Russian battleship Pobeda

After the Japanese victory in the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894–95, tensions had arisen between Russia and Japan over their ambitions to control both Manchuria and Korea. A further issue was the Russian failure to withdraw its troops from Manchuria in October 1903, as it had promised. Japan had begun negotiations to ease the situation in 1901, but the Russian government was slow and uncertain in its replies because it had not yet decided exactly how to resolve the problems. Japan interpreted these as deliberate prevarications designed to buy time to complete the Russian armament programs. The final straws were news of Russian timber concessions in northern Korea and the Russian refusal to acknowledge Japanese interests in Manchuria while continuing to place conditions on Japanese activities in Korea. These led the Japanese government to decide in December 1903 that war was now inevitable. The Pacific Squadron began mooring in the outer harbor at night as tensions with Japan increased, so as to react more quickly to any Japanese attempt to land troops in Korea.[8]

On the night of 8/9 February 1904, the IJN launched a surprise attack on the Russian fleet at Port Arthur. Pobeda was not hit in the initial torpedo-boat attack, and sortied the following morning when the Combined Fleet, commanded by Vice Admiral Tōgō Heihachirō, attacked. Tōgō had expected the surprise night attack by his ships to be much more successful than it was, anticipating that the Russians would be badly disorganized and weakened, but they had recovered from their surprise and were ready for his attack. The Japanese ships were spotted by the protected cruiser Boyarin, which was patrolling offshore and alerted the Russian defenses. Tōgō chose to attack the Russian coastal defenses with his main armament and engage the ships with his secondary guns. Splitting his fire proved to be a poor decision as the Japanese eight-inch (203 mm) and six-inch guns inflicted little damage on the Russian ships, which concentrated all their fire on the Japanese ships with some effect. Pobeda was hit once or twice amidships near the waterline, losing two men killed and four wounded, but the shell(s) failed to penetrate the ship's armor and little damage was done.[9]

On 22 March, Pobeda joined several other battleships firing indirectly at Japanese ships bombarding Port Arthur's harbor and hit the Japanese battleship Fuji once, killing seven men.[10] She participated in the action of 13 April, when Tōgō successfully lured out a portion of the Pacific Squadron, including Vice Admiral Stepan Makarov's flagship, the battleship Petropavlovsk. When Makarov spotted the five Japanese battleships, he turned back for Port Arthur, and Petropavlovsk struck a mine laid by the Japanese the previous night. The ship sank in less than two minutes after one of her magazines exploded, and Makarov was one of the 677 killed. When Pobeda was returning to port after Petropavlovsk sank, she struck a mine herself, but was able to steam to the harbor under her own power despite an 11° list.[11] Her repairs were completed on 9 June although some of her guns were removed during this time to reinforce the defenses of the port. Pobeda lost a total of three 6-inch, two 75-millimeter, one 47-millimeter and four 37-millimeter guns.[12] She sailed with the rest of the Russian squadron on 23 June in an abortive attempt to reach Vladivostok. The new fleet commander, Vice Admiral Wilgelm Vitgeft, ordered the squadron to return to Port Arthur when it encountered the Japanese fleet shortly before sunset as he did not wish to engage the numerically superior Japanese in a night battle.[13] Pobeda bombarded Japanese positions besieging the port on 28 July.[10]

The Japanese bombardment of 9 August, coupled with a direct order from Tsar Nicholas II, forced Vitgeft to make another attempt to reach Vladivostok. The squadron sortied in an attempt to escape to Vladivostok the next morning. At 12:25, it was spotted by Japanese cruisers and intercepted by the Combined Fleet in what became the Battle of the Yellow Sea. Pobeda was third in line during the battle,[14] and was not seriously damaged during the early long-range stage of the action. Around 18:00, two 12-inch shells from the battleship Asahi penetrated the conning tower of the Russian flagship Tsesarevich, killing Vitgeft and the helmsman, severely wounding the captain, and causing the ship to come to a dead stop after executing a sharp turn. Thinking that this was a maneuver planned by Vitgeft, the Russian battleline started to execute the same turn, causing all of the ships directly behind Tsesarevich, including Pobeda, to maneuver wildly to avoid hitting the stationary flagship.[15]

As the Japanese ships continued to pound the Tsesarevich, the battleship Retvizan boldly charged Tōgō's battleline in an attempt to divert the Japanese shellfire, followed shortly afterward by Peresvet, the flagship of the squadron's second-in-command, Rear Admiral Prince Pavel Ukhtomsky. The Japanese battleline immediately shifted fire to the oncoming ships, badly damaging both and forcing them to turn away.[15] Ukhtomsky signaled the other Russian ships to follow him back to Port Arthur, but the signal was hard to discern because the flags had to be hung from the bridge railings because Peresvet's topmasts had been shot away; the signal was only gradually recognized.[16] Although Pobeda was struck by eleven large-caliber hits that killed 4 men and wounded 29, including one below the waterline, they failed to penetrate her armor and she reached Port Arthur without any difficulties; the hits did knock out one 10-inch gun and three 75-millimeter guns.[10]

Pobeda (right) and the protected cruiser Pallada sunk in Port Arthur

Returning to Port Arthur on 11 August, the Russian squadron found the city still under siege by the Japanese Third Army led by Baron Nogi Maresuke. The new commander, Rear Admiral Robert N. Viren, decided to use the men and guns of the Pacific Squadron to reinforce the defenses of Port Arthur and even more guns were stripped from the squadron's ships. This proved to make little difference and Pobeda was struck by several 5.9-inch (150 mm) and 4.7-inch shells on 28 September that did no significant damage. The Japanese bombardment with medium guns continued for the next month and a half and the ship was repeatedly struck, without much effect.[10] Japanese troops were able to seize 203 Hill which overlooked the harbor on 5 December. This allowed the Imperial Japanese Army's 28-centimeter (11 in) siege guns to fire directly at the Russian ships; they hit Pobeda approximately 30 times and sank her in shallow water on 7 December 1904.[17] Russian attempts to destroy the ship before they surrendered were frustrated because her vital parts were already underwater.[10]