Kalevala (corvette)
The total cost of the ship's construction was 342'804 Russian silver rubles (the Finnish Markka became the currency of Finland from 1860 onward).
[6] In the early summer of 1859, the steam engines of the vessel were tested at the Baltic Sea waters near Kronstadt.
[8] Finnish Paul Karl Toppelius (later promoted to rear admiral) became the head of the officers serving on the ship.
Unexpectedly, in 1860 Kalevala was pointed in the service of the Pacific Fleet of Russia, with new home port in Nikolayevsk-on-Amur in the Russian Far East.
[10] In addition to Kalevala, the squadron heading to the Far East consisted of two other corvettes, Bogatyr and Rynda, as well as two clippers, Finnish-built Abrek (built in Pori in 1860) and its model vessel Gaidamak, which had been obtained from England.
[11] According to another source, also Vladimir Davydov[10] skippered Kalevala, and from 1863 also Fedor Želtuhin (Федор Николаевич Желтухин).
[14] Russian America was the name of Russian colonial possessions in North America from 1733 to 1867, that today is the U.S. State of Alaska and settlements in California (1) and Hawaii (3 - starting in 1817) (distant from the North American landmass in the Pacific Ocean and therefore more commonly associated with the other territories of Oceania).
Finnish Chief Managers ("governors") of Russian America included Arvid Adolf Etholén (a.k.a.
As a captain of several ships, Etholén then sailed from Sitka to California, Sandwich Islands and other areas, and in 1821-1823 he explored and mapped the utmost northwestern edges of the Pacific Rim of North America, between Alaska and the Bering Strait.
[15] After having been pointed the Chief Manager ("governor") of Russian America, Etholén skippered the Finnish-built[20] vessel Nikolai I ("Nicolai") from Kronstadt to Sitka in 1939-1940.
[21] In 1841, under the governorship of Russian America by Finnish Arvid Adolf Etholén (1840-1845) (promoted to rear admiral in 1847), the Russian-American area of Fort Ross in Bodega Bay, California, was sold to Johann Sutter.
According to a contract which had been signed, Russian America had to deliver a certain amount of ice to San Francisco at a fixed price.
The Finnish Chief Managers of Russian America Etholén and Furuhjelm helped pave way for the American Alaska purchase, and the Finnish Sea Captain Gustave Niebaum as the Consul of Russia in San Francisco played a critical role in the final striking of the deal that made Alaska a part of the United States in 1867.
[22] During the California Gold Rush and in its aftermath, a substantial Finnish population had settled in San Francisco.
[25][26] The website of the California State Military Museum provides the following quote, which describes the event: In 1863, a six-vessel Russian Imperial Navy squadron, a part of the Russian Pacific Fleet, sailed via Vladivostok to the West Coast of the United States, to help defend the waters there against a possible attack by the United Kingdom or France, during the American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 10, 1865).
Finnish officers serving in the squadron included Theodor Kristian Avellan, who later became the Minister of Naval Affairs of the Russian Empire (similar role to Great Britain's First Lord of the Admiralty).
The Russian Baltic Fleet stayed in the American waters for seven months, paying side visits to Boston, Minneapolis and Washington D.C.
The two Russian navy expeditions to North America during the U.S. Civil War, one to the West Coast and another to the East Coast, and the Kalevala expedition in 1861-1862 were the only concrete foreign military support received by President Abraham Lincoln and the Union Army during the course of the entire war, fought in 1861-1865.
