The British Expedition to the Crimea

by Sir William Howard Russell

AT two o'clock P.M. on Wednesday, the 2nd of April, proclamation of peace was made to the Allied armies by salutes of 101 guns, fired by the field batteries of the Light and Second Divisions, from the heights over the plain of Balaklava; by the French batteries at the Quartier Générale; by the Sardinian redoubts at Fedukhine; and by the men-of-war at Kamiesch and Kazatch; but an early General Order and a very widely-spread rumour had diffused the intelligence among officers and men long before the cannon exultingly announced it by their thundering voices.

The news was known at Balaklava by eight o'clock A.M., and the Leander, Captain Rice, bearing the flag of Admiral Fremantle, "dressed," and the merchant shipping followed her example, by order, so that the harbour presented a gayer scene than human eye ever witnessed since it was first discovered by some most investigating, shore-hugging, and fissure-pursuing navigator. It was a fine day—at least it appeared so by contrast with its recent predecessors,—and the effect of the firing from so many points, all of which were visible from the heights of the plateau near the Woronzoff Road, was very fine. The enemy saw the smoke and heard the roar of our guns, but they maintained a stern and gloomy silence. One would have thought that they, above all, would have shown some signs of satisfaction at the peace which they sought, and which they had made such sacrifices to obtain, while no one would have wondered if the batteries of the English and Sardinians expressed no opinion on the subject. However, there was not a Russian shot fired or flag hoisted from Fort Constantine to Mackenzie, nor, although we had ceased to be enemies, did any increase in our intimacy take place.

The preparations for the evacuation of the Crimea were now pressed on with rapidity and energy. Each division collected about 4,000 shot a-day from the iron-studded ravines and grounds in front of our camp, and they were carried to Balaklava as fast as the means at our disposal—railway and land transport—permitted. Our soldiers were about to leave the scene of their sufferings and of their glory. Alas! how many of those who landed lie there till the judgment-day! Who can tell how many lives were wasted which ought to have been saved to the country, to friends, to an honoured old age? These questions may never be answered, least of all were they answered at Chelsea Hospital. Heaven lets loose all its plagues on those who delight in war, and on those who shed men's blood, even in the holiest causes. The pestilence by day and night, deadly fever, cholera, dysentery, strategical errors, incompetence and apathy of chieftains, culpable inactivity, fatal audacity—all these follow in the train of armies, and kill more than bullet or sword. But war has its rules. The bloody profession by the skilful exercise of which liberty is achieved or crushed—by which States are saved or annihilated, has certain fixed principles for its guidance; and the homœopathic practitioner in the art, the quack, the charlatan, or the noble amateur, will soon be detected and overwhelmed in the horrors of defeat and ruin. Perhaps on no occasion was the neglect of the course of regular practice so severely punished, even although in the end the object was gained, as in the siege of Sebastopol.

RETROSPECT.

Every statement made by the Russian officers in conversation with us concurred in this—that we might have taken Sebastopol in September, 1854; that they were not only prepared to abandon the city to its fate, but that they regarded it as untenable and incapable of defence, and had some doubts of their position in the Crimea itself, till our inaction gave Menschikoff courage, and raised in him hopes of an honourable defence, which might enable him to hold us in check, or to expose us to the attack of overwhelming masses. They admitted that their great error was the assumption of a simply defensive attitude after the battle of Inkerman, and they felt that they ought to have renewed the attack upon our enfeebled army, notwithstanding the terrible loss they suffered in that memorable action. It might have been mere military fanfaronade on their part to put forward such an assertion, but the Russians one and all declared they could have retaken the Malakoff under the fire of their ships, but it had been clearly demonstrated since the fire opened on September the 5th, that it would be impossible to hold the south side under the increasing weight and proximity of the bombardment. "It was a veritable butchery, which demoralized our men so far as to make them doubt the chances of continuing the struggle. We lost 3,000 a-day. No part of the city was safe, except the actual bombproofs in the batteries. We were content to have beaten the English at the Redan, to have repulsed the French at the Bastion of Careening Bay (the Little Redan), the Gervais Battery, and the Bastion Centrale and to leave them the credit of surprising the Malakoff; but, even had we held it, we must soon have retired to the north side, and we had been preparing for that contingency for some days."

The battle of the Alma had produced such an effect that there seemed to be no chance of offering resistance to the Allies, and the fall of Sebastopol was regarded as certain. The Russians, however, meditated a great revenge, and, knowing the weakness of our army, and that it could not hold the heights and storm the town at the same time, they intended to take the very plateau on which we were encamped, to fall on our troops while we were disorganized by our success, and get them between the fire of the Russian shipping, of the northern forts, and of the field artillery outside the place. At first they could not understand the flank march to Balaklava, except as a manœuvre to escape the fire of the north forts, and to get at the weak side of the city, and for three or four days they waited, uncertain what to do, until they learned we were preparing for a siege. It was then—that is, about five days after we appeared before the place—that they commenced the work. Men, women, and children laboured at them with zeal, and for the first time a hope was entertained of saving Sebastopol, or of maintaining the defence till the corps d'armée destined for its relief could march down to raise the siege.

It was the first instance on record of such a place having been taken by the mere fire of artillery; for it was admitted by the Russians that even if the assault on the Malakoff had been repelled, they must have abandoned a position exposed at every nook and chink and cranny to such a fire that the very heavens seemed to rain shot and shell upon them. We lost an army in establishing that fire, and we did not (notwithstanding the honeyed words of Lord Palmerston, every soldier of the Crimea feels what I say is the truth)—we did not add to our reputation—nay, we did not sustain it—in the attacks of the 18th of June and the 8th of September. And will it be said that because the particulars of those conflicts have been made known to the world, and because the daring, the devotion, the gallantry, the heroism of our officers and men have been displayed before its eyes, that the English nation has lost its military prestige? Would it have been possible to have concealed and slurred over our failures? Would it have been better to have let the story be told in Russian despatches, in French Moniteurs, in English Gazettes! No; the very dead on Cathcart's Hill would be wronged as they lay mute in their bloody shrouds, and calumny and falsehood would insult that warrior race, which is not less Roman because it has known a Trebia and a Thrasymene. We all felt well assured that it was no fault of our officers that we did not take the Redan. We could point to the trenches piled deep with our gallant allies before the Careening Bay and the Central Bastion, and turn to the Malakoff, won without the loss of 200 men, and then invoke the goddess Fortune! Alas! She does not always favour the daring; she leaves them sometimes lifeless at the blood-stained embrasure, before the shattered traverse, in the deadly ditch and she demands, as hostages for the bestowal of her favours, skill and prudence, as well as audacity and courage.

There was a song on the incidents of the war very popular in the Russian camp, in which Prince Menschikoff was exposed to some ridicule, and the Allies to severe sarcasm. Menschikoff was described as looking out of the window of a house in Bakshiserai, and inquiring for news from Sebastopol; courier after courier arrives and says, "Oh! Sebastopol is safe."—"And what are the Allies doing? "—"Oh! they are breaking down the houses of Balaklava and eating grapes." The same news for a day or two. At last a courier tell him the Allies are cutting twigs in the valleys, and that they are digging great furrows three-quarters of a mile from the place. "I declare they are going to besiege it," says he; "and, if so, I must defend it." And so he sends for his engineers. They at first think the Allies, misled by ancient traditions about the mines, must be digging for gold; but at last they make a reconnaissance, and, finding that the Allies are really making approaches, they say, "Why, we shall have time to throw up works, too;" and so they draw up their plans, and Todleben says, "Give me five days, and I'll mount three guns for their two;" and Menschikoff dances and sings, "Ha, ha! I've saved Sebastopol!" The Russians were astonished at their own success; above all, they were surprised at the supineness and want of vigilance among the Allies. They told stories of stealing upon our sentries and carrying them off, and of rushing at night into our trenches, and finding the men asleep in their blankets; they recounted with great glee the capture of a sergeant and five men in daylight, all sound in slumber (poor wretches, ill-fed, ill-clad, and worked beyond the endurance of human nature!) in one of the ravines towards Inkerman.

AFTER THE WAR.

Among many stories of the kind which I heard, one is remarkable. When the attack on Inkerman was projected, it was arranged that one strong column, having crossed the bridge of the Tchernaya, near the head of the harbour, should march along the road which winds up above the Quarries ravine, and which leads right upon the ground then occupied by Evans's Division; but this was conceived to be the most daring part of the enterprise, "as no doubt, strong pickets would be posted on that road, and guns commanding the bridge, or raking the road, would be placed behind the scarps, and these guns would have to be taken, and the pickets and their supports driven in. Judge of our astonishment when we found no scarps at all, and not a single gun on this point! Our General cried, as he gained the level of the plateau without a shot being fired, 'We have them—Sebastopol is saved!' The bridge over the Tchernaya was not repaired for the passage of men and guns till past five o'clock in the morning of the 5th, and the men did not begin till after dark on the preceding evening."