Icebreaker Lenin, built at Newcastle upon Tyne

Newcastle upon Tyne

Newcastle upon Tyne is a city and metropolitan borough of Tyne and Wear, in North East England. Historically a part of Northumberland, it is situated on the north bank of the River Tyne...

 and completed in June 1917, was the largest Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n icebreaker

Icebreaker

An icebreaker is a special-purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice-covered waters. Although the term usually refers to ice-breaking ships, it may also refer to smaller vessels .For a ship to be considered an icebreaker, it requires three traits most...

 of her time. Her design was supervised by Russian naval architect and author Yevgeny Zamyatin

Yevgeny Zamyatin

Yevgeny Ivanovich Zamyatin was a Russian author of science fiction and political satire. Despite having been a prominent Old Bolshevik, Zamyatin was deeply disturbed by the policies pursued by the CPSU following the October Revolution...

. This icebreaker was named St. Alexander Nevsky when it came out of the docks after Russian statesman and military hero Alexander Nevsky

Alexander Nevsky

Alexander Nevsky was the Prince of Novgorod and Grand Prince of Vladimir during some of the most trying times in the city's history. Commonly regarded as the key figure of medieval Rus, Alexander was the grandson of Vsevolod the Big Nest and rose to legendary status on account of his military...

.

Following the Russian Revolution of 1917 the icebreaker St. Alexander Nevsky was renamed icebreaker Lenin, after the leader of the Bolsheviks Vladimir Ilich Ulianov "Lenin".

The Norwegian

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

 sailor and Arctic explorer Otto Sverdrup

Otto Sverdrup

Otto Neumann Knoph Sverdrup was a Norwegian sailor and Arctic explorer.-Early and personal life:...

’s fourth and last expedition in Arctic Siberian waters in 1921 was with the Icebreaker Lenin when, from the bridge of it, he commanded a convoy of five cargo ships on an experimental run through the Kara Sea

Kara Sea

The Kara Sea is part of the Arctic Ocean north of Siberia. It is separated from the Barents Sea to the west by the Kara Strait and Novaya Zemlya, and the Laptev Sea to the east by the Severnaya Zemlya....

 to the mouths of the Ob

Ob River

The Ob River , also Obi, is a major river in western Siberia, Russia and is the world's seventh longest river. It is the westernmost of the three great Siberian rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean .The Gulf of Ob is the world's longest estuary.-Names:The Ob is known to the Khanty people as the...

 and Yenisei. The ships reached their destinations and returned safely. This was considered an important step in the development of the Kara Sea sector of the Northern Sea Route

Northern Sea Route

The Northern Sea Route is a shipping lane officially defined by Russian legislation from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean specifically running along the Russian Arctic coast from Murmansk on the Barents Sea, along Siberia, to the Bering Strait and Far East. The entire route lies in Arctic...

.

In 1937 icebreaker Lenin was trapped in ice. She and her convoy of five ships spent an enforced winter in the Laptev Sea

Laptev Sea

The Laptev Sea is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is located between the northern coast of Siberia, the Taimyr Peninsula, Severnaya Zemlya and the New Siberian Islands. Its northern boundary passes from the Arctic Cape to a point with co-ordinates of 79°N and 139°E, and ends at the Anisiy...

. They were finally rescued by icebreaker Krasin

Krasin (1916 icebreaker)

The first icebreaker Krasin was built for the Imperial Russian Navy as Svyatogor. She had a long, distinguished career in rescue operations, as well as a pathfinder and explorer of the Northern Sea Route...

 in August 1938.

During World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 the Lenin took part in Russian convoys in the Arctic. In 1942 the Lenin was spotted at the Mona Islands

Mona Islands

The Mona Islands is a group of a few scattered small islands covered with tundra vegetation. They are located in the Kara Sea, about 30 km north of the western coast of the Taymyr Peninsula in Siberia, Russia....

 in the Kara Sea by a Kriegsmarine

Kriegsmarine

The Kriegsmarine was the name of the German Navy during the Nazi regime . It superseded the Kaiserliche Marine of World War I and the post-war Reichsmarine. The Kriegsmarine was one of three official branches of the Wehrmacht, the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany.The Kriegsmarine grew rapidly...

 plane during Operation Wunderland

Operation Wunderland

Operation Wunderland was a large-scale operation undertaken in summer 1942 by the Kriegsmarine during World War II in the waters of the Northern Sea Route close to the Arctic Ocean...

. The heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer rushed to find it, but bad weather, fog, and ice saved icebreaker Lenin from destruction.

The Lenin continued in service during the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

, but in 1960, when a newly-built nuclear-powered icebreaker was also named Lenin, it was renamed "Vladimir Ilich".

In popular fiction

In his dystopian novel We

We (novel)

We is a dystopian novel by Yevgeny Zamyatin completed in 1921. It was written in response to the author's personal experiences during the Russian revolution of 1905, the Russian revolution of 1917, his life in the Newcastle suburb of Jesmond, and his work in the Tyne shipyards during the First...

, Zamyatin refers to the specifications of St. Alexander Nevsky in the names of some of his characters.