rested till 9 or 10 A.M., and then marched to Balaklava for food, or for coal. This latter we carried up in haversacks, one on either side, and gave it in at the company kitchens. After the battle of Balaklava we lost the use of the Woronzow Road. The state of the track now traversed especially on the Col de Balaklava (i.e., the rise from the plain to the upland), has been vividly portrayed by Sir E. Hamley, but even his description of its horrors falls short of the facts. On more than one occasion during the winter my boots were sucked off my feet by the tenacious mud, churned up in the rich alluvial soil of the valley; and in January I saw eighteen horses trying in vain to drag a gun on a travelling carriage, with five feet diameter wheels, over the hill, which, early in October, offered no difficulties to the hand power of the sailors, even with the gun on the board-ship trucks.1 But all our journeys were not undertaken for our stomachs. Our chiefs were renewing the armament of the batteries, prior to an assault in which the English were to storm the Redan and Barrack battery. This assault was unavoidably delayed till after the Russians had been strongly re-inforced, and they occupied the Mamelon while we were thinking of doing so, and thus the assault was eventually postponed indefinitely. We transported our own ammunition, each blue-jacket carrying a cartridge, sixteen pounds in weight, for the 68-pounder guns, on either side of the body. The men at first disliked carrying these to the battery, thinking that thirty-two pounds of powder was a disagreeable load under fire, but the officers setting the example in picking up the bags, nothing was said, and the load was soon preferred to that of round-shot, as being of easier carriage. Later in the siege the Naval Brigade furnished daily parties for carrying up hutting materials for the army, besides two hundred men to assist the railway plate-layers. 1 Wheels of eighteen inches diameter. We were not the only combatants acting as transport. The infantry at Balaklava during December and January, carried seven thousand loads of siege materials to the Engineer Parks, and one hundred and forty-five tons weight of biscuit to the Army Headquarters depôt. It was not till the spring of 1855 that Croats were engaged as carriers, although we were within two days' steaming of Constantinople, where all merchandise and personal luggage is transported on the backs of men, who at that time earned from 9d. to 1s. per diem. Even had they been unwilling to come to the Crimea on any terms, and we could have been generous, the ministers of the sultan, who was then our "very good friend," could doubtless have found means of persuading them if the Porte's aid had been invoked. A man who has been practising economy all his life, and referring to a central office for authority to expend even the smallest sums, cannot change his habits in a few weeks, so I impute no blame, but merely record a fact noted in my journal, dated 1st January, 1855, which irritated us at the time:~ We were offered last week three hundred ponies, brought up to Balaklava on speculation, but the officer thinking the price too high, refused to purchase till he had got authority from a superior. This he obtained, but when he returned next day the French had bought the cargo. As yet A day or two after shifting our position, our senior officer had a visit from the officer commanding a French regiment, stationed immediately above our camp, who said: "We think your sailors have somewhat indistinct ideas about ownership of animals. our men have strict orders not to retaliate, but I must explain that this cannot continue, and as I have some of the most expert thieves in Paris under my command, unless your men desist, some morning when you awake, you'll find half your camp gone!" I presume this was a word in time for we remained good friends. During the last days of November, and the first of December, the Russians Few men till late in December had more than one shirt, which they had worn incessantly day and night for weeks. During the last week of October, when the days were pleasantly warm, our soldiers tried to wash their only shirt, and every afternoon in the reconnoitred our position at night, and | soldier staggering out of the trenches we were ordered to keep full gun de- towards camp, till he fell. Captain tachments in the batteries. This was Lushington hurried to him, but he was irksome, for the trenches were fre- already dead, having struggled on till quently inundated by the heavy rains, his heart ceased to act. and we had to sit on stones or shell boxes, to keep our feet out of the water. Just before daylight on the 2nd December, the Russians, bayoneting a pair of our advanced sentries who were sound asleep, fell on a picquet, which benumbed with cold could offer but little resistance. Its relief, how-trenches the covering parties might be ever, came up at the moment, and our men then charged and drove the enemy back. A few nights later, not only were the sentries killed, but several lice; they had but one pair of lace men of their reliefs (I counted seven) boots, which when wet, they were were bayoneted through their blankets, afraid to take off, lest they should fail while lying asleep in the advanced to get them on again. When questrench. The Russians at this time frequently sent out a dozen men, who, crawling up near our works, opened fire; this obliged our soldiers to remain on the alert, but their incessant work was daily rendering them less capable of remaining awake. As Lord Raglan wrote: "Our men are on duty five nights out of the six, a large proportion constantly under fire." seen sitting naked, and picking vermin of all kinds from their garments. Now, their hair and bodies swarmed with tioned by the doctor they would often deny that they felt numbness in the feet, lest they should be ordered to take off their boots, and go to hospital. The life of an infantry soldier belonging to a battalion in the front was thus spent: The men were mustered, carrying great-coat and blanket, just before dusk, and marched through a sea of mud into the trenches, which were full of deep holes from which boulders and stones had been taken; into these holes, owing to darkness, the men often fell. When the soldier reached his position, he had to sit with his back to the parapet, and his feet drawn up close to allow others to pass along the four feet wide trench. If he was not for picquet in the advanced In the second week of December, I went to sleep in the 21-gun battery about 8 P.M., when it was freezing, and I was more anxious to get out of the wind than into a dry spot. The wind dropped and it rained about 2 A.M., when, although I felt I was getting wet, I was too tired to rise. When I tried to do so just before day-trenches, he could lie down, hoping light, I could not move, the water having frozen around me, for with the coming day the temperature had fallen. My comrades carried me back, and putting hot bottles to my feet and around my body, with loving care and attention saved me from frost-bite. Numbers of our sentries were thus affected, and six weeks later some of the Naval Brigade officers went round every morning before daylight, to bring in soldiers who from the intense cold had become incapable of movement. Our commodore records in his diary that he watched, later in the siege, a that his comrades out in the front would, by keeping awake, give sufficient warning in the event of an attack. Assuming the soldier was not on picquet and there was no alarm, and these were of frequent occurrence, he could lie down till daylight, when he marched back to camp. In the early part of the winter he was generally on duty two nights out of three, and later, every other night. This applied, however, to those men who were required only as a guard or reserve in the trenches, and not to the condition of those who were employed to time to tell off men to bury the quantities thrown away. Salt pork, which was issued two days out of seven, was frequently eaten by the men in its raw state, from the difficulties of finding fuel to cook it. from two to three hundred yards in tious. On his return he had again to advance, often within conversational gather fuel to boil the salt beef or salt distance of the opposing sentries. The pork in his mess tin, which did not reliefs of the sentries could snatch a hold water enough to abstract the salt. dog's sleep, four hours out of six, A portion of it therefore only was conhoping their comrades would, by re-sumed, and it was necessary from time maining on the alert, give them time to jump up ere the enemy was on them; but for the two hours each man was out near the enemy, the strain on the nervous system would have been great even to a robust, well-fed man. These sentries had necessarily to stand absolutely still, silent, and watchful, and as the severity of the weather became more and more marked, numbers of men whose frames were weakened by want of adequate nutritious food were found in the morning frost-bitten and unable to move. One battalion which landed nearly nine hundred strong early in November was actually in the trenches six nights out of seven, and then became so reduced, not only in numbers, but also in the men's bodily strength, that it was unable to go on duty again. Shortly before dusk the soldier either marched back to the trenches, or lay down to sleep, if he was not on picquet in front of the camp. Many men, disliking to report themselves sick, were carried back from the trenches in the morning, and died a few hours afterwards; those who reported sick were taken to hospital, in many cases a bell tent; here the men lay often in mud on the ground, and in many instances their food was only salt meat and biscuit, and they were so crowded together that the medical officer could scarcely pass between the patients. The regimental medical officers, unable to procure medical comforts, medicine, or proper housing, were eager to send down their patients, even in storm and rain, to Balaklava, as the best chance of saving their lives. As we had no transport, and the French could not always lend us mule littertransport, many were necessarily carried on cavalry horses, which, slipping up on the hill beside Balaklava, often caused the further injury or death of the patient. As I was returning from When the soldier got back to camp, he used to lie under a worn-out tent, through which the rain beat, often in a puddle which chilled his bones. The less robust would fall asleep completely worn out, to awake shivering, and in many cases to be carried to a hospital scarcely more comfortable than the tent which they had left, and thence to a grave in two or three days. Those who were stronger, went out and collected roots of brushwood, or of vine, and roasted the green coffee ration in the tin of the canteen; then, as al-Balaklava, on more than one occasion I ready described, pounding in it a frag- met a party of sick, mainly frost-bitten, ment of shell with a stone, ere they riding cavalry horses, the troopers leadboiled it for use. Others unequal to ing them and holding the men on, but this laborious process, would drink the ground was covered with snow and their rum with a piece of biscuit and very slippery, and on the hill above lie down in the great-coat and blanket Kadikoi, I once saw every man have a which they had brought, often wet fall from the horses slipping, and somethrough, from the trenches. times falling. In the afternoon the soldier was sent on fatigue from five to seven miles, according to the position of his camp, usually to Balaklava, to bring up ra The small schoolhouse at Balaklava held only between three hundred and four hundred men, thus the great majority of the sick and wounded were necessarily laid on the beach, exposed 1 In February, two hundred and ninety all ranks. to the elements in all weathers, await ing their turns for embarkation in the transports. While on the steamer between Balaklava and the Bosphorus, a voyage of from thirty-six to fortyeight hours, the soldier seldom got anything but tea and biscuit, sometimes only water. Yet no man was ever heard, even in hospital, to complain, or even to allude to his sufferings, except as incidents inseparable from war time. I have given some instances of our ignorance of war, but surely there is nothing in history grauder than the enduring courage and discipline of the British soldier as shown in the winter 1854-5. There was practically no crime. It is true sentries fell asleep, but not till the men's strength was exhausted by starvation, exposure, and overwork. The engineer officers often complained of the smallness of the task executed by working parties, but the majority of the workers were more fit for a convalescent home than for hard labor. When the men were so listless at night as to vex energetic officers who were anxious to push forward the covered ways towards the enemy's works, it needed only a sortie, and the inspiring shout of any officer whose voice they could recognize in the darkness, to send a few men headlong into a crowd of Russians. Though there was an absolute weakness of bodily strength, yet the men's spirits never quailed, and it was a common occurrence for men to deny feeling ill, lest they should throw more duty on their comrades. sioned officers, a small proportion of old soldiers, and reserve men; but we who saw the old soldier die without a murmur, may well be excused dilating on his virtues when we endeavor to describe what he suffered for our country, which, having given him a task far beyond his strength, failed to supply him with clothes and food. When the soldier reached Scutari in the early mouths of the war, his treatment was very different from what it became later. In peace time the soldier in hospital used his own underlinen, knife, fork, and spoon, and as at first there was no supply of these articles in the field hospitals, and next to none at Scutari, the result was painful, for when dysenteric patients were admitted, their shirts, worn day and night for months, were necessarily, in many cases, cut from off the men's backs. Miss Nightingale arrived at Scutari on the 4th of November, and although, in the first instance, she acted as an adviser only of the secretary of state for war, yet her local power increased daily; the doctors assisted her, and if our departments were slow to act- -a natural result of close inquiry into estimates - yet the irresponsible public, when made aware, by the graphic correspondence of Mr. W. H. Russell, of the situation in the Crimea, was quick, and the distribution of the Times fund began at Scutari in December. A month later, those in the Crimea were also benefited by it. I have before me a sketch of Inkerman by Simpson, cut from an illustrated paper of February 10th, 1855. On the reverse side I read : English Funds heavy. Proposed army increase of thirty-five thousand men has a depressing effect. . . . The army in the Crimea falls into the most heartrending' condition, but it is the press ... The epoch of the old soldier, as known in long service armies, has passed away. After twelve or fifteen years in the ranks as a private, his field service value sensibly decreases. Moreover, except in the small proportion of about one-twentieth of our forces, he declines to serve on. There- which exposes the truth.” fore, he cannot be seen again, nor Much had been done at Scutari by indeed would he be so effective for the single engineer officer available modern warfare, as the more fully before Miss Nightingale arrived, but instructed soldier of to-day, when stiffened by experienced non-commis 1 When full-grown. more was needed. The buildings we occupied were magnificent in appearance, but underneath were sewers and cesspools choked with filth. The wind blew sewer gas into the corridors | alone, lost on an average thirty-nine where many of the sick were lying. per cent. but in eight battalions which The wards had no ventilation, and the were most hardly worked, the morpatients were greatly overcrowded. tality amounted to over seventy per The closets in the upper floor were cent. drained by earthen piping running There were many causes accounting down through the walls, and these for this remarkable difference of the being misused, as is the wont of un-military and naval forces, but their releducated folks, were constantly choked, ative importance may be stated in causing an intolerable stench. Rags, sequence as follows: bed-clothing, and bones, were often The sailors hadremoved from the pipes, and on one occasion the body of a newly born baby, for the building was occupied not only as a hospital, but also as a depôt for troops. Good cooking arrangements, Less work. The After the great storm the Naval Brigade moved to a sheltered valley. When the troops landed at Gallipoli men lived in tents throughout the winin the early spring of 1854, the women ter, but they were thoroughly drained, and children accompanied some battal- and shelters were made for drying ions, and although they were at once clothes, by building up walls and covordered back, a few managed to remain ering them with hides and tarpaulins. at Scutari. From the end of 1854 So much importance was attached to there was continuous improvement in this point that the first hut we got from the drainage and administration, and England, erected about the middle of when, stricken by typhoid, I lay there January, was converted into a drying several months in 1856, until my room. The company cooks were not mother's nursing and a strong consti- taken to the trenches; 2 good soup tution enabled me to travel by short cauldrons were made out of empty stages to England, the hospital was as powder cases; parties, commanded by perfect as it could be made.1 The an officer who himself always carried a death rate in the hospitals, both front load, brought charcoal or coal from aud base, shows clearly when our mis- Balaklava daily; our water supply was eries culminated good, and close at hand, for we got some well-sinkers from the army, and thus ensured our men drinking from an uncontaminated source. Great attention was paid to the sanitation of our camp, and to ensure its perfect cleanlibut from February on it steadily dimin-ness the latrines were dug on the ished, and in June, 1855, was no greater than in hospitals at home. July 1854-5. 380 1,900 3,100 While the soldiers were thus dying at a rate exceeding the percentage of deaths from the Great Plague of London, in 1665, the Naval Brigade enjoyed comparatively good health, losing ten and a half per cent. only, of which seven per cent. were fatal wound cases, against an average of fifteen per cent. in the cavalry, and twenty-four per cent. in the battalions around Balaklava, which carried stores. The infantry in the front, from sickness I gathered, in August, 1894, that the Turks had reverted to their system of drainage. opposite side of the ravine, over which we threw a suspension bridge. We received certain necessaries from army stores on application, irrespective of the time we had worn our garments since leaving our ships, while in the army there arose delays and misunderstandings as to whether free issues were to be made, or a subsequent charge exacted from the men. In the morning, either coffee or cocoa, generally the latter, was prepared, as on board ship. On a slight increase of sickness - it being sus I believe, from December onward, most battalions left some cooks in camp. |