Part 14

=The V.C. and Distinguished Conduct Medal.=--These were comparatively small but significant campaigns, although the period between Waterloo and the breaking out of the Crimean War has been termed the long peace. The war in the Crimea was of a very different kind. Once again it was the meeting of Europeans face to face, and a long struggle resulted. An important outcome of the war from one point of view was the institution on January 29th, 1856, of that coveted decoration, the Victoria Cross, preceded by the institution of the Distinguished Conduct Medal on December 4th, 1854, and the Conspicuous Gallantry Medal for naval men on August 13th, 1855. The ribbon for the V.C. is dark red--dark blue for the Navy--that for the Distinguished Conduct Medal (illustrated facing page 140) dark blue with broad, red stripe down the centre, and the ribbon blue with a white stripe down the centre for the Conspicuous Gallantry medal. In the first issues the names were impressed on the edge, but in the later issues they are engraved, and the date of the action is also included. It is particularly noteworthy that the first medals of this class issued were struck from the Meritorious Service Medal, the two words being erased and Conspicuous Gallantry engraved in place thereof (see facing page 140).

THE CRIMEAN WAR

In October 1853 the Czar of Russia declared war against the Sultan of Turkey, and to defend "the sick man" Great Britain and France landed troops at Varna, a Bulgarian port in the Black Sea. At the end of February 1854 Queen Victoria bade farewell to the Guards at Buckingham Palace, and these with other regiments sailed for the East to take part in a war which, declared on March 28th, 1854, was to cost us the lives of thousands of brave men: 21,815 were killed, or died of wounds or disease, and 11,876 were wounded--a total of 32,691 officers and men. Disease accounted for the deaths of 16,041, battle only 4,774! The old soldiers, as Sir Evelyn Wood states, died without a murmur, and it "is impossible to overpraise the disciplined silence of men under privations which in a few weeks reduced one battalion from nearly 1,000 effectives to a strength of 30 rank and file." At the end of February 1855, although the strength of the British army was on paper 44,000, only 18,000 were "present and fit for duty"; and yet the medals of the brave and patient survivors of this war are selling at a few shillings apiece unless they happen to have the bar for Balaklava or Inkermann--Sebastopol, that long-drawn agony, counts for nothing!

On September 7th, 1854, the Anglo-French army put to sea, its objective being the great naval station of Sebastopol in the Crimea. There were, in addition to the crews of the warships, about 27,000 British, including the Light Brigade of 1,000, with 60 guns, under Lord Raglan, who had served on Wellington's staff in the Peninsular; 28,000 French under Marshal St. Arnaud, and 7,000 Turks under Omar Pasha. The Sardinian contingent under General La Marmora did not reach the Crimea until May 1855. The troops were landed, between September 14th and 18th, on the beach at Kalamita Bay, about twenty-five miles from Sebastopol, and two days after the disembarkation had been effected they had to force the Alma, when they defeated the Russians under Prince Mentschikoff so effectively that the allies were allowed to march southwards unmolested, and to form bases within a few miles of Sebastopol. The British established themselves at the little port of Balaklava, eight miles to the south of Sebastopol, and the French at Kamiesch Bay, six miles north of the place.

=The Alma.=--The Russians had taken up a position commanding the road to Sebastopol, with a front of two miles, mainly on the range of hills varying in height from 120 ft. to 200 ft. on the left bank of the River Alma, and on the morning of September 20th the allies prepared to attack them. The French and Turks began the battle, Marshal St. Arnaud attacking the left of the Russian position, and the centre with the aid of one British division, and Lord Raglan the right. The French General Bosquet made a brilliant advance, and drove the enemy from some high ground, but the French centre did not support him, and he was isolated; Raglan therefore decided to order the second and light divisions to advance, and this they did under a murderous cannonade. "Opposed to the English were at least two-thirds of the Russians," but the young and untried soldiers of Britain once again demonstrated the splendid fighting material of which they were made. Through the entangling vineyards and into the rapid waters of the Alma they steadily marched; emerging, they were ordered "to fix bayonets, get up the bank, and advance to the attack." They quickly climbed the steep and rugged hill-sides, but received a check, and then some one calling "Cease fire and retire," they became somewhat confused; they soon rallied, and the light division stormed into the great redoubt with its 14 guns of heavy calibre, carried the Kourgane hill, defended by 17,000 men with two redoubts and 14 guns, and then, with their depleted and broken ranks swelled by the Guards and the Highlanders, the Black Watch to the fore, who had pressed into the fight and up the Kourgane hill, charged the heights and at the point of the bayonet drove the Russians off in confusion. Thus the battle of the Alma was won, not by the brilliant tactics of the officers, but by the courage and tenacity of the men, and so by 6 o'clock in the evening Marshal St. Arnaud's tent was pitched on the spot where Mentschikoff had his headquarters in the morning. After the battle, a staff officer relates, Lord Raglan's eyes filled with tears when he shook hands with Sir Colin Campbell, and "he could not speak when the brave old veteran said to him, pointing to the dead Highlanders, 'Sir, it was they who did it,' and then the cheer went up when he asked to wear a bonnet! With its horrors, war has its romance." The same officer, writing a little later, said, "Glory when looked at close, and while it is being earned, is rather an ugly thing." The heroes of the Crimea certainly learned that.

The late Major-General (then Colour-Sergeant) Luke O'Connor, gained his Victoria Cross in this battle. Ensign Anstruther of the Royal Welsh had with boyish impetuosity gallantly rushed forward and, outpacing all, proudly planted the Queen's colour on the parapet of the Redoubt; riddled with Russian bullets he fell, but O'Connor, taking the colour from his dying grasp again planted them on the Redoubt, and, although wounded in the breast, carried them through the rest of the fight. Captain (afterwards Major-General) Bell, C.B., also won his V.C. at the heights of Alma for his daring conduct on that day, when, all the senior officers of the regiment being placed _hors de combat_, he found himself in command, and successfully brought the 23rd out of action. The gallant Welsh Fusiliers, who were the first to land in the Crimea, lost their colonel and 8 officers, and the Light Division, of which they formed part, lost 47 officers and 850 men. The Division was composed of the 7th, 19th, 23rd, 33rd, 77th, and 88th. The total British losses were 2,000, and those of the French 3 officers, including Generals Canrobert and Thomas wounded and 560 men. The Russians had 5,000 placed _hors de combat_, including 45 officers, among whom were Generals Karganoff and Shokanoff.

The regiments present at the Alma were the Grenadier, Coldstream, and Scots Guards; 1st, 4th, 7th, 19th, 20th, 21st, 23rd, 28th, 30th, 33rd, 38th, 41st, 42nd, 44th; two companies of the 46th; 47th, 49th, 50th, 55th, 63rd, 68th, 77th, 79th, 88th, 93rd, 95th Foot; 4th and 13th Light Dragoons; 8th and 11th Hussars and 17th Lancers. The cavalry were never called into action. Lord Raglan had said he preferred to keep his "cavalry in a band-box."

=Siege of Sebastopol.=--On September 23rd, 1854, the army began its slow and "most remarkable flank march in military history." Balaklava was ultimately reached, "the result of blind accident rather than knowledge of how war should be conducted," and the armies of Britain and France settled down on the Chersonese upland, and the siege of Sebastopol commenced. From September 28th, 1854, it ran its long course until September 11th, 1855, when the Russians, who had fought so well under Todleben, retired and the allies entered it unopposed. This long and complex siege cannot here be dealt with in detail. How the unfortunate troops fared in the trenches has passed into the history of this country as a blot upon the administration which allowed brave men to die like flies; "between November 1854 and February 1855 there were 9,000 deaths in hospital, and by the end of February there were no less than 13,600 officers and men in hospital," and no wonder when men, emaciated by disease and tried by the severe weather, "carrying great-coat and blanket, marched through a sea of mud to the trenches," where they remained in a cramped position all night until day broke, and, after a few hours' rest, "often in a puddle, which chilled their bones under a worn-out tent through which the rain beat"; they who had the heart of a lion were compelled to do asses' work. The hospitals were frequently merely bell tents, and "the men lay, often in mud, on the ground, and in many cases their diet was only meat and biscuit. They were, moreover, so crowded together that the doctors could scarcely pass between the patients." The heroic Florence Nightingale, as every one knows, with her band of nurses helped to lighten the burden of pain and suffering which the men endured, but the lasting disgrace which attaches to the callous administrators of the period is only accentuated when we consider the dire necessity for her action.

=Capture of the Mamelon.=--Sebastopol was bombarded, with the co-operation of the fleet, on October 17th, and the Russians made their first sortie on the 26th; in March 1855 they made another, and on April 9th the place was ineffectively bombarded; but on June 6th a bombardment was followed by an assault, and the Mamelon, an outwork of the Malakoff, was taken. Then the allies essayed the capture of the Malakoff and the Redan, the French to take the former and the British the latter; but despite the strenuous efforts of the men, the forts remained in the possession of the enemy. In these abortive attempts on June 17th and 18th the French lost 3,500 men, and the British 1,500; and of the six British and French Generals and Commanders who led the attacks on the 18th, 4 were killed and 1 wounded. The Royal Irish lost 259 officers and men by death and wounds in the attack on the Redan, and Captain Thomas Esmond of that regiment gained the V.C. and Sergeant John Grant the Meritorious Service medal. The Russians lost 4,500 officers and men killed and wounded. The siege was, following these repulses, resumed in the ordinary way, and the stubborn Russians, who were losing 250 men each day, began to realise that their magnificent courage could not stand much longer against the determination of the allies; and at the end of August, when the brave garrison was being depleted by the loss of over 900 each day, they determined upon the evacuation of the fortress they had held so well. So they built a bridge across the outer harbour, and made preparations to cover their retreat.

=Capture of the Malakoff.=--Then the allies again determined to reduce the fortress, and bombarded it for practically three days and nights, at the end of which, on September 8th, the French again assailed the Malakoff, and carried and held it against the enemy, but the British failed to capture the Redan. The British losses were 2,271 officers and men placed _hors de combat_, including three generals wounded, and the French 7,567, including 5 generals killed and 4 wounded. The Russian losses were 12,915, including 9 generals. During the night the Russians exploded their mines, and Prince Gortschakoff successfully took his garrison, with most of the wounded, across the bridge, which they destroyed, and took up a position on the heights to the north of Sebastopol, from whence they cannonaded the fortress which the allies had occupied. The war was thus virtually at an end, although hostilities continued until February 1856, and the treaty of peace was not signed in Paris until March 29th.

Meanwhile the battles of Balaklava and Inkermann had been fought, both brought about by the efforts of the Russians to raise the siege, and both battles remarkable for the courage and fearlessness of the British troops, and alas! for the lack of simple military genius on the part of many of the officers. As a military authority has stated, "The army ought to have been beaten according to all the canons of war, but it wasn't!" Tommy Atkins saved the face of his superiors.

=Balaklava.=--The charge of the Light Brigade in this battle was an example of what appears to have been either muddle-headedness or overweening belief in the importance of our cavalry, but it gave to the Light Cavalry of the British Army undying fame. Their "death-ride" gave them eternal life! The battle of Balaklava was fought on October 25th, 1854, the anniversary of Agincourt. The Russian relieving force, numbering 22,000 infantry and 3,400 cavalry, with 78 guns, advanced from the Tchernaya by Kamara across the Woronzoff Road to attack the front of the position at Balaklava, and to meet them Lord Raglan took down the first and fourth divisions to the plain, which General Canrobert--St. Arnaud had died--reinforced with the first division of French Infantry and the Chasseurs d'Afrique.

="The Thin Red Line."=--The Russians obtained possession of three forts, and managed to retain two of them with 7 guns; then "their artillery advanced with a large mass of cavalry, and their guns ranged to the 93rd Highlanders, which, with 100 invalids, under Lieutenant-Colonel Daveney, in support, occupied very insufficiently, from the smallness of their numbers, the slightly rising ground in front of No. 4 Battery." Then a body of the enemy's cavalry, "amounting to about 400, turned to their left, separating themselves from those who attacked Lord Lucan's Division, and charged the 93rd Highlanders, who immediately advanced to the crest of the hill, on which they stood and opened their fire, which forced the Russian cavalry to give way and turn to their left; after which they made an attempt to turn the flank of the 93rd ... upon which the Grenadiers of the 93rd under Captain Ross were wheeled up to their right and fired on the enemy, which manœuvre completely discomforted them." Thus the gallant Sir Colin Campbell officially described the deed of the "thin red line" at Balaklava; that line of imperturbable Highlanders armed only with muzzle loaders, that, despite the rounds of shot and shell which harried them, dared to accept the charge of cavalry and drove them off.

=Charge of the Heavy Brigade.=--Then the main body of the Russian horsemen, about 3,000, advanced against the British Heavy Brigade, 900 sabres strong. The light-blue jackets, with embroidery of silver lace, the grey coats of the Dragoons, and the glitter of the lances, made a brave picture as the enemy's cavalry cantered toward their objective. They "nearly halted. Their first line was at least double the length of ours--it was three times as deep. Behind them was a similar line, equally strong and compact. They evidently despised their insignificant-looking enemy," but the trumpets rang out again in the valley; then Brigadier-General Scarlett, with about 300 Scots Greys and Enniskilleners, went right at the centre of the Russian cavalry, and then, as W. H. Russell, the famous _Times_ correspondent, graphically described, "as lightning flashes through a cloud the Greys and Enniskilleners pierced through the dark masses of the Russians. The shock was but of a moment. There was a clash of steel, and a light play of sword blades in the air, and then the Greys and the redcoats disappeared in the midst of the shaken and quivering columns. In another moment we saw them emerging with diminished numbers, and in broken order, charging against the second line. It was a terrible moment.... With unbated fire the noble hearts dashed at the enemy. It was a fight of heroes.... By sheer steel and sheer courage, Enniskillener and Scot were winning their desperate way through the enemy's squadrons, and already grey horses and red coats had appeared right at the rear of the second mass, when, with visible force, like one bolt from a bow, the 4th Dragoon Guards riding straight at the right flank of the Russians, and the 5th Dragoon Guards, following close after the Enniskilleners, rushed at the remnants of the first line of the enemy, went through it as though it were made of pasteboard, and put them to utter rout." Then followed that "superb incident--at once a blunder and a miracle."

=Charge of the Light Brigade.=--Lord Raglan, being desirous that the withdrawal of the Russians should be taken advantage of to regain the heights, and fearing that the enemy might attempt to remove the guns from the redoubts captured from the Turks, gave orders for the Light Cavalry to be moved forward. Captain Nolan misconstrued the order, and indicated to Lord Lucan that the heavy battery of guns a mile away, supported by masses of cavalry and infantry, with other batteries on either flank, was to be charged. Lucan hesitated to carry the mad order into effect, but ultimately decided that it was his duty to do so, and gave the order to the Earl of Cardigan to take the terrible odds which he saw arrayed against him. Cardigan, like Scarlett, was a brave and daring cavalry leader, and into the "valley of death" he rode with his Light Brigade of 621 men. Encircled by fire they charged down the valley, dashed through the guns, sabred the gunners where they stood, cut their way through a brigade of Russian cavalry and a company of infantry, turned about, what was left of them, when four squadrons of Lancers were hurled at them, but they met the charge gallantly, and then the Russian artillerymen, recovering from their shock, but without regaining their senses, turned their guns upon the daring British cavalry and their own men who were struggling with them! The Greys and Enniskilleners, and the Chasseurs d'Afrique created a diversion, otherwise it is doubtful whether a single man of that brave little band, which rode so fearlessly and fought so uselessly, would have survived to receive the plaudits of his countrymen, and--shame of shames--as was the case with several of them, to end his days in the workhouse or eke them out with the aid of charity. It were almost idle for the poet to sing:

"Honour the charge they made! Honour the Light Brigade, Noble six hundred!"

Four hundred and twenty-six of the brigade were placed _hors de combat_, 13 officers and 162 men were killed or taken prisoners, the former including Captain Nolan, who was struck early in the charge by a piece of shell and killed; 27 officers and 224 men were wounded. There struggled back to camp, in scattered groups, a remnant of 195 mounted men. In this charge Quartermaster Charles Wooden, whose group of medals forms the frontispiece to this volume, as Sergeant-Major in the 17th Lancers, gained the Victoria Cross by assisting Surgeon Mouat in saving the life of Lieutenant-Colonel Morris of his own regiment when lying exposed to a heavy fire of shot and shell, and carrying him to a place of safety. The Sergeant-Major had a horse shot under him.

The regiments engaged at Balaklava were the Heavy Brigade, comprising the 1st, 2nd, and 6th Dragoons; 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards; the Light Brigade, consisting of the 13th Light Dragoons and 17th Lancers in the first line, 4th Light Dragoons and 8th and 11th Hussars in the second line, and the 93rd Highlanders; but men of the Rifle and Naval Brigades, and of the artillery and various line regiments, including the 4th, 19th, 21st, 30th, 33rd, 44th, 47th, 50th, 53rd, 68th, and 77th, were also present and received the medal with the bar for Balaklava.

=Inkermann.=--On Sunday, November 5th, 1854, the battle of Inkermann was fought. The Russians had received considerable reinforcements; it is estimated that by that time 120,000 troops were under Prince Mentschikoff's command, and the Czar's soldiers were in high fettle, owing to the presence in camp of the Czar's sons, Michael and Nicholas. A general advance was made by the Russians, Mount Inkermann being the objective, and the battle commenced by an assault thereon by General Danneburg with about 40,000 men. The Mount of Inkermann and the district thereof was held by the Second Division under General Pennefeather. At daybreak masses of Russians were discerned marching to the attack, and soon afterwards the armies were in conflict. Then began the "soldiers' battle," which was to add lustre to the record of the several British regiments whose gallantry gained the day. How can one adequately paint the picture of 200 men of the 30th charging a couple of Russian battalions and putting them to rout, or of the 49th defeating a strong column and chasing their flying foemen? How can one do justice to the 525 men of the 41st who fought and dispersed five battalions of the enemy, and the 260 men of the 77th who put to rout 1,500 of the famous Tomsk Regiment? In the first stage of the battle 4,000 British soldiers beat back 15,000 Russians from the slopes of Inkermann, where, in the detached fighting that had taken place, many a V.C. was well earned. In the second stage the terrific struggle ranged around the worthless sand-bag battery; seven times did the Russians capture it, and as often was it retaken by the British, each time with awful slaughter, until the dead lay around the battery in heaps and filled the entrenchment. In this useless and stubborn fight Generals Adams, Cathcart, and Torrens fell. There young Captain Stanley of the "Die Hards" fell as he called to his men to "remember Albuera" and follow him. There a few hundred Coldstreams, who had 8 officers killed, fought back to back against 6,000 Russians, and sustained "the bloodiest struggle ever witnessed since war cursed the earth." Then two 18-pounders were ordered up by Lord Raglan, and, as happened at the Alma, helped to determine the events of the day. An artillery duel resulted, many a British gunner falling by his gun, in the discomfiture of the enemy ere the Zouaves, led by their Vivandière, pushed into the fight and drove the Russians toward the sand-bag battery, where the dead had formed a wall. The French Zouaves and British soldiers then made short work of the contest, and the Zouaves' standard was firmly planted on the sand-bag battery. By 1 o'clock the battle was decided, but such was the straggling and intermittent nature of the fighting that it was not until 3 o'clock that Mount Inkermann was again entirely in the possession of the allies. In this great battle 10 British Generals were killed or wounded--Lord Raglan alone being unharmed--39 officers and 558 men killed, and 1,760 officers and men wounded (rather more than one-third of the total strength of the army engaged). The French lost 130 killed and wounded, and the Russians over 11,000, including 256 officers killed.