The British Expedition to the Crimea

by Sir William Howard Russell

The road which the French were making for the English from Kadikoi, by the Cavalry Camp, towards the front progressed, but not rapidly. The weather was so changeable, and was in every change so unfavourable for work, that it was hard to expect our allies to labour for us with their usual energy. However, they did work. They built huts for our officers, when paid for it, with much activity, and their aid in that way was invaluable. Some of the warm coats sent out for the officers were much too small, and I heard a pathetic story from a stout Highlander respecting the defeat of his exertions to get into his much-longed-for and much-wanted garment.

There was only one officer in the whole regiment that the largest of the great coats fitted, and he was certainly not remarkable for bulk or stature. The men were far more lucky, and their coats were of the most liberal dimensions, however eccentric in cut and device they might be.

As the Ambulance Corps were quite hors de combat in weather of this kind—as the men and horses were nearly all gone or unfit for duty, our sick were subjected to much misery in going from the camp to be put on board ship. But for the kindness of the French in lending us their excellent mule-litters, many of our poor fellows would have died in their tents. Captain Grant, at the head of the Ambulance Corps, was a most excellent, intelligent, and active officer, but he had no materials to work with, and this was no place for intelligence and activity to work miracles in. Experience had taught our allies that the mule-litter was the best possible conveyance for a sick or wounded man. A movable jointed frame of iron, with a canvass stretcher, was suspended from a light pack saddle at each side of a mule. If the sick or wounded man was able to sit up, by raising the head of the litter, a support was afforded to his back. If he wished his legs to hang down, the frame was adjusted accordingly, and he rode as if he were in an arm-chair suspended by the side of a mule. When the invalid wished to lie down, he had a long and comfortable couch—comfortable in so far as the pace of a mule was easier than the jog of an ambulance, and he was not crowded with others like hens in a coop. These mules travelled where ambulance carts could not stir; they required no roads nor beaten tracks, and they were readily moved about in the rear when an action was going on.

It was right that England should be made aware of the privations which her soldiers endured in this great winter campaign, that she might reward with her greenest laurels those gallant hearts, who deserved the highest honour—that honour which in ancient Rome was esteemed the highest that a soldier could gain—that in desperate circumstances he had not despaired of the Republic. And no man despaired. The exhausted soldier, before he sank to rest, sighed that he could not share the sure triumph—the certain glories—of the day when our flag was to float from Sebastopol! There was no doubt—no despondency. No one for an instant felt diffident of ultimate success. From his remains, in that cold Crimean soil, the British soldier knew an avenger and a conqueror would arise. If high courage, unflinching bravery—if steady charge—the bayonet-thrust in the breach—the strong arm in the fight—if calm confidence, contempt of death, and love of country could have won Sebastopol, it had long been ours. Let England know her children as the descendants of the starved rabble who fought at Agincourt and Cressy; and let her know, too, that in fighting against a stubborn enemy, her armies had to maintain a struggle with foes still more terrible, and that, as they triumphed over the one, so they vanquished the other.

On the night of the 12th of January the wind changed round to the southward, and the thermometer rose to 34°. A speedy thaw followed, and the roads and camp once more suffered from the ravages of our old enemy—the mud. The Russians who had been very active inside the town during the day, and who had lighted great watchfires on the north side of the place, illuminated the heights over Tchernaya with rows of lights, which shone brilliantly through the darkness of the cold winter's night, and were evidently with all possible pomp and ostentation celebrating the opening of their new year. Lights shone from the windows of the public buildings, and our lonely sentries in the valleys and ravines, and the enfans perdus—the French sharpshooters lying in their lairs with watchful eye on every embrasure before them—might almost fancy that the inhabitants and garrison of the beleaguered city were tantalising them with the aspect of their gaiety. At midnight all the chapel bells of the city began ringing. On our side the sentries and pickets were warned to be on the alert, and the advanced posts were strengthened wherever it was practicable.

About a quarter past one o'clock in the morning the Russians gave a loud cheer. The French replied by opening fire, and the Russians instantly began one of the fiercest cannonades we had ever heard. It reminded one of those tremendous salvoes of artillery which the enemy delivered on two or three occasions before we opened our batteries in October. The earthworks flashed forth uninterrupted floods of flame, which revealed distinctly the outlines of the buildings in the town, and defences swarming with men. The roaring of shot, the screaming and hissing of heavy shell, and the whistling of carcases filled up the intervals between the deafening roll of cannon, which was as rapid and unbroken as quick file-firing. The iron storm passed over our lines uninterruptedly for more than half an hour, and the French, whose works to our left were less protected by the ground than ours, had to shelter themselves closely in the trenches, and could barely reply to the volleys which ploughed up the parapets of their works.

While the firing was going on a strong body of men had been pushed out of the town up the face of the hill towards our works in front, and on the flank of the left attack. As it was expected that some attempt of the kind would be made, a sergeant was posted at this spot with twelve men. Every reliance was placed upon his vigilance, and a strict attention to his duties, but, somehow or other, the enemy crept upon the little party, surprised, and took them prisoners, and then advanced on the covering parties with such rapidity and suddenness that the parties on duty in the trenches were obliged to retire. They rallied, however, and, being supported by the regiments in rear, they advanced, and the Russians were driven back close to the town.

MORTALITY AMONGST THE TURKS.

In this little affair one officer and nine men were wounded, six men were killed, and fourteen men taken. The French had to resist a strong sortie nearly at the same time; for a short time the Russians were within the parapet of one of their mortar batteries, and spiked two or three mortars with wooden plugs, but the French drove them back with loss, and in the pursuit got inside the Russian advanced batteries. The soldiers, indeed, say they could have taken the place if they had been permitted to do so. At two o'clock all was silent.

A heavy gale of wind blew nearly all day, but the thermometer rose to 38°, and the snow thawed so rapidly that the tracks to the camp became rivulets of mud. The establishment of a central depôt for provisions had, however, done much to diminish the labours and alleviate the sufferings of the men engaged in the duties of the siege; but the formation of the depôt and the accumulation of the stores wore out and exhausted many of our best men. Out of a batch of 500 or 600 horses brought up from Constantinople, 279 died between the 16th of December and the 16th January. In fact the commissariat consumed and used up horseflesh at the rate of 100 head per week, and each of the animals cost on an average 5l. The araba drivers from Roumelia and Bulgaria disappeared likewise—out of the several hundreds there were very few left; and of the Tartars of the Crimea in our employ the majority were unwilling or unfit to work in cold weather, accustomed as they seemed to be to sit all day in close rooms provided with large stoves as soon as winter set in. Disease and sickness of all kinds swept these poor people away very rapidly. The mortality of the Turkish troops, which had, as I before stated, assumed the dimensions of a plague, had now begun to be attended with much of the physical appearances of the same terrible disease, and their sanitary condition excited the liveliest apprehensions of our medical officers in Balaklava, who had, over and over again, represented to the authorities the danger of allowing the Turks to remain in the town.