ABSTRACT
In 1854, Britain and France declared war on Russia. The Crimean War would be primarily a maritime conflict. Allied naval and amphibious forces attacked Russia in the Baltic, the Pacific, the Black Sea, and the White Sea. The last, the most peripheral campaign of a war fought on Russia’s maritime margins, achieved significant strategic effect at minimal cost with intelligence-led operations that exploited British technological superiority. The weather on the Murman Peninsula and in the White Sea was harsh, with the White Sea freezing solid every winter. Archangel was the main trading center, with Onega the only other White Sea port of consequence. Kola, the provincial capital on the Murman coast, was also fortified, but the region remained thinly populated. In the mid-nineteenth century, exports from Archangel and Onega were expanding, but most capital came from Britain and Scandinavia.1
