Sklyaev, Fedosey Moiseevich

The Early Years of Life (1672–1698)

Fedosey Moiseevich Sklyaev was born on January 4, 1672 in the court village of Preobrazhensky near Moscow. His father, Moses Sklyaev, was a native of Novgorod and served as the royal groom.

In 1676, together with the children of other tsar’s grooms, F. M. Sklyaev was enrolled in the “amusing Petrov regiment”, formed by order of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich specifically for the amusement of his son Pyotr Alekseevich from his peers Tsarevich.

In 1688 , when the sixteen-year-old Peter I was carried away by the creation of a “funny flotilla” on Lake Pereyaslavsky , his peers from the “amusing army” were carpentry together with the tsar, among whom was Sklyaev. The all-knowing mentor and friend of Peter, the Dutchman Franz Timmerman was the first instructor to teach Sklyaev with his comrades shipbuilding carpentry .

In 1691, the "amusing army" of Peter I was reorganized into a life guard with the formation of two guards regiments - Preobrazhensky and Semenovsky . Fedosey Sklyaev, who at that time was considered the scorer of the "amusing army", was of the same quality was assigned to the Preobrazhensky regiment.

In the spring of 1696 in Voronezh the forced construction of galleys for the upcoming campaign of the Russian army to Azov began . Under the direction of Franz Timmermann, as well as ship masters Peter Klas and Jan Jansen discharged from Holland, among the Transfiguration “schipman” F. M. Sklyaev was carpentry on the construction of the royal gallery “Principium” . After the galley was launched into the water, Sklyaev was enlisted as a sailor in her crew. Peter I personally commanded this gallery on the way to Azov , who was convinced that "his favorite not only knows the ax well, but also a clever sailor."

Soon after the Azov campaigns , preparations began for sending the Great Embassy to Western Europe, including Peter I himself, who was planning to go incognito. In the first ten detachment of volunteers, the tsar also included his close associate, the scorer of the Preobrazhensky regiment Fedosey Sklyaev. In the Netherlands, Sklyaev, along with Peter and other volunteers who wanted to study shipbuilding, became a ship carpenter at the Amsterdam shipyard of the East India Company . The volunteers took a practical training course in shipbuilding under the supervision of the Dutch ship master Gerit Klas , under whose leadership the frigate Apostles Peter and Paul was built in less than three months.

In early January 1698, Fedosey Sklyaev and the rest of the volunteers who worked with the king moved to England , where they stayed for more than four months. In England, Sklyaev studied ship architecture , as well as shipbuilding drawing. Linguistic abilities allowed him to quickly learn English , so that he could do without an interpreter in conversations with his teachers.

To get acquainted with the Venetian galley shipbuilding, Peter I sent Fedosey Sklyaev, Lukyan Vereshchagin , Faddey Popov and Grigory Ostrovsky in Venice in 1698 . In Venice, they were met by Ivan Golovin, who, with a group of several volunteers, arrived here a little earlier. All volunteers who arrived arrived were selected to teach shipbuilding in the local arsenal , which was considered one of the best shipbuilding enterprises in the Mediterranean . The rapid mastery of the Italian language greatly contributed to the depth of Sklyaev's study of Venetian shipbuilding.

The Activities of F. M. Sklyaev in 1699-1708

Peter, who always felt a vocation for shipbuilding and enthusiastically worked in this area, as a statesman was aware that he couldn’t be left behind during the construction of ships. Peter needed a shipbuilder - a comrade in work. The Tsar chose Fedosey Sklyaev as his companion, with whom he began to master his favorite shipbuilding business from his adolescent years. Peter decided to interrupt Sklyaev’s teachings and urgently called him together with Lukyan Vereshchagin to Voronezh.

Not immediately managed to leave Venice Sklyaev and Vereshchagin. It took some time to draw up the certificates that they should have obtained by passing the relevant exams to the strict examiners from among the best Venetian shipbuilders. In a relatively short period of time, Fedosey Sklyaev thoroughly got acquainted with the Dutch, English and Venetian methods of shipbuilding, having mastered them in practice. He learned to critically approach each of them, to compare the constructive decisions of various foreign shipbuilders, to develop his own distinctive judgment on each issue. It is not surprising that the exams in Venice were passed brilliantly, and in mid-November 1698 Sklyaev and Vereshchagin left for Russia ^[1] .

Immediately after the arrival of F. M. Sklyaev in Voronezh, Peter I appointed him his first assistant in the construction of the 58-gun battleship Goto Predestination .

In the next few years, Peter, according to his drawings, laid three more ships of the line in Voronezh shipyards - “ Lastka ”, “ Old Oak ” and “Old Eagle”, Fedosey Sklyaev was invariably appointed the builder of all three. F. M. Sklyaev was the king's confidant and, in fact, the main shipbuilder at the Voronezh shipyards. In the absence of the king, he resolved all fundamental issues related to the construction of ships and ships by foreign masters.

The ships built by Sklyaev under the supervision of Peter I were not inferior in their qualities to the linear ships created in Voronezh by the best foreign ship masters and together with them formed the basis of the Azov fleet. They favorably differed from the ships of the "kumpanism" ^[1] .

Together with the construction of multi-gun "sovereign" ships in Voronezh, Sklyaev mastered the creation of prams , some of which were equipped in the form of floating wooden docks - chambers necessary for lifting the most deep-seated ships on them and guiding these ships through the shallow mouth of the Don to the Sea of ​​Azov .

With the beginning of the creation of the Baltic Fleet, Sklyaev was sent to the Ladoga shipyard and to St. Petersburg, where he built galleys and shnavy . For the Baltic Fleet, Sklyaev designed the “brigantine of a new style” - a type of small galley for the rowing squadron of the Baltic Fleet.

In 1706, Sklyaev developed a design for a high-speed yacht type shnyavy, which did not have artillery weapons. This yacht, named "Nadezhda" , became the first ship built in the St. Petersburg Admiralty , and turned out to be faster than the fastest vessel of the Baltic Fleet - the Munker shnava . The following year, in the St. Petersburg Admiralty Sklyaev was built 16-gun schnava "Lyset". Peter I was so pleased with the new shny that he promoted Sklyaev to the rank of naval lieutenant of the Preobrazhensky regiment. In addition, F. M. Sklyaev was given a “master's pass,” that is, a certificate of his production as a ship master.

Shipbuilder Activities 1709-1728

In 1709 - 1712 F. M. Sklyaev built the first full-fledged battleship of the Baltic Fleet - Poltava .

In November 1711, F. M. Sklyaev laid down and, after five months, launched the “Princess” 20-gun shnuva (the ship's drawing was developed by him). The following year, according to the projects developed by him, he laid down two battleships in the St. Petersburg Admiralty: the 60-gun Narva and the 68-gun Revel . In 1714, F. M. Sklyaev built the 32-gun frigate “St. Ilya. " In 1713 - 1718, he built four large prams for the Baltic Fleet in St. Petersburg, and from 1716 to 1720 he led the construction of the 80-gun three-deck battleship "Friedemaker" .

Family

It is known that in 1708 Sklyaev owned a site near the Winter Palace . In the 1720s, Sklyaev built a stone house on this site, in which he would live until his death. F.M.Sklyaev died on May 10, 1728 . Daughter Natalya will live in the same house from 1761 to 1773.

• 58-gun battleship Goto Predestination (1700).
• Yacht " Liebe " (together with G. A. Menshikov).
• Yacht " Hope ".
• The 16-gun yacht Lyset (1708). ^[2]
• The 80-gun battleship Old Eagle (1709).
• 54-gun battleship “ Lastka ” (1709).
• 54-gun battleship Poltava .
• 20-cannon slut " Princess ".
• 60-gun battleship “ Narva ”.
• The 68-gun battleship Revel .
• The 80-gun battleship Friedemaker .
• The 100-gun battleship Peter the First and Second .
• 90-gun battleship " Forest ".

• List of ships of the Baltic Fleet (1702-1725)
• Sklyaev House in Petersburg

• Grigoryev S.V. Biographical Dictionary. Natural science and technology in Karelia. - Petrozavodsk: Karelia, 1973. - S. 208. - 269 p. - 1000 copies.
• Bykhovsky I.A. Petrovsky shipbuilders. - L .: Shipbuilding, 1982. - 100 p.

• Sharymov Alexander. The background of St. Petersburg. 1703 year. Website of Alexander Sharymov.