cutting roads, effecting preliminary reconnaissances, preparing an
hospital, and in providing domiciles for the temporary accommodation of
the company, by making huts of the branches of fir trees; while a strong
party, about 400 yards from the hill, worked with unflagging industry in
making fascines and filling sand-bags, which, when finished, were
carried by the seamen and marines to the depôt near the site of the
intended battery.
Meanwhile two or three attempts had been made by some officers of the
corps, attended by a few intrepid sappers, to trace the battery; but the
enemy opened so heavy a fire upon the parties, that a suspension of
their exertions necessarily followed. Determination and tact, however,
got over the difficulty. No trace was used, but a simple alignment
struck, from which, on the 13th August, under shade of the evening,
sergeant John Jones and twenty-four rank and file, began to construct
the battery, under the orders of Captain Ord. Without the chance of
digging a shovel-full of earth to give solidity and strength to the
cover, the battery was built on the bare rock entirely of fascines and
sand-bags. The sappers reared it unassisted, except that the royal
marines carried the material from the engineer’s park to the hill.
Sergeant John Jones had the honour of laying the first sand-bag. In ten
hours, the detachment, unrelieved, nearly completed the battery, which
would soon have opened upon Fort Tzee; but the French having forestalled
the arrangement by obtaining the surrender of its commandant, the
battery was free for other employment, and its direction was
consequently changed against Fort Nottich. Speedily the epaulement which
flanked the battery was prolonged, the platforms promptly laid, and
three 32-pounders having been placed in position, the embrasures were
unmasked by some daring sappers, and the firing, which lasted about nine
hours, ended at the fall of the day in the capture of the garrison. It
was surrendered to Captain Ord, R.E., who had with him to receive the
formal capitulation, a force of 100 of the royal marines and five rank
and file of the sappers.
The added work was partly constructed in the day, under fire, as was
also the laying of the platforms. Corporal Peter Leitch,[135] a
first-class carpenter with some handy men of the company, attended to
this service. The working party was relieved every four hours day and
night, until the battery was completed, and also during the siege, to
throw fatigue and danger equally upon all. The guns fired by the seamen
and marine artillery were first drawn by them to the battery on sledges
of a novel construction, over steep and rugged ascents. When they
reached the camp, however, their labours were considerably diminished,
as a road to assist them had been cut by the sappers, up the hill to the
breaching battery, under the orders of Captain King. Corporal George
Luke acted as overseer in this duty. Two of the men were allotted to
each of the guns to keep the embrasures in good order. This they usually
attended to while the gun was loading, and not a few displayed a stoical
coolness and intrepidity in repairing the damaged merlons, and clearing
away the debris occasioned by the enemy’s cannonade. Though the fire
upon the battery was warm at times, the casualties only embraced two
killed, of whom one was the Hon. Lieutenant Cameron Wrottesley, R.E.,
and one wounded. None of the sappers were even touched; and this good
fortune, as well for them as the seamen and marines, was attributed to
the prudence of Brigadier-General Jones, who had men appointed to look
out and warn the battery when the enemy’s guns were fired. These
“look-out” men were sappers—alert spirits with quick eyes and stout
hearts—who gave the alarm the instant a flash was seen at the fort. The
better to enable them to give the intimation they took ground in advance
of the battery in some chasms of the rock, where, although partially
screened by the natural cover of their hiding places, it was a wonder
that they escaped unhurt. Privates James Moncur[136] and Thomas
Ross[137] were most conspicuous in this hazardous duty.
When the French had captured Fort Tzee the Brigadier-General gave an
order for sergeant John Jones to make a plan of it. He had a note to the
officer commanding the garrison requesting the service to be permitted.
Taking with him privates John S. Rowley and George Peters to assist, he
started on the morning of the 15th, but contrary to expectation found
the French had abandoned the work and taken shelter in an advanced
trench. Presenting the request to the French Commandant, the sergeant
awaited authority to proceed. The fort was on fire, having been shelled
by the Russians the previous evening. The Commandant and several French
officers advised Jones not to venture into the place, but with
soldier-like firmness he persevered in urging the performance of the
duty; and permission being granted, he and his assistants went on. Going
through one of the embrasures, which was on fire, and the gun-carriage
burning, they pushed into the tower. Loose powder, broken cartridges,
and five shells were lying about; the flames had nearly spread to the
principal magazine, the remainder of the building had more or less fire
in every casemate, and the smoke in thick columns was streaming from the
crackling apertures. With difficulty they gained the first floor, and
then, finding the stairs, penetrated to the roof, not without being
almost suffocated, and losing, for a time, private Rowley in the smoke.
From floor to floor and embrasure to embrasure they moved, in hopes of
stealing the barest chance of taking even a few measurements, but their
efforts were unavailing; and so, compelled to quit the tower, they had
scarcely reached their own camp, about 1,200 yards away, when the flames
having communicated with the magazine, it exploded, and the fort blew
up.
Without attempting to chronicle the different incidents of the campaign,
in which the fleet and the French troops so gallantly participated, it
will be sufficient to note that Bomarsund, the principal fort of the
Aland Islands, capitulated without material opposition, and the Russians
were marched out prisoners of war. The sappers and miners and royal
marines formed in line, faced by a force of the French infantry; and
through their divided ranks, the Russians moved pensively away to the
point arranged for their departure.
No sooner were the forts in possession of the allies than measures were
taken to disable the guns and dismantle the works. The sappers only were
employed in carrying out the mining operations under the direction of
their officers. In this duty they worked with so much energy, that their
exertions were scarcely checked by the fatigues to which they were
necessarily subjected. Forts Prasto, Nottich, and Bomarsund all fell in
turn—blown up by mines skilfully laid and fired. The magazines also were
exploded, the shot and shell removed, and stores of timber, prepared for
use in the contemplated fortifications, were burnt. The work of
destruction extended even to the garrison chapel; it was sacked and then
destroyed, and all the unfinished forts and buildings, rising from
foundations which marked the extent of a stupendous engineering design,
were torn up by mines and thrown down. The stone landing-pier was
likewise demolished, and not a slab of granite which promised to be of
service in future works was left unbroken. But a few weeks, and what a
change! This proud maritime position—this formidable outport of the yet
impregnable Cronstadt, studded with forts and bristling with ordnance,
was one widespread area of ruin and desolation!
Brigadier-General Jones and the officers of the corps were well pleased
with the military bearing and exertions of the company, and commended
the “cheerful and willing manner in which they performed the laborious
duties” assigned to them. Besides the non-commissioned officers and men
named above, there were others noted for their services. Privates John
Williams,[138] John Veitch,[139] and Francis Enright, for their
boldness, resolution, and zeal. Corporal George Luke,[140] for his
ability and usefulness as a miner in the demolition of Bomarsund.
Sergeant John Jones,[141] for his assistance as a draughtsman; and
sergeant Richard P. Jones,[142] for his general diligence and
intelligence, as well in the general operations as in the special one of
diving. The ‘Penelope’ having run ashore on an unknown rock off
Bomarsund, was compelled to throw fifteen of her guns overboard to float
and save her. Several naval divers attached to the fleet were afterwards
employed to bring them up; but as some submarine difficulties prevented
as speedy an accomplishment of the undertaking as was desired, the
co-operation of sergeant Richard Jones was found to be an acquisition,
inasmuch as he recovered five 8-inch guns and one 10-inch.
There was much sickness among the sappers during the brief campaign, and
on one day no less than forty-seven men out of a company not a hundred
strong, were on the sick-list with choleraic symptoms; but owing to the
attention of the naval surgeons, only two died. Quitting the Baltic Sea
in the ‘Cumberland,’ the company rejoined the corps at Woolwich on the
16th October, and before two months had intervened, was despatched in
all haste to Turkey.
It is now time to turn to the East, to trace the movements and services
of the corps in that interesting quarter. The van of the army sent
thither under the command of Lord Raglan, was a small party of six rank
and file of the sappers and miners under Captain Chapman of the
engineers. They belonged to the fourth company, at Malta, whence they
sailed in the ‘Banshee’ on the 25th January, and having arrived four
days after in Beicos Bay, were the first British soldiers landed on the
Ottoman shores.
To meet the calls for its services in the coming struggle, the corps, by
order of Lord Raglan under date the 23rd February, was augmented from an
establishment of 2,218 of all ranks to 2,658 officers and men, by
enlarging the organization of each of the twenty-two companies with one
sergeant, one corporal, one second-corporal, and seventeen privates. The
corps was now fixed according to the following details:—
Colour Ser- Cor- 2nd Pri- General
Sergeant. geants. porals. Corp. Bugl. vates. Total. Total.
17 general service 1 5 6 6 2 100 120 = 2040
companies, each
1 company for Corfu 1 3 4 4 2 68 82 = 82
3 survey companies, 1 7 8 8 2 99 125 = 375
each
1 survey company 1 5 6 6 2 100 120 = 120
Sydney mint . 1 1 3 . 11 16 = 16
detachment
Van Diemen’s Land . 1 2 . . 12 15 = 15
detachment
-——
2648
Staff—1 brigade-major, 1 adjutant, 3 quartermasters, 2 sergeant-majors, 2 10
quartermaster-sergeants, and 1 bugle-major
——
Total 2658
====
To concentrate the available force for active duty, the seventh company,
employed in services of a secondary character only, was withdrawn from
Hurst Castle, and removed to Woolwich. While at the castle the company
had assisted in strengthening the place by constructing two batteries
for ten and twelve guns respectively, and also three loopholed
caponniers, built of brick and cement in the moat of the castle.
Quartered as it was upon an exposed shore, in a spot that was isolated
and dreary, the conduct of the company was anything but satisfactory,
and in the short space of eighteen months, out of a strength that
scarcely exceeded ninety non-commissioned officers and men, no fewer
than twenty-three privates deserted.
On the 24th February the eleventh company, under Captain Hassard,
embarked at Southampton for Turkey on board the ‘Himalaya’ steamer, in
which was shipped a store of intrenching tools for field operations. At
Malta they landed on the 8th March, and were temporarily quartered at
Floriana. The seventh company—Captain Gibb’s—joined them on the 27th
March, and brought with them a further supply of tools and implements.
Two days later both companies embarked in the ‘Golden Fleece,’ and
steamed off with the rifle brigade to Gallipoli, where they landed with
Lieutenant-General Sir George Brown on the 8th April. About forty
non-commissioned officers and men of the corps were left at Gallipoli,
and the remainder, marching nearly nine miles, took up a position not
far from the village of Boulair, from which the camp derived its name.
On the 17th April twelve rank and file of the eleventh company, detached
to Constantinople, joined the ‘Fury’ steamer for service in the Black
Sea, and were present at the bombardment of Odessa. The squadron was
hotly engaged when the ‘Fury’ arrived, and after firing a few rounds,
was signalled from the action by the Admiral. On the 23rd April she was
again in the fight for two hours, but her presence in the action is not
noticed in the official despatches.
Meanwhile the six men with Captain Chapman, R.E., who in the course of a
few months had been in six different vessels, were, during the
intervals, employed under their officers, surveying Fort St. Nicholas,
on the Asiatic side of the Dardanelles, and the country from thence as
far as the gulf of Saros. A few weeks later they assisted in a similar
service at Boulair and Gallipoli, and then sailing again up the
Bosphorus to Beicos Bay, landed at Therapia, from whence seven days
after they removed to Constantinople, pushing out a party of four men
under Lieutenant De Vere to survey Buyuk Tchekmedjie, a district some
twenty miles from the port.
When Sir John Burgoyne was in the country prior to the arrival of the
troops, private James Cray was his orderly, and accompanied him to Varna
and Shumla. Majors Dickson and Wellesley, with Lieutenants Burke and the
Honourable George Wrottesley and lady, were of the party. From rough
roads and inclement weather the journey was not without its trials; and
at night the little expedition rested by the road-side in any nook or
hovel where they could find shelter.
Subsequently private Cray was orderly to the heroic Lieutenant Burke,
R.E. With him he passed a few days at Silistria, and then took horse to
a small town on the banks of the Danube nine miles from Rustchuk. Major
Wellesley had given him a sword, but this was not considered sufficient
for his defence, and he was provided from the Turkish armoury with a
Minié rifle and revolver. Thus armed, he joined the Ottoman forces in an
action against the Russians, who under cover of a fusillade from a
strong body of riflemen, were endeavouring to cross the river. Met by a
fire it was impossible to stand against, they faced about and retreated
in their boats to land. Cray was thus the first soldier of the British
army engaged in the common cause, and for his conduct on the occasion
was presented by Lieutenant Burke to Omar Pacha. His next ride was to
Sistova. At the time the party entered the town an engagement was going
on, and the Turks were again victorious. Journeying onwards they crossed
to an island, where Lieutenant Burke and his orderly at imminent risk
laid out new works, and traced batteries to complete the defences of the
place. On that occasion private Cray exchanged between twenty and thirty
shots with the enemy, who kept up a sharp fire upon the party from the
opposite bank. In all his tours of inspection and survey, from the
Danube, across the Balkan chain to Adrianople, and back again by another
route to Constantinople, private Cray accompanied Lieutenant Burke, and
for his usefulness and spirited conduct was made lance-corporal and
afterwards attached as orderly to the Brigade-Major.
The detachment at Gallipoli erected piers at the port, for landing
stores, guns, &c., and prepared hospitals for the sick. The companies at
Boulair assisted to form the lines on the left of the position allotted
to the British troops to execute. About 1,500 men of the infantry were
daily distributed for some months to the trenches and roads, and
performed their tasks with ardour and cheerfulness. One man detached to
Ibridgi, about fifty miles distant on the north side of the gulf of
Saros, superintended the Greeks in felling and collecting brushwood and
timber, for the construction of magazines, platforms, log-huts, &c. A
fluctuating party, numbering at one time nine men under a corporal, was
afterwards detached on this duty.
When Sir George Brown, who commanded the division, took his departure
for the frontier, he communicated in orders of the 6th May “his entire
approbation of the general conduct, zeal, and industry of the royal
sappers and miners on the works, both at Gallipoli and the camp at
Boulair.”
Two other companies were quickly reorganised to reinforce the corps in
the East. These were the tenth under Captain Bent, to form the pontoon
train, and the eighth from Gibraltar, under Captain Bourchier. The
former embarked at Woolwich in the ‘City of London’ steamer, on board of
which was Lieutenant-General Sir De Lacy Evans and staff, and the staff
of the Duke of Cambridge. Sir De Lacy Evans was well pleased with the
conduct and services of the company on board, for they had much to
attend to in strengthening the horse-boxes. Landing at Constantinople on
the 24th April, the company was quartered in Scutari barracks, as was
also the eighth on debarking from the ‘Albatross,’ on the 9th May. The
pontoons sent out in the ‘Melbourne’ in charge of corporal William
Dickson, an able and intelligent non-commissioned officer, reached
Constantinople on the 13th May.
The sappers attached to Her Majesty’s ship ‘Fury’ being transshipped to
the ‘Agamemnon,’ bearing the flag of Rear-Admiral Lyons, served with the
squadron in a obsolete’ on the coasts of Circassia, Georgia, and
Anatolia, and were present on the 19th May in the reduction of Redout
Kaleh.
Next morning the party landed, and were employed for two days as
overseers in the defensive occupation of the place, under the orders of
Lieutenant H. Cox and H. B. Roberts, of the royal marine artillery.
Parties from all the ships were ashore at the works. The Turks, utterly
unacquainted with the mode of protecting themselves by intrenchments,
were instructed by the sappers. A Russian barrack was speedily
loopholed, a stone building in a commanding situation was converted by
massive planks into a block-house as an outwork, and a parapet was
formed, flanked by a deep marsh. Houses, too, that could not aid in the
defence were thrown down, whilst others, well sited, were turned into
points of security and resistance. The old fort on the land side was
also strengthened with additional works. When these services were
sufficiently advanced, the Turks with two sappers were left to complete
the defences, and the Anglo-French working parties, with the remainder
of the sappers, returned to their ships.
Renewing its cruise, the squadron anchored off Bardan. Landing Captain
Brock, R.N., Captain Stanton, R.E., a doctor, and four sappers, they
started, guided by an escort of Circassians commanded by Ismail Bey,
over the mountains, to communicate with the prophet-warrior Schamyl.
Late in May, Lord Raglan ordered the sappers, when employed as
artificers “in repairing tools, constructing wharves, and the like,” to
receive working pay; the non-commissioned officers at the rate of 1_s._
a-day, and the privates 6_d._ to 1_s._ a-day each, according to conduct
and ability. The non-commissioned officers appointed conductors of
stores, photographers, electricians, &c., were granted 2_s._ a-day each.
To form a connexion between the sappers and miners and the army, the
four companies with the expedition were attached to the divisions as
follows:—
1st division. 11th company Captain Hassard.
2nd ” 8th ” Captain Bourchier.
3rd ” 7th ” Captain Gibb.
Light ” 10th ” Captain Bent.
Four men employed for a few weeks with Captain Chapman, R.E., in the
survey of Buyuk Tchekmedjie, were recalled to Constantinople late in
May, as the intention of forming that district into an encampment had
been abandoned, owing to the altered character of events.
While the carpenters of the companies at Scutari were fitting up
horse-boxes for the cavalry on board the transports, a forward movement
was commenced by a detachment of one sergeant—John F. Read—and
twenty-seven rank and file of the tenth company, commanded by
Lieutenants E. C. A. Gordon and Pratt, which landed at Varna from the
‘Caradoc’ on the 22nd of May. Precedence was given to this party for the
purpose of erecting jetties to land the troops, horses, and ordnance, on
the arrival of the army.
On the 26th of May, the remainder of the company under Captain Bent,
disembarked at Varna with the pontoons, from the ‘Cyclops’ steamer. The
removal of the company was an expeditious operation, for in less than
ten hours from the time of receiving orders, the pontoons, stores,
horses, and all the miscellaneous gear attending a war company of
sappers, were stowed into one vessel, and then transshipped into another
when subsequent orders rendered such an arrangement imperative. In
allusion to the company’s departure, the corps was spoken of in the
‘Times,’ as a “most indefatigable and invaluable body of men.”[143]
Simultaneously with this movement, Captain Hassard’s company sailed from
Gallipoli, when their exertions elicited the following complimentary
order from the officer of Royal Engineers in command.
“_On board the ‘Emu,’ 25th May, 1854._
“Captain Gordon thanks the eleventh company for the zealous and willing
manner with which they worked during the whole of last night, and till
six o’clock this morning, embarking intrenching tools and stores,
immediately after their march in from the camp at Boulahar. This
exertion, so cheerfully performed, as to enable the company to proceed
without loss of time on active service, will be brought to the notice of
the Brigadier-General.” It was so and received his hearty
acknowledgments.
The company disembarked at Varna on the 27th, and the scene at the quay
was strikingly interesting and animated. About 250 French sappers had
also landed from the ‘Cacique,’ and working as they did some twenty
yards from the British sappers, a good opportunity was afforded for
contrasting the temperament and military habits of the two nations. The
French, gay, volatile, and impulsive, stirred about with elated spirits
and elastic activity, that gave a cheerful, though an impetuous aspect
to their exertions; whilst the English sappers, grave, impassible, and
taciturn, wheeled off scaling ladders and stores so devoid of bustle and
joyousness, and with so much attention to order and composure, that an
air of stern and serious necessity was impressed on their labours.
Nevertheless, the work was done with a business-like energy and
earnestness that seemed more than adequate for any task or
enterprise.[144]
Varna for a few months was the principal frontier station and depot for
engineer stores and pontoons, from whence parties were thrown out to
Devno, Aladyn, Monister, Rustchuk, &c. At Varna the companies built a
stone pier of some pretensions, and a wooden one at the south side of
the bay, run out into deep water 140 feet from the beach. They also
banked up the shore, deepened the little harbour, and improved the
almost trackless roads beyond and within the vicinity of Aladyn, making
them passable for heavy wheeled conveyances. Much of the work was
carried on in bog and water, which, however, was ultimately
discontinued, as it was found that some of the men who were so employed,
died from cholera, traceable to their exertions and exposure.