg was impossible, the enemy would be here destroyed by the artillery of the fort. During the years of the Great Patriotic War the fort participated in the defense of Leningrad, was the core of the Lomonosov (Oranienbaum) bridgehead.

From the highway that goes from Lebyazhye to Sosnovy Bor, an old cobblestone road goes to the fort.

When you walk along it, you see a lot of trenches in the forest a couple of kilometers before the borders of the fort. These are the positions of the infantry that defended the approaches to it.

At first, there are just trenches and trenches, with positions for machine gunners and light guns. Then, about a kilometer from the fort, numerous concrete bunkers appear.

These are shelters for infantry, built during the time of the Russian Empire, when the survival of a soldier was at least somehow taken care of. Some shelters are designed not only to shelter infantry, but also for guns, so they have a wide entrance, and from them to the parapet where the guns were placed, there is an inclined ramp, like for carriages in the passages above the tracks.

In the photo - a position for a light anti-assault gun.

You can go to the hideout.

Inside, there is an exit to an armored cap with holes so that the observer can monitor the situation outside the bunker.

This huge concrete shelter is perfectly camouflaged. It is visible only from the side of the fort's defenders, but on the other side it is just a forest, land with trees.

Pieces of asphalt inside. He is here for a reason. Asphalt was used as an anti-spall coating. In the event of an explosion, the walls did not crack, because the asphalt is viscous, it would slow down the process of destruction. For a hundred years, it all collapsed and cracked.

On the ceilings are long needles of stalactites.

At the top of the bunker is a shelf where the shooters could stand, and next to it are recesses in the concrete. Ammunition was hidden in these niches.

It is amazing how well they were able to build a hundred years ago, if the walls are still in perfect condition. At least now they can fight in them.

It is very difficult to get around the entire fort's land defense zone - it will take a lot of time, especially since you have to go through the forest. Usually, during our visits to Krasnaya Gorka, we always limited ourselves to only small areas. Otherwise, we would have to go at least 7-8 kilometers along all the trenches and bunkers - and then, it would only be the main strip, not counting the trenches that were simply brought forward into the forest.

We go further, to the citadel - the fortified core - of the fort. We pass through the railway gates, there used to be rails along which a train drove into the fort. An earthen rampart is visible to the left and right of the gate - a wall around the citadel.

Information stands on the territory of the fortress. All this was done by enthusiastic volunteers who have been protecting Krasnaya Gorka Fort from looting attempts for years. They turned it into a free open-air museum, which has no analogues anywhere else in Russia!

From them you can learn a lot about the fortress.

There is a folk museum created not by the state, but by volunteers. There are unique exhibits from things found on the territory of the fort during excavations.

The main attraction of the fort is the guns on the railway platforms!

And unlike any other museums, here you can climb them as much as you like.

An earthen ditch around the citadel of the fort. Everything, as in the classical ancient fortresses.

An earthen rampart around the citadel of the fort. And under the shaft - concrete dungeons connecting the batteries.

The coast is definitely worth a look. The shore of the Gulf of Finland here is a natural monument! Only here it is a steep cliff, leaving almost directly into the water.

And in the distance - ships are visible ... Petersburg - a sea city. Ships from all over the world follow the fairway that runs along the southern coast.

The edge of a cliff.

A very beautiful place.

Such a bank was additional protection for the fort. Enemy troops would not have climbed here.

We go back to the batteries of the fort. One of the guns was put in place by enthusiasts a year ago, and before that it stood drearily on the rails. Now it is in the gun yard, as it should be.

And the shell is already in place.

In the gun yards there are entrances to the underground part of the fort. Dungeons, I will say right away, there are a lot. There are places to walk.

The stairs are modern. They were made by those who put the fort in order, patriots - enthusiasts. Previously, they were destroyed.

underground corridor.

You can see traces of pipes that were part of the heating system, as well as supplying Fresh air. There were also electrical cables. The era of Nicholas II is a time when technological progress has already covered all aspects of life.

Air filtration and purification system. In the tanks - coal chips, air passed through it, and it absorbed all the polluting particles. Just like pills activated carbon that you take for stomach disorders.

You can walk around the fort for a very long time. There are things to do here for about 5 hours. But our main goal is Cape Gray Horse. Therefore, a small tea party - and soon we will go there.

Farewell look at the "armored train". This gun participated in the defense of Leningrad and beat the Nazis.

And with this, I complete the first part of the story about the trip, but there are still a lot of photos and descriptions ahead. We have yet to see the mine searchlight station, the village of Chernaya Lakhta and the Lebyazhy nature reserve, as well as the Gray Horse fort. So stay tuned in my blog, there will be a continuation soon!

Information for those who want to come here! You can get there by train from the Baltic Station. It costs about 155r. Get off at the station 68 kilometers, then about 45 minutes on foot. In addition, buses run from Parnassus and Avtovo metro stations and cost 145 rubles. Exit at the turn for 68 km. In time, they often go even faster than electric trains, but they check passports at the frontier post, and if you do not have Russian citizenship, they will not let you in.

---------------------

Page of our tourist club in VK:

What is Fort Gray Horse? What is he famous for? You will find answers to these and other questions in the article. This fortification is a coastal antiamphibious battery of the sea fortress of Peter I, which has a Kronstadt position. From October 21, 1919, it was renamed the Peredovoy fort, from 1926 - the Bukharin bastion, and from 1936 to 1953 it was called the Krasnogvardeisky fort.

chronicle

Fort "Grey Horse" was built on Cape Gray Horse in 1911 near the village of Black Lakhta. The position consisted of two long-term open batteries: a three-gun 152-mm Kane howitzer was placed on the right flank, and a four-gun 120-mm Vickers howitzer was placed on the left.

The battery was made thanks to Major General A. A. Shishkin, who provided the management with a corresponding memorandum. She was supposed to confront the enemy in the Koporsky Bay so that the Krasnaya Gorka bastion was not captured from land.

In May 1919, together with the Krasnaya Gorka fortification, the Gray Horse fort repelled the offensive of the Northern Corps (commander - General A.P. Rodzianko) on Petrograd. In October of the same year, he defended Petrograd from N. N. Yudenich and his North-Western troops, successfully repelling all attacks of the attackers. For this reason, in December 1919, he was awarded the Honorary Red Banner. During the Great Patriotic War, the Gray Horse fort was forced to defend the Oranienbaum bridgehead. In the 1950s it was disarmed due to the abolition

Battery No. 333

Have you ever seen Fort Gray Horse? Its scheme is rather unusual. In 1925, it was planned to reinforce the battery with two 254-mm turret mounts from the Rurik caravel. In 1927, a project was created to strengthen the fleet with the help of two 203 mm turrets from the cruiser Respublika. It was based on an improved scheme of the 254-mm Gabbin and Konoplev turret batteries. The towers were mounted in separate concrete nests instead of a single concrete array for a pair of towers.

During installation, the following improvements were made:

The PUAO system has been installed.
The thickness of the armored roof has been increased from 2 to 5 mm.
Ammunition upgraded to 195 volleys per howitzer.
The vertical guidance angle has been expanded from 25 to 35°.

The new battery received No. 9, and then she was assigned No. 333.

Insurrection

The uprising of the Gray Horse and Krasnaya Gorka bastions is a fragment of the civil war that took place in the northwestern zone of Russia. Then, in June 1919, the paramilitary garrisons of the forts opposed the Bolshevik authorities. This uprising was suppressed by the ships of the Red Baltic Fleet, units of the Red Army and amphibious assault. The rebellion in the Gray Horse bastion was prepared by officer Ogloblin. It started on June 13th. The battery commissar and the communists were taken under arrest, but the team was inactive and did not go over to the side of the rebels. She barricaded herself on one of the fortifications and took up a waiting position.

The cruiser "Whaler" went over to the side of the rebels, which was converted into a patrol vessel. They were commanded by midshipman V. I. Speransky, who was on duty at the battery that day. The ship was armed with two 75mm howitzers. When the "Kitoboy" went over to the side of the rebels, he was first fired upon by the artillery of the battery and the fleet, and then, when he changed the red flag to Andreevsky, by the "Anchor" brigantine of his personal red platoon. Nevertheless, the Whaler received one small hole in the deck.

The Whaler went to Fort Krasnaya Gorka the next day. From there he left with a message for the English squadron about the mutiny. At the same time, the British seized the ship and treated it like a spoils of war. They did not at all take into account the fact that the Andreevsky flag fluttered on it. Only on June 17 the ship was handed over to the "Russian Naval Staff", and the provision of assistance to the rebels by the British squadron was indecisive and belated. The guns of the battery participated in the shelling of the brigantines of the Baltic Fleet and Kronstadt. Moreover, the team refused to conduct artillery fire, and the officers took up this. The uprising was broken on the night of June 16, the rebels left the fort without damaging the buildings and guns.

Results

After the end of the confrontation, the leadership of the defensive region of Petrograd paid close attention to the bastions. The garrisons of the fortifications were improved with communist details, and subsequently these formations turned into real strongholds of the defense of the Gulf of Finland Riviera. It was this nuance that played the most important role in repulsing the autumn attack of the North-Western Army on Petrograd.

The leadership arrested the conspirators at the forts. As a result, the Cheka was able to reach the Petrograd group of the "People's Center", which was later destroyed.

Nuances

In fact, the Gray Horse battery is the subsequent development of the defense of the nearby approaches to Kronstadt. The bastion was rebuilt in two stages. The construction of two rapid-firing batteries at Cape Gray Horse began in 1911, as we discussed above. In 1925-1928. coastal defenses were modernized and the fort was upgraded with an 8-inch battery consisting of two towers and located on Cape Suurniemi. This fort during the years of the civil war, intervention and the Great Patriotic War fully justified its mission.

How to get there

Many want to take a look at the Gray Horse Fort. How to get there by car? From Krasnoflotsk you need to move through Chernaya Lakhta. Before reaching Pulkovo, turn right along the cobblestone road. You need to get to Grafskaya Lakhta Bay. You will be able to identify the bay by its pungent smell. Move to the gate with the inscription "No Entry". Then go on foot through the forest towards Cape Gray Horse. Then you will need to find a path that will lead you to the destroyed gates of the camp of the Higher Naval Diving School with prohibitory inscriptions.

After that, pass by the buildings to the desired fort, which defended Krasnaya Gorka from the west. Today, the four-gun battery, due to inaccessibility, has been well preserved. Although its lower casemates are flooded due to the proximity of water, and it is overgrown with grass. The same can be said about the second battery.

The top of the local observation post, built in the 1910s, was built on with a rangefinder pavilion after the end of the Great Patriotic War. The post consists of three floors, and if you climb it, you can admire the blue waters of the Gulf of Finland for a long time. After visiting these sights, you can get to the station "68 km" and depart for St. Petersburg. It should be noted that if you started your hike from the central square of the village and completed it in the Gray Horse bastion, then the length of your path will be 40 km.

By minibus

Agree, the Gray Horse fort is far away. How to get to it by bus? Let's take a look at the shortest path. You need to take minibus No. 401 in St. Petersburg near the Avtovo metro station and go to a stop in the village of Gora-Valdai. Then you have to walk about a kilometer to the first turn to the right. On it after three kilometers you will come out to the open gate with a sign.

On November 5, our trip to Cape Gray Horse took place. At first we visited the Krasnaya Gorka fort, walked along the western part of the Lebyazhy nature reserve and visited the village of Chernaya Lakhta, and at the end of the hike we reached the main goal of the trip - the Gray Horse anti-landing battery, historically and logically connected with Krasnaya Gorka ", for which we first went to the first, main fort.

The Gray Horse is worth being the main goal of the hike, for several reasons. Firstly, there are no numerous crowds of tourists, but on the contrary, peace and quiet reign. Therefore, it is easier to plunge into history, to feel the atmosphere of the past. Secondly, there is wonderful, almost untouched by man nature, which is worth talking to for several hours during a walk.

I already talked about nature in a previous post. (Reserve "Lebyazhy"), and now let's see what we saw on the Gray Horse.

The first thing that opens to the gaze of the traveler is the Command and Observation Post (CNP). Sometimes they write not "point", but "post", perhaps this is an outdated designation, because it is traditionally used like the first one. In general, the command of the fort was located here, observation was carried out, orders were given to the batteries from here. The structure is made of thick concrete, bunded on the outside - disguised as earth under a mound, which is traditional for all buildings of the Russian Empire at the beginning of the 20th century, when under Nicholas II they began to build new and re-equip old forts and batteries.

The building was mothballed, the entrances were blocked with bricks, but this brick has been broken for a long time, and you can safely enter.

Stairs lead to the upper floors. But you have to be careful not to hit your head on the numerous hanging pipes.

There are a lot of devastated empty rooms on the intermediate floors, but we go straight upstairs. In one of upper parts visible concrete base. What was here is not clear, but something that rotated and looked into the embrasure.

The embrasure, going in a circle, is bricked up. It is very likely that there was a machine gun here, which shot everything around through this gap.

Stairway up. The rooms are dark, you need a flashlight.

On one of the sites - small windows for observation.

The windows were closed with metal shutters.

Finally, we climb to the highest platform.

You can see the car of the lighthouse workers on the coast in the distance, as well as some greenhouses.

Part of the group did not go with us to the bunker. Now we look at them from above, from where they seem quite small. If you look closely, you will see dark spots on the ground to the left and right of the road. This is a swamp. The road was built on top of the swamps; without an artificial embankment, it was impossible to get to this cape by land.

View of the Gulf of Finland. The enemy will not pass unnoticed.

An old intercom.

One of the lower floors. Everything is destroyed and stolen. But complaining is not the worst thing that is happening with forts now.

After leaving the KNP fort, we go to the batteries. A right-flank battery is visible in the distance, where there were 3 guns. Now is the time to explain what kind of animal the Gray Horse is, and why it is needed at all. The fact is that Krasnaya Gorka, with its powerful guns, could perfectly smash everything that moved along the sea to dust, but could not effectively protect itself from landing on boats. The guns could not shoot from the hill along the coastline, their shells flew only into the distance. But this is not the main thing, even if light guns or machine guns are installed along the entire coast right near the water - they will see the enemy only when he comes close, emerging from behind the cape and being right in front of the battery. And if he comes down to land earlier, a couple of hundred meters from the guns, without swimming to them, he will not be visible at all, and it will be impossible to knock him out in the water. In case of an attack from the land, Krasnaya Gorka had an impressive land defense zone, which I already wrote about at the beginning of this article.

But it would be much more effective to destroy enemy landing craft right in the water, while they had not yet landed troops on land - there would be much fewer losses among their own. For this, the Gray Horse battery was built, which would have detected the enemy earlier, knocking out his ships on the distant approaches to the main fortress.

Look at this photo taken on the left flank of Cape Gray Horse. In the center of the frame is another cape - Shepelevsky, where there is an operating lighthouse. And to the right of it is the open sea, which is visible in the distance for many kilometers. It is impossible to pass unnoticed past the observation posts of the battery.

Near the right-flank battery there is an old masonry on the shore. She strengthened the coast so that the sea surf did not destroy the battery. Still, the Gulf of Finland is part of the Baltic Sea, and the waves here can be quite destructive.

Battery observation post. There are many towers like this. Through them it was possible to safely monitor the sea.

Gun yard of the battery. The right-flank part was armed with three guns - rapid-fire cannons of the Kane system. They could fire up to 12 rounds per minute. Through the windows, shells were fed from underground storage directly to the guns.

All battery guns are interconnected by underground corridors, it was possible to move from gun to gun without leaving the surface, which increased the survivability of personnel. We go inside.

The corridors here have two levels. The first one runs around the guns and also connects the courtyards with each other. The second is located below, on it are dungeons where ammunition was stored.

What is striking is that the battery has long been abandoned. The conditions are harsh - dampness, climate ... And the paint on the walls is still in perfect condition. How so? Now the buildings are re-whitewashed every three years. And here for a hundred years, and nothing happens to her! We lost something that we used to know how ...

In the lower level, where the underground storage for ammunition, there were such devices with handles. You turn the knob - by the way, it still works - and the damper closes, blocking the pipe. Probably, this was how the air flow was regulated for ventilation or heating of the premises.

Staircase from the upper corridor to the lower ammo rooms.

One of the lower rooms.

There were shells here.

We leave on the coast of the Gulf of Finland and go to the second battery. The coast here is very beautiful!

Reeds can well shelter from the wind in summer, if there is a need to sunbathe in not the hottest weather ...

The gun yard of the second battery. There were 4 guns of the Vickers system. These guns were mounted in pairs - two barrels next to each other, on one rotating installation.

Here the underground storage facilities are flooded. Once I was here in the winter when the water in them froze. But it so happened that, due to its high level, it was possible to move on the ice only while sitting or on your knees. Also, it was very slippery. So we rolled on our knees along the lower corridors, it was very funny: a group of 10 people pushes with their hands, and rolls on the ice one by one. And then somewhere they heard the crack of ice - and at great speed they rolled back on their backs and knees ...

The last part of the fort is the Rangefinder Pavilion, from where the fire was corrected and the sea was monitored.

Previously, entry was free. But now there is a lock on the door, and you can't get inside. Surely, as always, this will be explained by "patriotic considerations." Recently, a number of forts and pillboxes have been seized and, in fact, illegally privatized by various "patriotic" clubs, who turn them into their own property, and then lead excursions there either for their favorites or for those who pay very well. And then a certain N. writes on his website "it's closed there, but I have an exclusive agreement with the owners, and for 1000 rubles you can go there ...". The trend is disgusting and sad.

So I advise everyone to visit the Gray Horse as soon as possible - over time, both the batteries and the KNP will be closed, the trend is obvious ...

Bay coast near the rangefinder pavilion. It was getting dark, and we walked back in complete darkness. It's good that everyone had flashlights.

And now the most important part of the trip. But not for everyone. We put half of them on bus 401, going from Sosnovy Bor to St. Petersburg, to the Avtovo metro station. The stop was at the village of Goravaldai. And the other half, the most active, went with me to Goravaldai Lake. We didn't know if it was frozen or not, but we hoped to swim. When they reached the lake, they saw floating leaves near the shore. The decision was quickly made - to swim! Moreover, they got pretty wet while walking, the November day was warm, +7.

And then I realized that something was wrong here .. my foot ran up against some kind of obstacle. I thought that I had crashed into a fallen tree trunk in the dark, but in the light of the lanterns it was clear that there were no trunks. It's ice! Yes, he was three meters from the shore! Near the shore it melted during warm days, and then it remained, after those frosts that were a week ago.

I had to break the ice with my hands and feet in order to get to a place where you can at least sit in the water and dip at least somehow. Following me, the other members of the group took up a fantastically absurd business.

Swim in November, in the dark, by the light of lanterns, in a frozen lake... why not? Everything is possible in our travel club...

The crumbs of ice broken by us floated sadly near the shore...

Half an hour later we boarded the next bus, where there were exactly as many seats as there were us. So we have very successfully divided the group in this way. We rushed back to the city in about 1 hour and 20 minutes.

------------

Page dedicated to our hiking trips:

In 1910, on the coast of the Gulf of Finland, on the Cape "Gray Horse", they began to build a fort, which received the same name. It was considered as a continuation of Krasnaya Gorka. It was not even a fort, but only two batteries, which, having been the first to open fire on the advancing enemy fleet, could enable the Krasnaya Gorka artillery to prepare to repel the attack.

The fort was of great importance for the defense of Petrograd and Kronstadt. During the Civil War of 1918-20, during the offensive of the White Guard troops of General N. N. Yudenich on Petrograd, on the night of June 13, 1919, a counter-revolutionary rebellion broke out at the forts Krasnaya Gorka, Gray Horse, Obruchev and the minesweeper Kitoboy , prepared by the White Guards, Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks with the active participation of foreign intelligence services. The Revolutionary Military Council of the Baltic Fleet addressed the rebels with an ultimatum - to immediately stop the rebellion. The garrison of the fort "Obruchev" arrested the instigators and declared obedience to the Soviet power; the forts "Krasnaya Gorka" (25 guns of caliber from 76 to 305 mm) and "Gray Horse" (8 guns of caliber 120-152 mm) refused to fulfill the requirement of the RVS, relying on the support of the British fleet. On June 13-14, the artillery of the ships of the Baltic Fleet (2 battleships, 1 cruiser, 3 destroyers) and Fort "Rif" fired on the rebellious forts. On June 15, the coastal group (up to 4.5 thousand people) under the command of Sannikov, with the support of 2 armored trains, 2 armored cars and 2 destroyers, went on the offensive and knocked out the rebels (500 people) from positions on the outskirts of Krasnaya Gorka. The command of the rebellious forts, headed by the commandant of the Krasnaya Gorka fort, former lieutenant Neklyudov, fled, and on June 16 the forts surrendered.
In Soviet times, the forts were renamed. "Krasnaya Gorka" became the "Krasnoflotsky" fort, and the "Gray Horse" - "Forward". But these names were preserved only in official documents, the old names turned out to be more tenacious.
The fort underwent significant reconstruction in the early 1930s. Here, on the western shore of Batareynaya Bay, two 203-millimeter turret mounts were installed, taken from the battleship Respublika (former Emperor Pavel I) sold to Germany for scrap.

In the difficult years of the blockade, the forts of Krasnaya Gorka and Seraya Horse, with their artillery power, held back the onslaught of the Nazis, smashed their rear, provided defense, and then the offensive.
In the late 1960s, the fate of the forts was decided very simply: to disarm, providing a plan for the delivery of scrap metal. The unique tower installations of the Krasnaya Gorka and the Gray Horse were completely dismantled. Only the so-called "cuirass" remained, supporting the concrete outer part. Now it's just wells among the overgrown bushes concrete block- a sad sight illustrating the attitude towards history in our country.

Currently, the fort is in decline, as evidenced by the barbarian traces of metal hunters. The fort is destroyed and plundered, and only strong concrete looks at all this with silent sorrow.

http://militera.lib.ru/h/vmf/03.html
http://www.nortfort.ru
http://www.antiq.info/arms_/6964.html

November 5, 2017 we made a one-day trip to the western part of the Leningrad region. The main goal of our campaign was Cape Gray Horse and the antiamphibious battery on it, created to protect the Russian coastal fortress - Fort Krasnaya Gorka. Since the Gray Horse and Krasnaya Gorka are inextricably linked historically, our campaign began precisely with a visit to Krasnaya Gorka, where we went for a short time, for a general acquaintance and understanding of what it is (the fort itself is very large, and you can fully explore it only for a long summer day, or even two). In the first part of the story about our journey, I will describe what we saw at the Krasnaya Gorka fort, which is a valuable historical monument of fortification from the last years of the Russian Empire.

BRIEF HISTORICAL SUMMARY. Fort Krasnaya Gorka was built on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland, like its counterpart on the northern coast, Fort Ino, to protect Kronstadt and St. Petersburg from possible attacks from the sea. The old defensive structures - the forts of Kronstadt and various coastal batteries - no longer met the requirements of the time, when the seas were cut through by mighty battleships, almost unsinkable, with monstrous artillery. For the reliable protection of the seas, modern powerful coastal guns were needed, with fortifications and a large garrison to protect them. In 1909, on a high bank near the village of Krasnaya Gorka, they began to build a fort of the same name. Its armament was more than impressive - many batteries with guns of various types, later huge guns were added on railway platforms, moving along rails, and capable of firing all the time from different positions. On the territory of the fort, there were many underground passages connecting batteries, command and observation posts, searchlight and mine stations, earthen ramparts and ditches, a powerful land defense belt - all this made the fortress impregnable, and passage by sea to St. Petersburg was impossible, the enemy would be here destroyed by the artillery of the fort. During the Great Patriotic War, the fort participated in the defense of Leningrad, was the core of the Lomonosov (Oranienbaum) bridgehead.