Vsevolod Rudnev

Vsevolod Fyodorovich Rudnev (; 31 August 1855 – 20 July 1913) was a career naval officer in the Imperial Russian Navy, noted for his heroic role in the Battle of Chemulpo Bay during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905.

Biography Rudnev was born in Dünamünde, Governorate of Livonia of the Russian Empire (now part of Riga, Latvia), where his father was a naval officer and a hero of the Russo-Turkish War. His ancestors were local nobility from Tula, Russia, one of whom was also a naval officer who had been decorated by Tsar Peter the Great for valor at the Battle of Azov. After the death of his father, the family relocated to Lyuban, near St Petersburg.

Rudnev entered the Sea Cadets on September 15, 1872, on a government scholarship granted in recognition of his father's heroism. He entered active duty as a midshipman on May 1, 1873, and participated in training voyages on the Baltic Sea in 1875. After graduating with honors in 1876, he was appointed to a training frigate Petropavlovsk, reaching the rank of warrant officer. Assigned to the cruiser Afrika on April 16, 1880, he circumnavigated the globe, returning to Russia in 1883. One of his shipmates on this voyage was future Admiral Vasili Fersen.

Rudnev was assigned to patrol vessels on the Baltic from 1885 to 1887, and was assigned to sail Russia's first steam military transport, "Peter the Great", and an unprecedented recognition of an enemy commander. Rudnev accepted the order, but never wore it in public.

Rudnev retired to his family's ancestral estate in Myshenki village (now Zaoksky District, Tula Oblast), where he died in 1913. During the Russian Civil War, his wife and three sons relocated to Sevastopol, and eventually fled to exile in Yugoslavia, and later to France. His older son Nikolay returned with his family to the Soviet Union in 1958 where he lived until his death in 1963. His middle son Georgiy emigrated to Venezuela. The younger son stayed in France. The Soviet government erected a monument to his memory in Tula in 1956.

In philately Rudnev was a noted philatelist, starting as a youth. He used every opportunity on his numerous circumnavigations of the globe to add to his collection. He assembled a large collection, containing many rarities, including the famed "Blue Mauritius". The eventual fate of his collection is unknown.

In the Soviet Union and in post-Soviet Russia, a number of commemorative postage stamps were issued honoring Rudnev and/or the crew of the Varyag, including: 25 March 1958, a USSR postage stamp (TSFA (ITC "Mark"), # 2135), with a drawing of Rudnev by Ivan Dubasov. 22 November 1972, a USSR series of stamps dedicated to the history of the Russian Navy. A stamp with face value of 3 kopecks by artist depicts the cruiser Varyag (TSFA (ITC "Mark") # 4182) . 7 February 2002, a Russian Federation stamped envelope from the series "Russian Navy" depicting the cruiser Varyag.