ABSTRACT
The two towns Murmansk and Archangel on the White Sea had come into considerable prominence during the World War, since they were the chief entry-ports for the large quantities of munitions and supplies that Great Britain was despatching to Imperial Russia to aid her war effort. The emergence of Murmansk as a port can be attributed to the vagaries of the Gulf Stream, which freakishly keeps the Kola inlet, on which Murmansk is situated, free from ice all the year round. From Murmansk a railway had been built that connected up with the Trans-Siberian trunk line, and thus provided for the transport to St Petersburg of cargoes docked in the north. The railway was constructed largely as a result of British initiative and persistence. But it was not the British, but the Reds, who stood to profit by the stockpile of matériel that had built up in both ports in February 1918.
