The allied squadron in the Black Sea, after having escorted a Turkish squadron freighted with supplies to Batoum, Trebizonde, and Checkvetil, reconnoitred the Russian fleet in Sebastopol, and returned to the Bosphorus.
England and France having announced to the world their intention of affording to Turkey both moral and material support, but their moral aid having failed to avert the invasion of the Danubian provinces, the massacre of Sinope, or the treachery of Austria, masked as it was under the guise of friendship, it became incumbent on the two Western Powers to abandon at once all further discussion, and to appeal to the stern but inevitable arbitrament of the sword.
The Queen’s declaration of war appeared in the Gazette of the 28th of March: on the preceding day, at Paris, the Minister of State read to the Legislative corps a message from the Emperor, announcing “that the last resolution of the Cabinet of St. Petersburg had placed Russia in a state of war with respect to France—a war, the responsibility of which belonged entirely to the Russian Government.”
Great now was the activity displayed at the naval port, and arsenals of England and France. From Portsmouth and Southampton regiment after regiment were embarked—ships were commissioned faster almost than they could be got ready for sea—and additional reinforcements were despatched in all haste to Sir Charles Napier’s magnificent Baltic fleet, which sailed from Spithead on the 11th of March.
[CHAPTER XII.]
TREATY OF ALLIANCE.
The Five Articles of the Treaty—War on the Danube—General Luders—The Pestilence—Decree of the Czar—Governor of Moscow—Loss of the Frigate Tiger—Captain Gifford—Black Sea Fleet—Duke of Cambridge—Arrival at Varna—Captain Hall—Admiral Plumridge—General Bodisco—Silistria—The Siege—Mussa Pacha—Evacuation of the Principalities by the Russians.
On the 12th of March, 1854, the treaty of alliance between England, France, and the Porte, was signed by the representatives of those powers.