Under the Red Dragon: A Novel

by James Grant

Knapsacks were generally thrown aside, and the muskets of the pickets were in some instances so wet by overnight exposure, that they failed to explode, so others taken from the dead and wounded were substituted for them. There was firing fast and furious on every hand; the musketry flashing like red streaks through the gray gloom, towards the head of the beautiful valley of Inkermann, even before our regiment was formed and moved forward to the support of the pickets, who were retreating towards a small two-gun battery which had been erected, but afterwards abandoned during the progress of the siege. The great Russian cannon now opened like thunder from those hills which had been reached unseen by us, and then began one of the closest, because confused, most ferocious, and bloody conflicts of modern times. The Russian has certainly that peculiar quality of race, "which is superior to the common fighting courage possessed indiscriminately by all classes--the passive concentrated firmness which can take every advantage so long as a chance is left, and die without a word at last, when hope gives place to the sullen resignation of despair."

Descriptions of battles bear a strong family likeness, and the history of one can only be written, even by a participant, long after it is all over, and after notes are compared on all sides; so to the subaltern, or any one under the rank of a general, during its progress, it is all vile hurly-burly and confusion worse confounded; and never in the annals of war was this more the case than at Inkermann. Though hidden by mist at the time, the scene of this contest was both picturesque and beautiful. In the foreground, a romantic old bridge spanned the sluggish Tchernaya, which winds from the Baidar valley through the most luxurious verdure, and thence into the harbour of Sebastopol between precipitous white cliffs, which are literally honeycombed with chapels and cells: thus Inkermann is well named the "City of the Caverns." These are supposed to have been executed by Greek monks during the reigns of the emperors in the middle ages, and when the Arians were persecuted in the Chersonesus, many of them found shelter in these singular and all but inaccessible dwellings. Sarcophagi of stone, generally empty, are found in many of the cells, which are connected with each other by stairs cut in the living rock, and of these stairs and holes the skirmishers were not slow to avail themselves. Over all these caverns are the ivied ruins of an ancient fort but whether it was the Ctenos of Chersonesus Taurica, built by Diophantes to guard the Heruclean wall, or was the Theodori of the Greeks, mattered little to us then, as we moved to get under fire beneath its shadow; and now, as if to farther distract the attention of the Allies from the real point of assault--which at first seemed to indicate a movement towards Balaclava--all the batteries of the city opened a fearful cannonade, which tore to shreds the tents in the camp, and did terrible execution on every hand. Louder and louder, deeper and hoarser grew the sounds of strife; yet nothing was seen by us save the red flashes of the musketry, owing to the density of the fog, and the tall brushwood through which we had to move being in some places quite breast-high; and so we struggled forward in line, till suddenly we found the foe within pistol-shot of us, and our men falling fast on every side. Till now, to many in our ranks, who saw these long gray-coated and flat-capped or spike-helmeted masses, the enemy had been a species of myth, read of chiefly in the newspapers; now they were palpable and real, and war, having ceased to be a dream, had become a terrible fact. Vague expectancy had given place to the actual excitement of the hour of battle, the hour when a man would reflect soberly if he could; but when every moment may be his last, little time or chance is given for reflection.

In this quarter were but twelve thousand British, to oppose the mighty force of Osten-Sacken. Upon his advancing masses the brave fellows of the 55th or Westmoreland Foot had kept up a brisk fire from the rude embrasures of the small redoubt, till they were almost surrounded by a force outnumbering them by forty to one, and compelled to fall back, while the batteries on the hills swept their ranks with an iron shower. But now the 41st Welsh, and 49th or Hertfordshire, came into action, with their white-and-green colours waving, and storming up the hill bore back the Russian hordes, hundreds of whom--as they were massed in oblong columns--fell beneath the fatal fire of our Minie rifles, and the desperate fury of the steady shoulder-to-shoulder bayonet charge which followed it.

On these two regiments the batteries from the distant slope dealt death and destruction; again the Russians rallied at its foot, and advanced up the corpse-strewn ground to renew an attack before which the two now decimated regiments were compelled to retire. Their number and force were as overwhelming as their courage, inflamed by raki and intense religious fervour, was undeniable; for deep in all their hearts had sunk the closing words of the bishop's prayer: "Bless and strengthen them, O Lord, and give them a manly heart against their enemies. Send them an angel of light, and to their enemies an angel of darkness and horror to scatter them, and place a stumbling-block before them to weaken their hearts, and turn their courage into flight." And for a time the Russians seemed to have it all their own way, and deemed their bishop a prophet. Our whole army was now under arms, but upon our right fell the brunt of the attack, and old Lord Raglan was soon among us, managing his field-glass and charger with one hand and a half-empty sleeve. Under Brigadier-general Strangeways, who was soon after mortally wounded, our artillery, when the mist lifted a little, opened on the Russian batteries, and soon silenced their fire; but the 20th and 47th Lancashire, after making a gallant attempt to recapture the petty redoubt, were repulsed; but not until they had been in possession of it for a few dearly-bought minutes, during which, all wedged together in wild mêlée, the most hideous slaughter took place, with the bayonet and clubbed musket; and the moment they gave way, the inhuman Russians murdered all our wounded men, many of whom were found afterwards cold and stiff, with hands uplifted and horror in their faces, as if they had died in the act of supplication.

Driven from that fatal redoubt at last by the Guards under the Duke of Cambridge, it was held by a few hundred Coldstreamers against at least six thousand of the enemy. Thrice, with wild yells the gray-coated masses, with all their bayonets glittering, swept madly and bravely uphill, and thrice they were hurled back with defeat and slaughter. Fresh troops were now pouring from Sebastopol, flushed with fury by the scene, and in all the confidence that Russia and their cause were alike holy, that defeat was impossible, and the redoubt was surrounded.

Then back to back, pale with fury, their eyes flashing, their teeth set, fearless and resolute, their feet encumbered with the dying and the dead, fought the Coldstream Guardsmen, struggling for very life; the ground a slippery puddle with blood and brains, and again and again the clash of the bayonets was heard as the musket barrels were crossed. Their ammunition was soon expended; but clubbing their weapons they dashed at the enemy with the butt-ends; and hurling even stones at their heads, broke through the dense masses, and leaving at least one thousand Muscovites dead behind them, rejoined their comrades, whom Sir George Cathcart was leading to the advance, when a ball whistled through his heart, and he fell to rise no more.

The combat was quite unequal; our troops began slowly to retire towards their own lines, but fighting every inch of the way and pressed hard by the Russians, who bayonetted or brained by the butt-end every wounded man they found; and by eleven o'clock they were close to the tents of the Second Division.

The rain of bullets sowed thickly all the turf like a leaden shower, and shred away clouds of leaves and twigs from the gorse and other bushes; but long ere the foe had come thus far, we had our share and more in the terrible game. Exchanging fire with them at twenty yards' distance, the roar of the musketry, the shouts and cheers, the yells of defiance or agony, the explosion of shells overhead, the hoarse sound of the round shot, as they tore up the earth in deeper furrows than ever ploughshare formed, made a very hell of Inkermann, that valley of blood and suffering, of death and cruelty; but dense clouds of smoke, replacing the mist, enveloped it for a time, and veiled many of its horrors from the eye.

Bathurst and Sayer, Vane and Millet of ours were all down by this time; many of our men had also fallen; and from the death-clutch or the relaxed fingers of more than one poor ensign had the tattered colour which bore the Red Dragon been taken, by those who were fated to fall under it in turn. I could see nothing of Caradoc; but I heard that three balls had struck the revolver in his belt. Poor Hugh Price fell near me, shot through the chest, and was afterwards found, like many others, with his brains dashed out. In the third repulse of the Russians, as we rushed headlong after them with levelled bayonets, I found myself suddenly opposed by an officer of rank mounted on a gray horse, the flanks and trappings of which were splashed by blood, whether its own or that of the rider, I knew not. Furiously, by every energy, with his voice, which was loud and authoritative, and by brandishing his sword, he was endeavouring to rally his men, a mingled mass of the Vladimir Battalion and the flat-capped Kazan Light Infantry.

"Pot that fellow; down with him!" cried several voices; "maybe he's old Osten-Sacken himself."