Exhibition for the anniversary of the Russian sailor shirt
The exhibition displays the oldest English sailor shirt from the Central Naval Museum collection, the sailor shirt that once belonged to the historical and naval novelist Valentin Pikul and other exhibits, including painted portraits displaying the heroes of the Revolution in their naval glory.
The Central Naval Museum that once introduced the initiative for celebrating the Naval shirt day in St. Petersburg gathered a rich experience in 2014-2016 in arranging this festival that was, first of all, an exhibition project for the museum. Each Naval shirt day in the Central Naval Museum was accompanied by an original exhibition.
In 2014 it was a story about the way how the naval shirt appeared in the Russian navy, and in 2015 the museum displayed the naval shirts from the period of the Great Patriotic War that used to belong to the heroes of the fleet. Last year the exhibition was dedicated to the naval shirts from the Warsaw treaty countries.
The current exhibition will display the naval shirts of the Revolution and will be dedicated to the events of 1917 that have a hundred year anniversary this year. The visitors of the museum will have the rare opportunity to see historical naval shirts and the portraits of the people who took part in the revolution of 1917, together with a number of other exhibits that used to belong to the seamen of the Revolution from the Central Naval Museum collection.
On the 19th of August (the 1st of September according to the new style) 1874 the Great Prince Admiral General Konstantin Nikolaevich signed Order No. 115 approved by the Emperor Alexander II, according to which the undershirt (naval shirt) of the approved type became an obligatory part of the seaman's uniform in the Russian navy. This is the moment that marked the appearance of the naval shirt in the Russian and later in the Soviet navy.