The dawn of the 12th opened with the customary firing, but its results were far more serious than for the few days previous. The enemy had ascertained the range of the 21-gun battery with so much exactness that every shot or shell, falling true at the work, tore up its embrasures and parapets. Two 13-inch shells, however, fell upon magazines without breaking through them. From splinters of shells the casualties were many. In the naval brigade alone about twelve men were killed and wounded. Captain Crofton of the Engineers was severely injured and died of his wounds. Private Alfred Jarratt was killed; both of his legs were carried away: and three privates were wounded. One—Donald McArthur—died a few days after the amputation of one of his legs, and James Bayne had his jaw fractured and his left cheek wounded.
A live shell having struck the roof of the magazine near the right 68-pounder gun in the 21-gun battery, some of the sandbags took fire. Apprehending danger, Captain Peel of the navy begged some soldiers near him to quench it, who, indisposed to risk an enterprise so perilous, refused compliance. Two sappers superintending the man-o’-war’s men, though busy in repairing the embrasures, were then called on by the Captain to extinguish the burning bags. Without hesitation, corporal James Wright and lance-corporal William J. Lendrim leaped on the roof, and, under fire from the enemy, quickly removed them, refilling the chasm with fresh sand-bags. Captain Peel himself assisted in the work. The delay of a few seconds might have seen the magazine in the air and the ground strewed with lifeless artillerymen. In descending, Captain Peel thanked the sappers for their exertions; but they had scarcely time to reflect on the service they had accomplished when a ball tearing through the battery covered them with earth. At this addendum to their labours the sailors chuckled with their accustomed mirth, and swore that was the fulsome way in which the Russians always bespattered the British with praise.
The same day Lendrim was about to enter an embrasure to remove a sand-bag which was burning on the sole, when the petty officer in charge of the gun mounted there requested him not to do so until he had fired, as the piece was already loaded. While waiting, a very young naval officer approached, and asked Lendrim why he delayed the service. He soon explained, but the midshipman as quick as thought leaped into the opening and threw the bag on the merlon. Piqued at this interference, Lendrim told the officer he did not thank any one for doing a duty for which he was responsible; and added, “Since you have done so much you had better finish the job.” With as much good sense as good nature, the officer, seeing the chafed spirit of the sapper, did not attempt to supplant him, and so Lendrim sprang into the embrasure. With some water brought to him by an assistant line soldier he quenched the smoking sand-bag and patched up the breach in the stricken check. Witnessing the corporal’s coolness and celerity the officer observed, evidently to dissipate the unpleasant feeling which his daring had induced, “I would not have touched the bag had I known you were one of the old sappers.” Lendrim was more than satisfied with this complimentary apology.
Sixteen extra sappers were sent to the left in the afternoon for exposed duty, and in two or three hours fixed mantlets across the gaping mouths of No. 7 battery. Under fire all the time the operation was necessarily hurried, and did not admit of those nice attentions which unopposed exertions would have permitted. The mantlets were simply suspended across the openings on a piece of wood jambed into the parapets of the embrasures. Four guns of the battery did good service against the Boulevard works. In the course of the evening two of the mantlets were blown away, but the battery stood up firmly.
In allusion to the officers and men under this date ‘The Times’ thus speaks of their unshrinking labours:—“It is impossible to deny to the Russian engineers great credit for the coolness with which they set about repairing damages under fire; but words cannot do more than justice to the exertions of our own men and to the engineer officers and sappers engaged in this most perilous duty. When an embrasure is struck and injured it is the business of the sappers to get into the vacant space and repair the damage, removing the gabions, &c., under fire, and without the least cover from shot, shell, or riflemen. Our engineer officers have frequently set the example to their men in exposing themselves when not called upon to do so; and I believe that, as yet, there has not been a single instance in which a gun has been silent owing to damage done to an embrasure. The officers and men charged with this dangerous work have not waited for the cover of night to effect repairs, but have carried them on in the face of the enemy.”[[178]] This eulogium is corroborated by a conversation held between two officers of the engineers, in which one exclaimed to the other, “How admirably and cool these sappers behave under fire. They are really good men and brave soldiers.”
As the night crept on 900 of the line and 89 sappers marched into the trenches, who, scattered among the batteries, left no point unstrengthened, no embrasure unequal to its wonted work. Everywhere the platforms obtained fixity, and the gaps which had been made in the parapets for the passage of cumbersome guns were filled up before the darkness sped. Much shattered was the Gordon battery, and its fascines, broken at the bands, were strewn in waste about the gorges, while the sand-bags were ripped up and disembowelled by every telling shot and tearing splinter. Iron gabions and fresh sand-bags were pressed into the embrasures to patch up their furrowed cheeks, and the shot-holes behind were plugged up with earth. A new sand-bag battery for four guns on the right attack was founded this night in rear of the left communication from the 8-gun battery to the left boyau. Much would have been done to raise it, but the night was dismally dark, and as rain was falling the men straggled on the road and loitered in their tasks. With fruitless effect the engineers and sappers tried to awaken in the workmen something like passable animation. Nevertheless 1,600 sand-bags reached the site and the sappers tossed and packed them in their places with nonchalant dexterity. Though much annoyed by fire from opposing rifle-screens, four men, superintending 100 of the infantry, made good progress in rendering defensible the advanced works on the left of the second parallel across the Woronzoff road, and six sappers in the 8-gun battery first relieved it of the debris which choked up the embrasures and then masked them. Early in the morning private Joseph McAsh was killed.
The fifth day’s bombardment commenced on the 13th April, and No. 9 battery on the right attack opened for the first time on the Malakoff and Mamelon. Until ready to fire its embrasures were blinded with hide bags filled with hay, which effectually answered the intention of their employment. No. 7 battery on the left was silenced by overpowering discharges upon it from the Upper Garden batteries. It was, moreover, much broken and its salients knocked into grotesque forms. Ninety-four sappers were in the trenches eleven hours giving heed to the quickly-recurring urgencies of the siege. In the following night No. 7 battery was again in battle order, and No. 8, which had been delayed from untoward vicissitudes in weather, was also provided with its equipment of heavy guns. About this time the scaling-ladders at the parks were prepared and held in readiness with selected parties of sappers to take advantage of any event that might turn up by tactics or strategy to render an assault desirable.
In a despatch dated 14th April Lord Raglan remarked:—“Our parapets and batteries continue to stand remarkably well, notwithstanding the very unfavourable state of the weather. Although the duties have been unusually severe and arduous both by night and day during the week they have been carried out with the utmost cheerfulness and zeal, reflecting much credit both on officers and men.” The necessity for these repairs and exertions were constant, and never more so than on the date of the despatch.
Captain Burnett of the navy, who narrowly watched the efforts made to execute the repairs in the 21-gun battery, was impressed with the steadiness and intelligent activity of privates Robert Crawford Cowan and William Baker, seventh company, while working at the embrasure for the Lancaster gun. It was mended with gabions, fascines, and sand-bags. Completing the restoration before quitting the opening, their gallant perseverance, despite the bursting of shells and the flight of Miniés, was recorded by Major-General Jones in brigade orders. Indeed the cheeks were thrice patched up during the day by these intrepid men who also attended to the lesser damages in Nos. 15 and 16 embrasures. With No. 17 embrasure, these three constituted, in the homely phraseology of the sailors, “the slaughter-house.” Lieutenant-Colonel Tylden also observed that he could mention other sappers who were zealous and unflinching under fire; “but,” he proceeds, “I am glad to be able to report that the men generally do their duty so well that there are few who can be named as exceptions.” Private William Smale was severely wounded this day in the right leg by the splinter of a shell while repairing a platform in the 21-gun battery.
It will not, perhaps, be misplaced to mention here the names of privates Samuel Evans and James Callaghan of the 19th regiment. Seeing a sapper—private Alexander McCaughey—toiling by himself in the difficult repair of a broken embrasure—No. 17 of the 21-gun battery—the former voluntarily went into the opening and shared with the overseer the duty of removing the debris. The latter received a blow on the head from a stone sufficient to draw blood, and certainly sufficient for ninety-nine men out of a hundred to get excused from a working party, but he nevertheless remained steadily at work.[[179]] These instances of devotion were noticed in general orders and praised by Lord Raglan.