On the 26th the eighth company, under Captain Schaw, with Lieutenant Edwards attached, marched to Cossack Bay, and had traced out a line of entrenchments to be executed for covering the embarkation of the rear of the army in the event of such an operation being needed, when an event transpired which rendered the service unnecessary. The company remained nearly two months at the bay, during which it built a pier on the shore and run a road to it from the camp.
An armistice was concluded in the Crimea on the 29th, which temporarily suspended military operations till the 31st March; but as the plenipotentiaries at Paris had not then made known their agreement to a treaty, the armistice was prolonged indefinitely. The treaty, however, had already been ratified bearing date the 30th March, and on the 2nd April peace was proclaimed in the Crimean camps, ending a stubborn war which had taught Russia a grave lesson of the strength and firmness of the Anglo-French alliance, and proved that her shores and her fortresses—though vaunting an aspect of menacing impregnability, were open to the endurance and valour of the quadruple league.
To break the boundaries which war had narrowed to prison limits and afford opportunities of intercourse between the belligerents was now a measure of first consideration. This was the chivalric wish of Sir William Codrington. To effect it the Tchernaya bridge was renewed. In thirty-two hours a party of sappers, directed by Lieutenant C. G. Gordon of the royal engineers, built a superstructure on the burnt tops of the old piles. The damaged portions, in part, were cut away, and cross beams being spiked to them, each pair of piles was clamped together by their heads. There were six pairs of piles at either side of the bridge, and along the series of clamps was stretched from end to end a stout beam on which rested a number of girders to support the roadway. This roadway was ten feet broad and twenty-six long from bank to bank and raised eighteen inches above the level of the stream. The Tchernaya was not a tidal river, but was swelled at times to an average depth of ten feet by mountain streams and the meltings of snow from the Tchater-Dagh range. The communication between the armies was open on the 6th April.
While a probability existed of the pending negociations for peace terminating unfavourably, the War Minister, alive to this eventuality, did not stay his hand in keeping up the organizations of the Crimea to an efficient standard. Unmitigated vigour was displayed everywhere; troops were on the way to Balaklava, and a reinforcement of sappers, 299 strong, which had embarked at Liverpool on the 10th March, landed at Scutari on the 8th April. This force consisted of the 17th and 24th companies, with detachments to complete the old companies which had suffered during the war. Too late to be of service, they had not the good fortune to tread on Crimean soil. Up to this date the strength of the corps despatched to the East, including Lieutenant and Adjutant Saville, who joined from the royal artillery at the siege, reached a total of 1,644 of all ranks.
One of the stipulations of the treaty was the rapid evacuation of Russian territory; and the British troops, with inviolable honour, were not slow in fulfilling this condition. The breaking up of camps and the pulling down of huts and stables followed with rapidity. The sappers and miners performed its share in this extraordinary clearance, and among an endless variety of services, made stalls for the officers’ horses on board ships, and portable deck contrivances for the accommodation of the troops; but its most popular labours, at this time, were devoted to the construction and working of flying bridges for the embarkation of the army. No less than sixty rafts, made of beer barrels and rum casks, with the usual superstructure of baulks and chesses, were prepared for the operation. Each raft had fourteen barrels—seven to a pier; and the sixty rafts were lashed together into eight floats, varying in length according to circumstances, with pier-heads nearest the shore to bear the pressure of heavy baggage. The vessels were anchored with their sterns to the shore, so that each occupied a position between two bridges; and the troops, as they marched down the floats, only halted to run up the ladders, which had been reared for them, to the decks. Every movement of the floats was carried out so adroitly and with so much celerity that one regiment—second battalion of the rifle brigade—was embarked in less than twenty minutes!
Rubble walls were built round several of the British graveyards by some bricklayers and masons of the corps, while many stone-cutters were permitted to erect tombs and monuments to departed worth. Most of the memorials were built and inscribed by the sappers. Lance-corporal Simon Williams was one of the best artificers in this description of service. He erected the monument to the 44th regiment; the modest stone which covers the grave of Sir John Campbell; and the simple cross and reclined slab which mark the spot where repose the remains of Lieutenant-General Sir George Cathcart. The epitaph, which records in simple language the great events of his life, is written in English and Russian.[[208]] Corporal Keyte built the monument to the corps of sappers, which bore the name of every man who had fallen or died during the war. He also worked several other tombs and grave-stones, among the best of which was the one erected in honour of Major Ranken of the engineers. Private David Thompson, an excellent mason, erected the monuments to the officers of the 23rd, 30th, and 33rd regiments. The masons of the tenth company, under the direction of Lieutenant Brine, executed the obelisks which stand at Balaklava and Inkermann. The one built in front of the Redan—of stones taken from the docks of Sebastopol—was reared chiefly by the companies quartered in the Karabelnaia and finished by the tenth. These three memorials rested on pedestals with copings, mouldings, and simple ornature, and were approached by three or four steps with broad treads. One panel of each displayed a cross, the other three short inscriptions in English and Russian. Private D. Thompson lettered those at Balaklava and Inkermann and assisted to inscribe the Redan monument. Private James Dickson of the third company executed two of its epitaphs and the cross.[[209]]
Just prior to breaking up the light division, Major-General Lord William Paulett commended the tenth company in his orders of the 7th June—“My thanks,” wrote his Lordship, “are also due to the officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the tenth company royal sappers and miners, whose assistance has been most valuable to the division and their conduct most exemplary.” Lieutenant Brine commanded the company.
The last services performed by the corps in the Crimea were building two tablets in memory of Lord Raglan in the wall of the room where his lordship died.[[210]] This was done by private William Church. A monument was also built on Balaklava heights, overlooking the Sanatorium, which could be seen from the sea. It was a plain white marble colossal cross, without inscription, cut by Turkish and Armenian masons at Constantinople, and arrived after all appliances necessary to raise it had been stowed away in the ships about to sail for England. Its erection, nevertheless, proceeded, tackle being lent for the purpose from the ‘Leander,’ and was accomplished by some sappers hurriedly and with difficulty under Mr. Sargent, late of the corps. The cross was risen at the expense of Miss Nightingale, whose many graceful acts of deep sympathy and patient exertion for a suffering army have given her name historic celebrity. A strange influence she possessed which worked out remarkable results. Hundreds of mutilated soldiers, and hundreds more wasted by pestilence and disease, seemed to revive by her presence; and lived to bless her, or died unrepining, cheered through the vale, by the solace of her voice and the charm of her encouragement. How she brought order out of chaos; how she overcame giant obstacles; how she managed interminable offices, nursed the sick and wounded stretched before her in miles of ward and corridor, and in her tender devotion was herself twice thrown down by dangerous fevers, to renew, when only partially recovered, her hard but noble labours, are events which belong to the history of the world as well as the war. England has produced many self-denying and heroic philanthropists whose calm zeal to ameliorate human misery and suffering have won the lasting admiration of nations; but the beautiful honour of being the chief of that excellent band belongs to Florence Nightingale.
The companies of royal sappers and miners embarked at Balaklava in the following order:—
| 23rd May | 2nd | — | landed at Gibraltar 4th June, and there took up its station. |
| 27th ” | 1st | — | landed at Malta 7th June, and there remained. |
| 27th ” | 9th | — | landed at Corfu 3rd June, and there remained. |
| 11th June 11th ” 11th ” | 4th 7th 8th | } | landed at Portsmouth 9th July; moved to Aldershot the same day, and marched into Chatham 19th July under Major Nicholson, R.E. |
| 11th July 11th ” 11th ” | 3rd 10th 11th | } | landed at Portsmouth from the ‘Dragon,’ 5th August, and marched into Chatham the 9th, under the command of Major Robertson, R.E. The accommodation on board the war steamer was very limited, but Captain Houston Stewart, R.N., permitted the quarter-deck to be fitted up for them, which prevented that inconvenience and sickness to which a crowded vessel is usually subject. Exemplary was the behaviour of the men, “and Captain Stewart expressed to them the great satisfaction their good conduct and willingness in rendering assistance in carrying on duties on board had given him.” |
| 12th ” | 17th | — | embarked at Scutari; landed at Malta 22nd July, 1856, and there remained. |
| 17th ” | A troop | — | embarked at Kulalee, landed at Woolwich 9th August, and removed next day to Aldershot to be stationed. |
| 22nd ” | 24th | — | embarked at Scutari; landed at Gibraltar 5th August, and there remained. |