Makarov, Stepan Osipovich

MAKAROV, STEPAN OSIPOVICH

(b, Nikolayev, Russia, 8 March 1849; d. aboard the battleship Petropavlovsk, Port Arthur, Russia, 13 April 1904)

oceanography.

His father, Osip Fyodorovich Makarov, retired from the navy in 1873 with the rank of junior captain. His mother came from a simple family and had no education; she died in 1857, leaving two daughters and three sons, of whom Stepan was the youngest. His officer’s rank enabled Makarov’s father to enroll his son at the age of ten at the naval school at Nikolayevsk-na-Amure, to which his father had been transferred. The five-month voyage from St. Petersburg instilled in him a love for the ocean and for sea voyages: Makarov often said, “At sea means at home.”

Makarov graduated from the naval school in 1865. He served as a cadet and in May 1869 he was commissioned a warrant officer. Assigned to the Black Sea fleet in 1876 as commander of a steamer, he conducted successful military actions during the Russo-Turkish War.

In 1881–1882 as commander of the ambassadorial station ship Taman in Constantinople, Makarov conducted hydrological research in the Bosporus. In 1886–1889 he commanded the corvette Vityaz on its round-the-world voyage, and in 1896 he became vice-admiral. From the beginning of 1897 Makarov was actively involved in research on icebreaker in the North Atlantic. While planning the icebreaker Ermak Makarov studied previous voyages through ice, particularly on the Great Lakes. He supervised the building of the Ermak in England and in 1899–1901 completed the first voyages on it in polar latitudes. In December 1899 Makarov was named commander in chief of the Kronshtadt port and military governor of Kronshtadt. Makarov died during the Russo-Japanese War, when his battleship, the Petropavlovsk, was sunk by a Japanese mine.

Makarov began his oceanographic studies in 1881–1882 on currents in the Bosporus. In his first experiment Makarov proved the existence of a deep current running counter to the surface current. In the middle of the channel, he let down a barrel which was borne by the surface current toward the Sea of Marmara. At a certain depth the line began to pull in the opposite direction. The force of the deep current was so great that the barrel dragged the boat against the surface current. Makarov organized systematic observations of the water density and temperature at various depths, and of the velocity of the current throughout the strait. The velocity of the current was measured by a rotator, which Makarov invented and which he called a fluctometer. The velocity of the surface current varied from 6 to 3.22 feet per second, and of the lower from 3.22 to 1.84 feet per second. The density of the upper water was 1. 015; the lower, 1.028. This difference in density between the less saline Black Sea and the more saline Sea of Marmara appears to be the reason for the existence of contrary currents in the Bosporus. Makarov estimated that the ratio of the volume of inflow to outflow in the Black Sea is 1: 1.85; the difference is accounted for by fresh water flowing into the Black Sea. The results of Makarov’s Bosporus research were published in Ob obmene vod Chernogo i Sredi-zemnogo morey (“On the Exchange of Water of the Black and Mediterranean Seas,” 1885), which was a major contribution to oceanography.

In his main oceanographic work, Vityaz i Tikhy okean (“The Vityaz and the Pacific Ocean,” 1894), he explained the hydrological observations carried out under his direction aboard the corvette Vityaz on its thirty-three-month round-the-world voyage. Although it was undertaken mainly for purposes of military instruction, Makarov began oceanographic observation at the outset. Makarov made more than 250 individual measurements of water density and temperature at depths from twenty-five to 800 meters. After careful analysis of the results of these observations and also descriptions in logs of other voyages, Makarov compiled the first water temperature tables for the North Pacific Ocean. He also considered the origin of the deep waters of the North Pacific, the reason for the homogeneous temperature and density of the water at every depth of the English Channel, the reason for the rising of deep waters near the mouths of large rivers, and the general pattern of ocean currents, with an indication of the primary significance of the action of the Coriolis force on sea currents. This main work of Makarov’s, published simultaneously in Russian and French and awarded prizes by the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences and the Russian Geographical Society, brought Makarov international recognition as a scientific oceanographer.

Makarov conceived the idea of opening up navigation along the northern borders of Siberia with the aid of icebreakers. “Straight Through to the North Pole!” was the expressive title of his report in 1897 to the Russian Geographical Society. On two voyages on the icebreaker Ermak to Spitsbergen and to Novaya Zemlya (1899–1901), Makarov gathered data on the Arctic ice and on the temperatures and salinity of the Arctic basin.

Although the Ermak, constructed on Makarov’s initiative, did not achieve all the results for which its creator hoped, research in the Arctic Ocean with icebreakers has subsequently been widely realized in the Soviet Union.

Makarov must be credited with a great number of different inventions pertaining to oceanographic research and naval construction. He published several works on naval tactics, the chief of which was Rassuzhdenia po voprosam morskoy taktiki (“Considerations on Questions of Naval Tactics”). Several geographical areas including an island in the Nordenskjöld Archipelago and in the Kara Sea were named for him.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Original Works. Makarov’s oceanographic works were published as Okeanograficheskie raboty (Moscow, 1950). See also Ob issledovanii Severnogo Ledovitogo Okeana (“Research in the Northern Arctic Ocean”; St. Petersburg, 1897), written with F.Vrangel; Ermak vo ldakh (“Ermak in the Ice”), 2 pts. (St. Petersburg, 1901); and Rassuzhdenia po voprosam morskoy taktiki (“Considerations on Questions of Naval Tactics”; Moscow, 1943).

II. Secondary Literature. On Makarov and his work, see D.N.Anuchin, O lyudyakh russkoy nauki i kultury (“People of Russian Science and Culture”; Moscow, 1952), 318–328; A. D. Dobrovolsky, Admiral S. O. Makarov, puteshestvennik i okeanograf (“Admiral S. O. Makarov, Traveler and Oceanographer”; Moscow, 1948); A. N. Krylov, Vitse-Admiral Maakarov (“Vice-Admiral Makrov”; Moscow-Leningrad, 1944); B. G. Ostrovsky, Admiral Makarov (Moscow, 1954); F. F. Vrangel, Vistse-Admiral Stepan Osipovich Makarov, 2 pts. (St. Petersburg, 1911–1913), a biographical sketch.

I.A. Fedoseyev