“I must not conclude,” wrote Lieutenant Fisher, “without bringing under your notice the very gallant conduct of sergeant Landrey, whose steadiness in the advance, and exertions in cheering on the men were most praiseworthy.” Lieutenant-Colonel Tylden, being unable to report on the operations of Lieutenant Fisher and his sappers, Colonel Gordon supplied the omission. “The officers of engineers and men,” he wrote, “attached to this column, performed their duty in a brave and devoted manner. The non-commissioned officers and men bravely followed their officers, and were foremost among the assailants. Sergeant Landrey particularly distinguished himself.”
In awarding high praise to the naval brigade for their noble behaviour with the ladders, Lieutenant Graham acknowledged “the steady conduct of the party of sappers under sergeant Coppin of the fourth company,” and drew attention to the valiant behaviour of private John Perie. Alluding to the latter at another time, Lieutenant Graham wrote, “he was invaluable to me on that day, as he followed me everywhere, and was always ready when I wanted anything done.” His cool determination in taking a message to Lieutenant Murray in front during the thick of the fight, and returning with an answer, was one of the instances which called for Lieutenant Graham’s special commendation. When the assault was over, a naval officer, seeing a wounded man lying exposed in front, asked for assistance. With his natural brusqueness, Perie said to Lieutenant Graham, “I’ll follow you, sir!” All three bounded over the parapet and brought in the injured man. Had further help of the kind been needed they would have humanely exercised it. The front fortunately was clear; and so, anxious to prevent the chance of anything falling into the hands of the enemy, they threw themselves again over the parapet, and lugged into the trench some ladders from the open. The devotion of Perie to his brave leader was the more remarkable, as he had already been wounded by a rifle-bullet in the side.
Major-General Jones also made this record to the credit of the corps: “The royal sappers and miners continue to distinguish themselves by their gallantry and good conduct.”
Under Lieutenant Neville of the engineers and Captain Penn, R.A., Sergeant Thomas R. Drew and 30 sappers, with destroying implements and powder-bags, were detailed to act with Brigadier-General Barnard’s division, which, having marched across the Woronzoff ravine and halted under the cliffs, was to move forward and capture the Barrack Battery as soon as the Redan and Malakoff had been taken; but the utter discomfiture of the two columns placed this subsidiary attack in the category of impossibilities. While the assault was still at its highest, corporal Jenkins obtained permission to go to the front to watch its desperate phases. He was accompanied by sergeant Drew. Keeping close under the beetling rocks, which in a measure shielded them from the gusts of fire that struck the steep and broken sides of the ravine, they at length reached the left flank of the advance trench, where for a while they looked at the doubtful strife, and returned to report its progress. Again they moved to the quarries by the rough unbeaten track they had previously traversed, guiding Lieutenant Neville and Captain Penn. A short reconnaissance determined Lieutenant Neville to send Jenkins with a message to General Barnard. Off he started, and communicated to the General the information he had been commissioned to convey. Colonel Waddy of the 50th regiment, who had been appointed to lead the stormers of General Barnard’s column, expressed a wish to go to the front to see the aspect of affairs, if any one would show him the road. “Follow the sapper!” said Jenkins, using the phrase of the trenches; and Colonel Waddy, glad of the offer, run along under the brows of the rocks, whither the corporal conducted, and found himself in less than ten minutes safe in the quarries. A few glances put him in possession of intelligence he did not expect to learn; the attack was failing; the scenes he witnessed were untoward and disheartening, but he still had hope of doing some service to retrieve the fortunes of the day. Placing himself again under the guidance of the corporal, the rough route by the hill-side was speedily retraced; and the colonel, boiling over with desire and anxiety, proposed to lead out the stormers at once without waiting the accomplishment of those operations which were considered essential before the secondary attacks should commence. But the orders for the movement of the column were too explicit and imperative to admit a deviation without special directions from the ruling authority, and so Colonel Waddy had not the honour on this great occasion to “do or die.”
Jenkins now rejoined the officers in the quarries. This was his third march over that toppling hill-side, almost suffocated with dust and fatigued with a restless foot, which for six hours and more had been in active motion. Before this time the fate of the day was irrevocable; the cannonade had ceased, the stormers had retired, the open was clear, but a murderous crossfire of musketry still played on our works. Seeing a wounded man of the 57th regiment struggling in front of the Quarry batteries, Jenkins and Drew volunteered to bring him in. To this Lieutenant Neville assented, and in broad daylight they bore him to the trench, resigning their charge to a party of the 57th in the rear. The poor fellow had been deeply struck in the right thigh and ankle and was torn with stones and splinters. A little later they saw other men lying exposed with bad wounds on the reverse of the advance trenches. With a broken stretcher, the sergeant and Jenkins carried away one after another into safe cover. This was a service of supreme risk, and many of the defeated stormers who filled the trenches, pale with enervation and panic, possessed nevertheless sufficient self-command to make their surprise obvious. “Look at those mad sappers!” said they, envying the courage they feared to exercise; but the humane non-commissioned officers, heedless of the taunts that assailed them, never slackened their hand till there was no longer a necessity for their exertions. Again Jenkins pushed into the ravine by the old track. “A corporal of sappers came along the hill-side from the direction of the Redan,” wrote Lieutenant-Colonel Sir James Alexander, 14th regiment.[[187]] “I asked him what was the news of the assault from the trenches of the right attack? He said, ‘Bad news,’ and in a few words he told of the disastrous events of the morning.” The corporal alluded to was Jenkins. Seeing a comrade, private Rollings, killed and huddled up on the slope with a broken neck, he begged Lieutenant Neville’s sanction to bear him away, as no sapper had yet been buried in the trenches. His request being granted, he, with the help of three volunteers, carried the dead sapper on a scaling-ladder across the ravine to the first parallel of the left attack, from whence he was removed to camp and honoured with a soldier’s funeral.
Equally conspicuous was private George Ramsey in his endeavours to succour the wounded. He too belonged to Lieutenant Neville’s party, and crept along under the rocks till he made the open. It was a wonder with so hot a fire of musketry that he escaped. He first removed a wounded sailor who had pushed himself into a rifle-pit; and afterwards, with the assistance of Lieutenant Hallowes of the royal navy, then mate of the ‘Wasp’ steam-sloop, and a few men, he bore away on a scaling-ladder softened with wool taken from the sacks of the stormers, a brave rifleman who was struck down with severe wounds near the abattis.
The cool bravery of these three sappers was brought to the notice of Major-General Jones by Lieutenant Neville, who recommended them for distinguished medals. They “succeeded under a very heavy fire,” he reported, “in rescuing the bodies of several wounded men of the 57th regiment lying out in front of the Redan.”
The column under Brigadier-General Eyre was directed to push down the picket-house ravine past the cemetery into the rear of the Barrack Battery, and there co-operate with General Barnard in its capture. This column bore on with an irresistible front into the grounds near the graveyard, but were locked in among some houses of the suburb, beyond which it would have been more than madness to proceed. As it was, they held the position until evening under a harassing fire, and retreated with the loss of no less than 31 officers killed and wounded, as also the Brigadier struck in the head.
Of second-corporal William Baker, third company, who went forward with this column, a more than passing notice may be permitted. He was on duty in the third parallel, and left it without orders, declaring at all hazards he would that day enter the town. But how brittle is human intention! Armed with his carbine and a full pouch of ammunition, he joined the 38th regiment; and losing sight of the fact that he was not in charge of a working party in the saps, cheered on the men with the inspiriting cry, “Now, my boys, follow the sapper!” In the excitement of the moment he caught up the expression, because it had become a settled by-word of the trenches. On went poor Baker, heedless of those who followed, and he was killed in the ravine beyond the grave-yard. Disembowelled, wounded in the breast, and with a broken leg, he lay for a time in great pain. He was seen to wave his hand as if entreating assistance, but so thick was the firing up the valley from the crow’s-nest and garden batteries, none dared to pass into it to help the corporal in his last agonies.
The casualties in the English troops this day were very great. Both officers who led the columns on the Redan were killed. In addition to the engineer officers already named, Major-General Jones was wounded in the head by a grape-shot; and his Brigade-Major, Captain Bourchier, received a slight contusion in the arm. The French, in their imposing but unavailing attacks upon the Malakoff, lost 2 generals, 37 officers, and 1544 men killed, wounded, and missing; while the Russians in their sturdy defence, achieved a victory at a sacrifice which counted thousands of killed and wounded. No less than 797 fell dead in the various works, and 4979 were wounded.