Having decided to build the large and expensive 40kn destroyer leaders, the Soviet Navy sought Italian assistance in designing smaller and cheaper destroyers. They licensed the plans for the and, in modifying it for their purposes, made a marginally stable design top heavy.[1]
The Gnevnys had an overall length of 112.8m (370.1feet), a beam of 10.2m (33.5feet), and a draft of 4.8m (15.7feet) at deep load. The ships were significantly overweight, almost 2000NaN0 heavier than designed, displacing 1612MT at standard load and 2039MT at deep load. Their crew numbered 197 officers and sailors in peacetime and 236 in wartime.[2] The ships had a pair of geared steam turbines, each driving one propeller, rated to produce 48000shp using steam from three water-tube boilers which was intended to give them a maximum speed of .[3] The designers had been conservative in rating the turbines and many, but not all, of the ships handily exceeded their designed speed during their sea trials. Others fell considerably short of it. Gnevny reached from during her trials. Variations in fuel oil capacity meant that the range of the Gnevnys varied between 1670nmi3145nmi at . Gnevny herself demonstrated a range of 2720nmi at that speed.[4]
As built, the Gnevny-class ships mounted four 130adj=onNaNadj=on B-13 guns in two pairs of superfiring single mounts fore and aft of the superstructure. Anti-aircraft defense was provided by a pair of 76.2sp=usNaNsp=us 34-K AA guns in single mounts and a pair of 45mm 21-K AA guns[5] as well as two 12.7mm DK or DShK machine guns. They carried six torpedo tubes in two rotating triple mounts amidships; each tube was provided with a reload. The ships could also carry a maximum of either 60 or 95 mines and 25 depth charges. They were fitted with a set of Mars hydrophones for anti-submarine work, although they were useless at speeds over .[6] The ships were equipped with two K-1 paravanes intended to destroy mines and a pair of depth-charge throwers.[7]
Built in Leningrad's Shipyard No. 190 (Zhdanov) with the yard number 501, Gnevny was laid down on 8 December 1935, launched on 13 July 1936, and entered service with the Baltic Fleet on 23 December 1938. She bombarded Finnish fortifications on Utö in Åland on 14 December 1939 during the Winter War. On 23 June 1941, a day after Operation Barbarossa began, Gnevny was tasked with covering minelaying operations at the mouth of the Gulf of Finland along with the rest of the 1st Division of the Baltic Fleet's Light Forces Detachment – the light cruiser and her sisters and . She ran into a German minefield 16to northwest of Tahkuna Lighthouse and had her bow blown off by a mine,[8] killing 20 men and wounding 23 others.[9] Her crew, ordered to abandon ship after the commander of the force received a report of periscopes, was taken aboard Gordy. The accompanying ships unsuccessfully attempted to sink Gnevny with gunfire. Two days later, the abandoned hulk was spotted by three German Junkers Ju 88 bombers, who bombed and sank her. The destroyer was removed from the Navy List on 27 July.[10]