The Memoirs of Admiral Lord Beresford

by Baron Charles William De la Poer Beresford Beresford

Shortly afterwards, as I was now a captain, I was relieved of the command of the Condor by Commander Jeffreys, and went on half-pay. I should naturally have much preferred to remain in my little ship; but she was not a captain's command; and I left her (as I see I wrote at the time) with a tear in each eye. Commander Jeffreys discovered the place where she had been hit during the bombardment, one of her under-water plates having been started. Until then, it was thought that the only damage consisted of a hole through her awning and the smashing of a boat.

At the conclusion of this period of my service, I was most gratified to receive a gracious message of congratulation from Her Majesty the Queen.

H.H. the Khedive wrote to me, kindly expressing his sense of my services, and at the same time offering me an appointment upon his staff, in which capacity I was to go to the front. Lord Granville and the Admiralty having signified their permission that I should accept the post, I left Alexandria for Ismailia, together with several members of the Khedival staff.

We went by steamer, which towed a huge iron lighter carrying horses. A beam ran from stem to stern of the lighter, and to it the horses were tethered with halters. I remarked to the captain of the steamer that it would be advisable, in order to avoid injuring the lighter, to take every precaution to prevent the steamer from having to go astern. But in Ismailia Bay, which was crowded with shipping, a vessel crossed the steamer's bows, the steamer was forced to go astern, and she cut a hole in the lighter with her propeller. One of the ship's officers instantly descended the Jacob's ladder into the lighter with me, and we cut the halters of the horses, just in time to free them before the lighter sank, and there we were swimming about among the wild and frightened stallions. By splashing the water into their faces, we turned one or two shorewards, when the rest followed and came safely to land.

Upon discussing the matter of my appointment to the staff of the Khedive with Sir Garnet Wolseley, to my surprise he declined to permit me to accept it. Discipline is discipline, and there was nothing for it but to acquiesce.

I was about packing up my things, when Mr. Cameron, the war correspondent of The Standard, informed me that he was authorised to appoint a correspondent to The New York Herald, and also that he had permission to send the said correspondent to the front, where I particularly desired to go. The notion attracted me. I applied to the military authorities for permission to accept the offer. Permission was, however, refused. So there was nothing to do but to go home. But before starting, I consoled myself by sending some provisions, privately, to the unfortunate officers at the front, who, owing to the substitution by the transport people of tents for food, were short of necessaries. I obtained from the Orient four large boxes filled with potted lobster, salmon, sardines, beef, tins of cocoa, and so forth, and sent one box each to the 1st Life Guards, the Blues, the Guards, and the Royal Marines. The orders were that no private supplies were to go up. These I ventured to disregard; got up bright and early at three o'clock in the morning; and had the boxes stowed under the hay which was being sent up in railway trucks, before officialdom was out of bed. Then I went home.

I consider that Sir Garnet Wolseley's conduct of the campaign, and his brilliant victory at Tel-el-Kebir, were military achievements of a high order. The public, perhaps, incline to estimate the merit of an action with reference to the loss of life incurred, rather than in relation to the skill employed in attaining the object in view. The attack at dawn at Tel-el-Kebir was a daring conception brilliantly carried into execution. Many persons, both at the time and subsequently, have explained how it ought to have been done. But Sir Garnet Wolseley did it.

The public seem to appreciate a big butcher's bill, although it may be caused by stupidity or by lack of foresight on the part of the general. But if he retrieves his mistakes, the public think more of him than of the general who, by the exercise of foresight and knowledge, wins an action with little loss of life.

I carried home with me a 64 lb. shell fired from the Condor at the Mex magazine, intending to present it to the Prince of Wales. I found it in the sand. It had passed right through the walls of the magazine, and it had not exploded. Having brought it on board the Condor, I caused the gunner, Mr. Alexander Greening, to sound it with a copper rod: and he came to the conclusion that it was empty of gunpowder. I therefore thought that it had never been filled. I intended to have it cut in two and a lamp for the Prince made of the pieces, and took it to Nordenfelt's works for the purpose. The foreman, desirous of taking every precaution before cutting it, had it again filled with water and sounded with a copper rod, when it suddenly exploded, blowing off the foot of the workman who held it, and doing other serious damage. The explanation seems to be that the force of the impact when the shell was fired had solidified the powder into a hard mass. But explanation would have little availed had the shell burst in the smoking-room at Sandringham, where a fragment of it remains to this day.