THE BOMBARDMENT.
On the 17th of October the dreadful work began, and no one then present will ever forget that memorable scene. The morning dawned slowly; a thick fog hung over the town, and spread far up the heights. Towards six o’clock the mist began to disperse, and the rich clear October sun every instant made objects more and more visible.
In the Allied lines, all the artillerymen were at their pieces, and as the iron muzzles of the guns became visible through the fog in the now unmasked embrasures, a scattering and fast-increasing fire was opened upon them from the Russian lines. Soon the Russian works, crowded with grey figures, could be seen below, with, in rear, the large handsome white houses and dockyards of Sebastopol itself. Slowly, like the drawing back of a huge curtain, the mist moved off seaward, a cool morning breeze sprang up, and the atmosphere became clear and bright.
Around were the wide-extending lines of the besiegers, sloping down from the elevated ridges held by the British to the low grounds on the coast occupied by the French. Facing them below was the continuous line of Russian intrenchments of earthwork, interspersed with redoubts and stone towers, and loop-holed walls, with the line-of-battle ships showing their heavy broadsides in the harbor; and beyond all, the open sea, bearing on its bosom, like a dark belt, the immense armada of the Allied fleet.
At half-past six, the preconcerted signal of three shells went up, one after another, from a French battery, and the next instant the whole Allied batteries opened simultaneously. On the side of the British, seventy-three, and of the French, fifty-three, in all one hundred and twenty-six guns, one-half of which were of the very heaviest calibre, launched their thunders on the side of the Allies; while upwards of two hundred replied in one deafening roar from the Russian lines. Two long lines of belching flame and smoke appeared, and through the space between hurtled a shower of shot and shell, while the earth shook with the thunders of the deadly volleys.
Distinctly amidst the din could be heard the immense Lancaster guns, which here, for the first time, gave evidence of their tremendous powers. Their sharp report, heard among the other heavy guns, was like the crack of a rifle among muskets. But the most singular thing was the sound of their ball, which rushed through the air with the noise and regular beat precisely like the passage of a rapid railway train at close distance—a peculiarity which, at first, excited shouts of laughter from the men, who nicknamed it the express-train. The effect of the shot was terrific; from its deafening and peculiar noise, the ball could be distinctly traced by the ear to the spot where it struck, when stone or earth were seen to go down before it.
The first few minutes’ firing sufficed to show to each side, what neither had as yet accurately known, the actual strength of its opponents; and it now appeared, that even in the extent of the earthwork batteries thrown up since the siege began, the Russians immensely surpassed their besiegers. Besides their stone forts, and a long line of intrenchments, guns of heavy calibre had been planted on every ridge and height; and as fresh batteries were unmasked one after another, often in places totally unexpected, the Allied generals were completely taken by surprise at the magnitude of the defences.
Opposite to the French lines, the main strength of the Russians lay in the Flag-staff batteries, erected upon a hill commanding the French works. They consisted of two tiers of intrenchments, each mounting about twenty-five guns, the upper of which tier of cannon was unknown to the besiegers until it opened fire; with several large mortars placed on the summit of the hill. And on the extreme right of the Russian lines was a ten-gun battery, most commandingly placed, so as to enfilade the French lines.
In this quarter the Russians had not only a great advantage in point of position, but also their guns outnumbered those of the French, and it soon became evident that the French were fighting at a disadvantage, and were dreadfully galled in flank by the ten-gun battery.
Suddenly, a little after nine o’clock, there came a loud explosion,—a dense cloud of smoke was seen hanging over one of the French batteries, and the Russians were observed on the parapets of their works cheering vigorously. The flank fire of the ten-gun battery had blown up one of the French magazines, killing or wounding about fifty men, and blowing the earthwork to atoms.
The British batteries were more successful. The principal works opposed to them were on their right front, the Round fort, a Martello tower, which had been faced up with earth. A battery of twenty heavy guns was planted on the top of this tower, and exterior earthwork intrenchments had been thrown up around it, mounted with artillery of heavy calibre.
Next, nearly opposite the British centre, was the three-decker, the Twelve Apostles, placed across the harbor creek; and facing their left was the Redan redoubt, carrying about forty cannon, likewise surrounded by intrenchments armed with numerous guns. On the British side, the principal redoubts were, the Crown battery, of 27 guns, in the centre, fronting the Twelve Apostles, and the Green-Mound battery, opposite the Redan redoubt.
At half-past three, a red-hot shot from the Russian three-decker, the Twelve Apostles, struck a powder wagon in the Crown battery, which exploded, killing one or two men, but leaving the works of the battery uninjured. The Russians cheered as before, imagining the same injury had been done, as previously to the French.
But while they were still cheering, a shell from the Green Mound battery lodged in the powder magazine of the Redan redoubt, and blew it up with a tremendous explosion. A white livid flame suddenly shot high into the air, followed by a report that made the very earth tremble in the Allied lines, and the next minute its garrison of hundreds, blown to atoms, were discovered strewing the ground to a distance around. “In the midst of a dense volume of smoke and sparks,” says an eye-witness, “which resembled a water-spout ascending to the clouds, were visible to the naked eye, arms, legs, trunks, and heads, of the Russian warriors, mingled with cannons, wheels, and every object of military warfare, and, indeed, every living thing it contained.” So powerful was the effect which this explosion produced on the morale of the besiegers, which had been somewhat depressed by the misfortunes of the day, that the enthusiasm displayed was almost of a frantic nature. Both the English and French troops, as well as officers, doffed their caps, and threw them high into the air, at the same time giving a shout which might have been heard at Balaklava, a league off. The Russians, however, were nowise daunted, and resumed their fire with undiminished energy.
While this terrific cannonade was going on by land, the Allied fleets were seen bearing down upon the strong forts which defend the mouth of the harbor. It had been arranged between the Admirals and Generals, that as soon as the attention of the Russians had been attracted to the landward attack, the fleets should move forward and take part in a general assault. The French took the Quarantine fort, and other works on the south side of the entrance to Sebastopol bay, and the British took Fort Constantine and the works on the north side.
By half-past one o’clock, the action was fairly commenced, and the conjoined roar from the guns of the fleet and in the forts, echoed by the thunders of the rival batteries on shore, baffled the imagination. Never before in the world’s history was such a cannonade witnessed—even the tremendous cannonade of Leipsic and Trafalgar fades into insignificance before so gigantic a strife. The fleets advanced to the attack in two lines—the British from the north, the French from the south.
Directly the vessels came within 2,000 yards, the forts opened fire, which the Allies never attempted to reply to until they took up their positions. The cannonade of the French was terrific and continuous; enveloped in smoke, they kept up whole salvoes, which was terrific, the smoke being lit up by the volleys of flashes, and the roar of cannon continuous. The Turks followed the French in this, sometimes in whole broadsides, again their fire running continuously along the line. There was less of this with the English ships, whose style of firing appeared less awful, but more business-like. The Russians used red-hot shot, rockets, combustible shell, and bar-shot; and the terrible effects of these soon made themselves apparent. The bar-shot cut the masts, spars, and rigging to pieces, and the rockets and red-hot shot raised conflagrations in many of the attacking vessels.
The allied vessels met with but little success, and towards night stood out to sea, the Russians cheering vociferously, and redoubling their fire.
Such were the incidents of this memorable opening day of the bombardment.
On the 18th, the fleet did not renew the attack; and as the French batteries were wholly silenced for the time, the enemy were enabled to concentrate a terrific fire upon the British trenches. During the previous day’s firing, the Russians had discovered the weak points of their opponents, as well as their own, and before morning, had erected, with sand-bags, batteries on new and commanding positions.
During the night of the 18th, the French worked incessantly, repaired all their batteries, and again opened fire on the morning of the 19th. Still they were unfortunate. About eleven o’clock a shell from the Russian ten-gun battery once more blew up one of their magazines, killing most of the men in the battery, and dismounting most of the guns; thus most of the French works were again silenced before two o’clock.
The British lines kept up a hot fire throughout the whole day; but though at times nearly one hundred shot and shell were thrown per minute, little or no effect was produced upon the Russian intrenchments. The enemy were provided with a perfectly inexhaustible supply of all the material requisite for a desperate defence. The instant a shot or shell struck their works the hole was filled up with sand-bags; so that the besieged built up as fast as the besiegers knocked down.
The French had repaired their injuries during the night, and resumed their fire; but they were still terribly overmatched; and, for the third time, one of their magazines was blown up, doing much damage.
During the following night the French not only repaired their works, but in order to fire with more destructive effect, advanced one strong battery about two hundred yards nearer the enemy. This new advanced battery not only enabled them to maintain their ground, but even to destroy and silence their inveterate assailant, the Russian ten-gun battery.
During the 22d the cannonade from the French lines was incessant, and told with great effect; but early in the day the British batteries received orders to fire only once in eight minutes—occasioned by a deficiency of ammunition. The Russians worked their guns with great energy and precision, even under the hottest fire, standing to their pieces as boldly as on the first day of the siege; and they continued to repair each night the injury done to their works in the previous day. The loss of the Allies up to this point of the siege was about twelve hundred men.
One feature in the memorable siege was the great use made of riflemen by the besieging force, and the extreme gallantry displayed by these men when at work.
Every day parties of skirmishers went out from the Allied lines, and lay under cover among the loose large stones about one thousand yards in advance of the batteries, and within two hundred yards of the Russian defences.
This compelled the enemy to send out parties to dislodge them, and these, as they advanced for that purpose across the open ground, became exposed to the fire both of the skirmishers and of the trenches, and usually suffered severely.
On one occasion a private in the British lines who had fired his last cartridge, was crouching along the ground to join the nearest covering-party, when two Russians suddenly sprang from behind a rock, and seizing him by the collar, dragged him off towards Sebastopol.
The Russian who escorted him on the left side held in his right hand his own firelock, and in his left the captured Minié; with a sudden spring the British soldier seized the Russian’s firelock, shot its owner, clubbed his companion, and then, picking up his own Minié, made off in safety to his own lines. Another of these fellows resolved to do more work on his own account, got away from his company, and crawled up close to a battery under shelter of a bridge. There he lay on his back, and loaded, turning over to fire; until, after killing eleven men, a party of Russians rushed out and he took to his heels; but a volley fired after him levelled him with the earth, and his body was subsequently picked up by his comrades riddled with balls.
Probably 100,000 shot and shell a-day, exclusive of night-firing, was the average amount of projectiles discharged by both parties in the extraordinary siege.
The darkness of night was constantly interrupted by the bursting of shell or rockets.
The passage of the shells through the air, thrown to an amazing height from the mortars, appeared like that of meteors. To the eye, the shell seems to rise and fall almost perpendicularly; sometimes burning, as it turns on its axis, and the fuse disappears in the rotation, with an interrupted pale light; sometimes with a steady light, not unlike the calm luminosity of a planet. As it travels it can be heard, amid the general stillness, uttering in the distance its peculiar sound, like the cry of the curlew. The blue light in a battery announces the starting of a rocket, which pursues its more horizontal course, followed by a fiery train, and rushes through the air with a loud whizzing noise that gives an idea of irresistible energy. So went on, day and night, ceaselessly, this unparalleled bombardment—a cataract of war, a Niagara of all dread sounds, whose ceaseless booming was heard for long miles around. Ship after ship, nearing the Crimean shores, heard from afar that dull, heavy sound, and all eyes were strained to catch sight of the dread scene, of that valley where the battle of Europe was being fought, where the cannon were ever sounding, and “the fire was not quenched.”