(Signed) “A. Pélissier.
“The General in Command of the
English Army.”
General Sir James Simpson, who had commanded the army since the death of Lord Raglan, resigned his high office on the 11th, and was succeeded by General Sir William Codrington.
The great French magazine on the brow of the Ravin du Carénage blew up on the 15th November. For miles the ground was convulsed by the explosion as if an earthquake had shaken the land, and in the vicinity of the devastation hill and ravine were covered with the black dust of the gunpowder as if the area were the approach to another Erebus. Shot, carcases, rockets, and shells, with their myriad splinters, fell in a terrible shower breaking up tents, collapsing stables, throwing into ruins store-sheds and hospitals, burning huts and siege materials, and striking down men at a considerable distance from the scene. The number of officers and soldiers killed and wounded were as many as might have occurred in a sharp action. Bugles were sounded to form a general parade, and the troops drawn aside to a neighbouring height looked on in bewildered amazement. The only two of the corps present at the moment of the catastrophe were Lieutenant Brine and sergeant Jarvis, who were inspecting work done at the stables of Captain Travers’ small-arm ammunition brigade. That grave explosion blew down the stables and also those of the Y battery, and let loose some four hundred horses which ran wildly over the hills. As soon as the nature of the disaster had been ascertained, Lieutenant Brine sent his sergeant for the tenth company. It soon arrived with picks, shovels, hooks, &c.; and, wrote Lieutenant-Colonel Lloyd, “rendered valuable service.” The army was then away, and the little band of sappers set to work under the eye of Sir William Codrington to arrest the conflagration. The powder mill at Inkermann was between two fires, and had been greatly injured by the concussion. But little danger was apprehended from the one on the valley side of it, because the ravine intervened; but some burning shells having penetrated a number of old French huts beyond the magazine, the little settlement was soon in flames, and as the wind was blowing in the direction of the mill it was a matter of first moment to stay the spread of the conflagration and render the magazine safe. To these duties the greater portion of the company was detailed. By digging a trench around the burning locality and throwing the excavated earth on the fire it thus became isolated, and the flames were gradually reduced by tearing down the planking and beams and removing them to a distance. Strong parties of the line, sent from the heights, working by reliefs, also assisted to extinguish the burning mass, and succeeded in preventing a repetition of the calamity.
Meanwhile the powder mill, on which all eyes were fixed, was scaled by some gallant fellows risking a jeopardy it was exciting to witness. Lieutenant Brine, who was directed to superintend the arrangements for subduing the fire, and to devise means for succouring the magazine, ordered sergeant Jarvis and corporal Osment to ascend it. Without hesitation they did so, followed by other sappers and Major Grant of the artillery and Lieutenant Hope 7th Fusiliers. Sparks were falling on them like pyrotechnic rain, and shells and rockets were still bursting, throwing their splinters and burning fragments in that perilous direction. With wet blankets handed to them from below they “promptly” covered the roof of the magazine and only gave up the task when the officers were convinced that further exertions were unnecessary. Of the brave and ready conduct of corporal Osment, Major Grant reported most highly to Lieutenant Brine, and he was therefore selected to protect the entrance to the magazine which, facing the flames, was most likely to take fire and yield to unforeseen disaster. At once he covered it with wet blankets suspended from posts, and building against it a wall of sand-bags, further protected it in front by a sand-bag traverse. This done, all alarm was finally allayed by Lieutenant Brine reporting to Sir William Codrington the perfect security of the mill.
When the magazine blew up, some of the company were working at a stone bridge in the ravine about 300 yards distant, and escaped without injury, while several of the line who were assisting, were killed and wounded. The party joined the company as soon as it was perceived to be mustered for duty in front of the huts of the 33rd regiment. Sir William Codrington observing the fire sweeping on to the right of the siege train, asked for volunteers to extinguish it. Several daring fellows answered the call and were soon in the heart of the flames tearing down the burning tents; but as this service did not seem to be of much profit in the presence of more imminent danger, an artillery officer enlisted their exertions to remove many box loads of live shells which, packed in the park of the siege train, were imminently exposed; so much so that while bearing them away, one after another ignited and burst, knocking down men, mules and horses, killing some and wounding others. To some excavated hollows where there had been an encampment, about 150 yards off, the shells were taken and buried. The French and soldiers of all corps assisted in the removal; those of the sappers who most distinguished themselves were sergeant James, corporal Enwright, privates William Church, John Burt, and others.
The explosion led to the construction of a very strong magazine on the plateau in rear of the land transport corps with the light division. It was sunk partly in rock six feet deep, and was 24 feet by 12 feet in the clear. The interior was walled with rubble stone, and splinter proofs ten inches square formed the roof, above which was a covering of earth between five and six feet deep. It was made to contain, if necessary, more than a thousand barrels of small-arm ammunition. Masons and carpenters of the tenth company built it assisted by parties from the 97th regiment, under Lieutenants Brine, R.E., and Hudson, 97th. It was completed on the 14th December, and being a somewhat showy structure of its class, the little details connected with its erection were inscribed on a slab built into the work.
When in command of the light division, Sir William Codrington desirous of adding facilities to the movement of the troops, directed a bridge to be thrown across the middle ravine to connect with the main road. The tenth company, with the assistance of infantry detachments, built it in November under the superintendence of Lieutenant Brine, R.E., who commanded the company. Sergeant Jarvis was his foreman, and corporal Rylatt his principal artificer. The bridge was of stone having one arch of nearly twenty feet span and a roadway of seventeen and a half feet, approached at each end by a long causeway with a gentle descent from the road. The foundations were of ragstone collected in the vicinity, and the piers, of great apparent strength, were formed of white stone from the Redan. The planking was secured to ten baulks, each 24 feet long and 10 inches square, taken from the white barracks in the Karabelnaia. A stout wooden handrail lined both sides of the bridge for convenience and finish. No mortar was used to give solidity to the masonry; and though the rains and melted snows, rushing down the slopes of the ravine, beat with violence against the rubble piers, the bridge stood as firm as a rock, while other temporary structures of the kind were carried away by the flood. On a stone let into one of the piers of this neat specimen of military engineering, was cut this inscription—
Erected