| No. | |||
| Head-quarters. | 3rd | company | 36 |
| Light division, | 10th | ” | 62 |
| 1st ” | 11th | ” | 62 |
| 2nd ” | 8th | ” | 77 |
| 3rd ” | 4th | ” | 34 |
| 4th ” | 4th | ” | 35 |
The fourth division was not engaged, being in reserve; but the sappers with the other divisions, though not called upon to participate to an extent that placed them in much danger, were under fire. The companies were held back, ready with their intrenching tools, to perform any service for which they might suddenly be required; but the daring advance and overpowering prowess of the British rendered a resort to field-works as a means of defence wholly unnecessary. The tenth company crossed the river by the ford and bridge while the battle raged. The eighth company, attached for the moment to one of the field-batteries, assisted in dragging through the river some field-carriages belonging to the royal artillery, one of which, having become disabled, capsized in the stream.
The eleventh company, under the direction of Captain Montagu of the engineers, rapidly repaired the broken timber bridge of Buliack, part of the sheeting of which had been removed by the Russians, leaving the end on the side of the British untouched. Had this artful contrivance not been discovered, the troops would doubtless have suffered fearfully in their attempt to pass over the bridge. Its restoration was of great service, as it enabled the whole of the baggage to be up with the army the same evening. For six hours there was an uninterrupted stream of well-laden carts and other vehicles crossing it, which tested to the utmost the efficiency of its renewal, and corroborated in part the encomium of Captain Montagu that it was “done right well and very quickly.” The fourth company was stationed about a quarter of a mile away from the Alma, and the third was with the baggage in rear.
On the night of the 20th the companies bivouacked on the site of the battle, where one of the privates, worn out by disease and fatigue, covered himself with his blanket and died. Resuming the march, the allies passed the Katscha on the 23rd September, on which day the third company, attached to the head-quarters of the army, was reinforced by the arrival from Woolwich of 66 non-commissioned officers and men under Captain W. M. Inglis of the royal engineers. Two days later the march was continued across the Belbec, and on the 26th to Balaklava by a bold flank movement through a difficult and thickly-wooded country. Sir John Burgoyne passed a night in bivouac with the company, and all that could be got for him to rest upon was an old door. Upon that the aged warrior stretched himself with a composure and satisfaction that showed how well he had braced himself to the vicissitudes and hardships of war. On the way the baggage of a Russian division, spreading over a vast extent of road, fell a prize to the British army. The third company was hurried to the front with artillery to remove it, and tumbling the waggons over the hill they broke in fragments in the valley. When the army pushed forward, the third company remained, blew up a magazine of thirteen barrels of gunpowder which was found with the train of baggage, and then hastened to Balaklava. All the companies arrived there on the 27th September, and were at once disposed of in making roads, sinking wells, and repairing shattered waggons, while the third company made good a rough pier at Balaklava, at which were landed the heavy ordnance, ammunition, and siege stores.
The royal engineers formed their encampment on the S.S.E. of the harbour of Balaklava, whither the siege material was conveyed. With great promptitude, guns and ammunition, gabions, fascines, sand-bags, and tools of all descriptions, unsurpassed in magnitude, were collected, and then despatched to the depôt about four miles nearer to the scene of operations.
By the 30th September a strong force of sappers moved to the ground, and soon commenced those services which the public, too enthusiastic in its anticipations, expected would reduce a fortress of unexampled strength in a few days. Full twenty days the company were without tents, their camp equipage having been left in the ships which conveyed the sappers from the shores of Bulgaria; and, exposed as they were in bivouac to the damp and chills of night, many robust and able men fell a prey to cholera at Balaklava, or predisposed, by these early trials and rigours, to disease, were struck down by suffering and exhaustion in the camp before Sebastopol.
Next night some sappers, pushed forward under their officers, assisted to examine the ground in front of the fortress towards Chersonese Bay; and although at times within rifle-range of the walls, were unmolested by the Russians. It was at first intended that the English troops should occupy this position, but in consequence of the tools of our allies being too light to carry out the heavy intrenchments assigned to them on the right, the disposition of the forces was altered to adapt them to the situations for which their material seemed to render them adequate. This change in the arrangements was followed by the preliminary duty of tracing the sites of the required trenches and batteries inland, in which some sappers were permitted to participate.
Among those who first left the camp to reconnoitre were lance-corporal McKimm and private Jenkins, in whose resolution and discipline reliance could be placed. They were apt men and sufficiently acute in comprehending orders not to worry their officers with strings of fatiguing questions about small details; and such was their stamp and bearing, they were not likely, in danger, to leave their officer unshielded. To Captain Montagu’s party of six sappers they were attached. In the darkness of the morning of the 1st October, the whole moved on in advance of the outlying pickets for nearly a mile and a-half, and quietly and in whispers, wandered over a country guarded by pickets in ambuscades as yet unknown. On their way they passed some posts which were alive with Cossacks, one of which they unwittingly approached so closely, that a couple of shots were fired at them. This was simply tendered as a warning to depart, for the Cossacks made no attempt to follow the explorers, and so continuing to give the points of ground and intersections to the Captain to enable him to form his sketch of the position of the left attack, the delineation was, in three or four hours, finished. With a careful pace yielding no perceptible sound, and a sharp look out, the party in returning crossed hill and ravine and passed pickets and sentries, reaching the camp safely at six o’clock in the morning.
It being necessary to despatch the mail from the first division at Balaklava to that of General Cathcart’s on the heights S.W. of Sebastopol, corporal John McQueen and private James Brennan volunteered for the duty. Cheerfully they jogged along the lonely road, and having delivered the letters at the camp commenced to return with that easy abandon so becoming soldiers. McQueen had been out on a coasting expedition, and prided himself with the belief that because he knew Sebastopol from the sea, he must as a consequence know every step of the road to Balaklava. He, however, soon found out his mistake. Losing their way, the letter-carriers struck on a road which took them into the Picket House ravine, up which they strode at a steady pace, straining their eyes through the darkness to discover a clue which should enlighten them as to their situation. Presently they were hounded by some dogs led on by a horseman with a glimmering lamp attached to his girdle. Luckily a cavern was near, and the sappers bounding into it, the dogs and the Cossack passed on. Allowing sufficient time to elapse to confuse the rider and his canine attendants, the comrades emerged from the cave, and regaining the road, turned in the direction of Sebastopol, impressed with the conviction that they had taken the correct route for the port. Allured by a fire which was burning on the hill to the left of the ravine, they began to ascend the slope to join the picket—supposed to be a Turkish one—who, grouped around the blazing sticks, were enjoying their pipes—an enviable pastime in which McQueen was anxious to participate. The night was still black; nothing could be seen, especially in the valley, for the picket-fire spread its capricious illumination over so small an area, that beyond the guard, the faint outline of objects only could be traced, and a little further on the dimness thickened into impenetrable darkness. So, suddenly coming on a pair of sentries concealed under some overhanging rocks, the sappers as suddenly stopped without losing their coolness. “Give me light, Turco?” said McQueen, placing a pipe between his teeth and pressing its bowl near the sentry’s chibouk. The sentry shrunk back: he was a Russian; and without word or challenge, in a moment the bayonet flashed, and the next it was plunged through the corporal’s body, while the companion sentry stabbed Brennan in the left shoulder. At the instant McQueen shot up in the air, then fell; but deadly wounded as he was, his entrails bursting through the puncture, he started from the ground, and, accompanied by Brennan, both ran at a furious speed pursued by the swift-footed sentinels. A wide ditch interrupted their course, into which McQueen and Brennan tumbled, but the cowardly Russians—for such they were to attack two unarmed men—gave up the pursuit.
McQueen moved not from the spot where he fell, for the shock he had received had doubled him up, and though his agonies were deep, he retained his consciousness. Brennan, suffering himself, set to work to alleviate, if possible, those mortal pains which at times made the corporal writhe and groan. His hand came on a well of blood, which told him, if the flow were not immediately stopped, the closing scene would soon be over. His plan of action in this extremity was quickly fixed, and taking off his shirt he tore it in strips, and tying them into one length bound it round his comrade. This, however, was not enough, for the blood still oozed through the bandage, and tearing away as much as he could of the corporal’s shirt without increasing his pangs, he knotted this also, as he added shred to shred, and plied it over the wound. This was the most he could do, except to encourage his spirit to bear the trial with the manliness his comrades would expect to hear he had exercised. “My head feels cold,” said he faintly. Both had lost their caps in the violent run they made to the ditch. Brennan instantly took off his coatee and turbaned it round the poor fellow’s head. “Here is a little bag with fourteen shillings in it,” said the corporal, as he released it from his neck. “Give it to my wife. It will never be my happiness to see her or the children.” This he said with an affectionate but choked utterance. “Tell her,” he added in a stronger voice, “I’m sorry I shall not see Sebastopol fall.”