Major-General Sir John Douglas, K.C.B.
From a photograph.
About half-past one o’clock the action commenced by the Russians opening fire from the redoubt on the left upon the French, who were attempting to assail their position in that direction. The British forces then formed in line, and proceeded to cross the river about the village of Burliuk. The light and second divisions led the way preceded by the skirmishers of the Rifle Brigade, who advanced through the vineyards beyond the village, and spreading themselves along the margin of the river, engaged the Russian riflemen on the opposite bank.
The first division, which formed the left of the allied army, advancing in support, traversed the vineyard and crossed the river, protected by its overhanging banks. On reaching the slope of the hill, the three Highland regiments formed line in échelon, and, “with the precision of a field-day advanced to the attack, the 42nd Royal Highlanders on the right, and the 79th Cameron Highlanders on the left, the extreme left of the allied army.”[529]
From its position, the 79th was the last of the Highland regiments to mount the slope on the Russian side of the river, and its appearance on the crest of the slope was opportune; it came in time to relieve the mind of Sir Colin, who trembled for the left flank of the 93rd, down upon which was bearing a heavy column of the enemy—the left Sousdal column. “Above the crest or swell of the ground,” Kinglake tells, “on the left rear of the 93rd, yet another array of the tall bending plumes began to rise up in a long ceaseless line, stretching far into the east, and presently, with all the grace and beauty that marks a Highland regiment when it springs up the side of a hill, the 79th came bounding forward. Without a halt, or with only the halt that was needed for dressing the ranks, it sprang at the flank of the right Sousdal column, and caught it in its sin—caught it daring to march across the front of a battalion advancing in line. Wrapped in the fire thus poured upon its flank, the hapless column could not march, could not live. It broke, and began to fall back in great confusion; and the left Sousdal column being almost at the same time overthrown by the 93rd, and the two columns which had engaged the Black Watch being now in full retreat, the spurs of the hill and the winding dale beyond became thronged with the enemy’s disordered masses.”[530]
The three Highland regiments were now once more abreast, and as Kinglake eloquently puts it, the men “could not but see that this, the revoir of the Highlanders, had chanced in a moment of glory. A cheer burst from the reunited Highlanders, and the hillsides were made to resound with that joyous, assuring cry, which is the natural utterance of a northern people so long as it is warlike and free.”
There were still a few battalions of the enemy, about 3000 men, on the rise of a hill separated from the Highland regiments by a hollow; on these the Highland Brigade opened fire, and the Ouglitz column, as it was called, was forced to turn.
The loss in the battle of the Alma of the Cameron Highlanders, who, although they performed most important and trying service, had no chance of being in the thick of the fray, was 2 men killed and 7 wounded.
On account of the conduct of the regiment, a Companionship of the Bath was conferred upon Lt.-Col. John Douglas, and Captain Andrew Hunt was promoted by brevet to be major in the army.[531]
After clearing the Russians out of the way the allied army marched onwards, and on the 26th took up its position before Sebastopol, Balaklava being taken possession of as a base of operations. On the 1st of October the first division encamped on the right of the light division to assist in the duties of the siege; and the 79th afterwards furnished a number of volunteers, to act as sharpshooters in picking off the enemy’s gunners and engage his riflemen. On the 8th of October, Sir Colin Campbell was appointed to the command of the troops and position of Balaklava, and was succeeded in command of the Highland Brigade by Colonel Sir D. A. Cameron, K.C.B., of the 42nd,—whose portrait we have given on the steel-plate of [colonels of that regiment].