1855 Neumann and Kaiser Bird's-Eye View of Odesa, Ukraine, during the Crimean War

This is a c. 1855 L. T. Neumann and Alexander Kaiser bird's-eye view of the Black Sea port of Odesa (Odessa / Одеса), Ukraine, before its bombardment in the Crimean War.

A Closer Look

The view looks southward over Odesa.The Quarantine Port for merchant ships and the Imperial Harbor occupy the foreground as Odesa itself stretches toward the horizon. The citadel occupies the high ground just behind the quarantine port. Granaries, warehouses, churches, barracks, and the Governor's Palace are among the 30 locations numerically identified and indexed below the view. Even the botanical garden and the public garden are labeled. The 1854 bombardment of Odesa during the Crimean War (1853 - 1856) by the British Royal Navy was an effort to stymie Russian naval power and break supply lines. The attack devastated Odesa's port and commercial infrastructure, but the British failed to capture the city, and its defenses remained strong.

The Crimean War

The Crimean War, with an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, Britain, France, and Sardinia on one side of the conflict and the Russian Empire on the other, lasted from October 1853 until February 1856. The root cause of the war has never been fully understood, but the stated impetus for hostilities was the rights of Christians in the Holy Land, with the Catholics being supported by the French and the Greek Orthodox Church gaining the support of the Russians. Other factors also included the gradual decline of the Ottoman Empire and British and French concerns about Russian gains in the region at the cost of the Ottomans.

Hostilities erupted in July 1853 when Russia invaded two Ottoman suzerainties known collectively as the Danubian Principalities: Wallachia and Moldavia. The Ottomans immediately responded and fought a defensive campaign that eventually halted the Russian advance at Silistra, which the Russians besieged. Alarmed by the possibility of an Ottoman collapse, the British and French jumped to their aid, sending troops and supplies to Gallipoli. They did not arrive at Silistra until after the Russians had withdrawn.

At this point, public opinion at home, where discontent aroused by the wasted effort and expense of sending armies to the Balkans, exerted an influence on the alliance. This outcry led to the planning and execution of an invasion of the Crimean Peninsula and a siege of the Russian naval port of Sevastopol, their primary naval base in the Black Sea. The siege lasted eleven months. Russia finally sued for peace in March 1856. In the Treaty of Paris that ended the war, Russia lost its Black Sea ports, Wallachia and Moldavia gained a modicum of independence, and Christians in the Holy Land were given a degree of equality.

Publication History and Census

This view was lithographed by Alexander Kaiser, printed by J. Höfelich's Wwe, and published by L. T. Neumann c. 1855. This is the only known cataloged example of the present German edition. An English language edition was drawn by Nathaniel Whittock, lithographed by Edmund Walker, and published by Lloyd Brother and Company in 1854.