shell.
Sergeant James H. Drew—dangerously, in the left shoulder and
collar-bone, by a shot.[163]
Private Samuel Coles—killed by a round shot, which struck his left
shoulder, and carried away his arm.
Lance-corporal William Eastley—severely, in left leg, by splinter of
shell.
The second company of 113 strong, under Captain King, reinforced the
corps in the Crimea on the 20th December. As the weather was severe and
the road to the camp almost impassable, the company was attached to the
invalid battalion at the port. Considerations for its convenience did
not, however, long prevail, for the want of sappers at the siege brought
an order from Lord Raglan to remove the company on Christmas-day with
its camp equipage and stores to the right attack. To assist the men on
the march his lordship sent 150 Turks to meet them at the French barrier
near Kadikoi, guided by sergeant Ramsay and another sapper who had
reached the rendezvous before the company. The arrival of the new
sappers elicited no concern from the stolid Turks, who, seated on the
ground, smoking their fuming chibouks, declined to attend to any orders
which should impose on them the labour of carrying the stores. Captain
King did his best to beguile their obedience, but without effect. It so
happened that colour-sergeant Brown of the company, who had been in
Syria, had picked up a smattering of Arabic and knew something of the
native idiosyncracy. Permitted by his captain, he tried to win the
acquiescence of the Turks by appealing gestures and the stammering out
of a few imperfect words, which must have grated on their ears as so
much jargon; but his best arts, either to force or delude them, failed
to dissipate their obstinacy. In the meantime he told off the officers
and men to their duties. Brown wore on his breast three medals, one of
which he had received from the Sultan for services in Syria. On its
reverse was an Ottoman inscription, similar to the standard impression
on the Turkish money. Curious to know the history of the medals, a young
officer of the detachment stepped up to the sergeant, and handling the
decorations, was surprised to find that one of them was the gift of the
Sultan. Naming the fact to a group of his brother-officers, it quickly
spread among the men, who, thinking that Brown was invested with
authority from his Majesty, bounded to their feet, loaded themselves
like mules with the equipage, and paced away with their burdens at a
warm and earnest rate, stopping not, though fatigued, till their arrival
at the sapper camp before Sebastopol. What was more remarkable in the
affair, was the refusal of the Turks, though indisposed to give their
labour without adequate compensation, to take tickets for working pay.
Lieutenant Ewart, at a loss to conjecture the reason, whether to ascribe
it to disaffection or disinterestedness, was not a little tickled when
informed, that the demonstration arose from the Turks regarding the
sergeant as a pacha.
In the early part of the siege, from the afflictions of a hard campaign,
great difficulty was found in procuring a sufficiently strong party from
the line for trench duty; and to make up for the deficiency a regiment
of Turks, quartered at Balaklava, was appointed to the front. From their
idle habits and indulgences, seldom could more than 400 men be brought
together for work, which number was still further frittered away by
disease and death to about 200. From the lack of land transport this
force was usually absorbed in the carriage of stores to the batteries.
To stimulate them to exertion, the sappers who superintended them were
empowered to give such of their parties as deserved it, a ticket for
pay, or even two, if their zeal were conspicuous; but to withhold the
recognition, if from indolence they did but little to further the
service. A sergeant of sappers—who was cashier and paymaster—always gave
a day’s pay for every authorized ticket presented to him; and this
system, acting like the prick of a spur on the sides of a sulky hack,
moved them to the exercise of an amount of effort which it would have
been next to impossible to have wrung from them by any other scheme.
Reduced when hostilities commenced to the minimum of peace requirement,
the sappers, whose duty it was to execute any description of work which
war or the elements might originate, were unable to spare a man from the
trenches for the pressing services of the rear. The troops of the line,
decimated and exhausted, were utterly inadequate to meet any extra
contingency; and thus arose a crisis in the affairs of the campaign
which led to the gravest considerations and misgivings at home. So
terrible had been the weather, so destructive the storms, so complete
the disruption of the communication between Balaklava and the camp—in
consequence of the road having become a swamp—that no resource was left
to the War Minister but to seek for remedies by the employment of novel
establishments. At his call a corps of hardy navvies sprung up in a day,
and controlled by civil superintendents, untrammelled by the rigours and
nice exactions of military discipline, the Balaklava railway was
commenced and carried through with so much despatch, that no one
regretted the temporary creation of a force which in its wonderful zeal
relieved the overworked and perishing troops of one of the most
appalling miseries of the campaign.
So obvious were the benefits evolved from this experiment, that when the
engagement of the navvies had ceased, the idea of perpetuating the
existence of so useful a body in an altered character assumed a
permanent form. Though ready, the navvies were rough and undisciplined,
bearing no connection with the great military expedition of which they
formed a part. This gave rise to the Army Works Corps, for the execution
of all extra services not properly belonging to the battle-field, the
trenches, or the operations of an army. It was arranged, it would seem,
that their duties should embrace the construction of roads and drains,
preparation of sites for encampment, erection of huts, &c. The pecuniary
advantages offered to candidates were of such a high standard that an
enthusiastic recruitment was the consequence. A few weeks were more than
enough to embody the corps, which consisted principally of navigators,
and about a fifth of mechanics of various crafts. Overseers were engaged
to superintend the gangs, with designations suitable to their
avocations, and a civil engineer commanded the whole, with the relative
rank of colonel. Later the force formed an important branch of the army.
Fostered and shielded by the ministry, it was equipped with gear and
working accessories of the most perfect and costly kind; and before the
close of the war, it had grown into an authorized body of 3,470 officers
and men, requiring for its sustenance in strength and efficiency no less
a sum for one year than 408,595_l._
In time, the formation of this working force was much commented on in
the House of Commons. While it was regarded—with insufficient reason
perhaps—as a reflection on the efficiency of the royal sappers and
miners, there were not wanting advocates—and none more earnest than
members of the ministry, particularly Mr. Monsell—to vindicate the
character of the corps, and to compliment it, in terms full of
appreciation and praise for its usefulness at the siege, and its
capability, with augmented numbers, of performing any amount of work
which the terrible exigencies of storm or war might render
indispensable.[164]
-----
Footnote 160:
This corporal completed the tombstone placed over the remains of
Colonel Hood and Captain Rowley; the latter was killed on the 16th. It
consisted of a flat slab, which enclosed both graves; and a monumental
cross at the head bore a well-cut inscription, which told of the
melancholy fate of these noble officers.
Footnote 161:
‘Quarterly Review,’ vol. xcv., p. 239.
Footnote 162:
This non-commissioned officer wrote some graphic and interesting
letters about the siege, in one of which he says,—“After setting my
working party to their task in the trenches, I went to the front to
show corporal Kirkwood—a new arrival—the extent of our works, and to
give him an introduction to Sebastopol. The trench in some places not
being deep enough to cover us, we sometimes had to run along the top,
and whenever we did so, the enemy peppered us well with grape and
rifle bullets at about 300 yards. So I borrowed a Minié rifle from the
38th, and returned the compliment. This was the first time I had ever
fired at a human being. Two 38th men loaded for me as fast as I could
fire, and we soon cleared the embrasures of the Russian gunners; but
they shot my comrade—a sergeant of the 38th—at my side. I bound up his
wound with my handkerchief, and fired away again with his rifle. I
have had many narrow escapes and much hard work, but I feel truly
thankful to the Almighty for having brought me through all without a
scratch. I hope soon to write to you from the imperial barracks
_inside_ Sebastopol. I hope,” says he, again, “we shall soon be
allowed to storm. I could lead a party in by a short cut that I know
of, and I think it would soon be over and the place ours.” The letters
from which these extracts are taken were kindly lent for my perusal by
an officer of the corps.
Footnote 163:
Was a well-educated and an active non-commissioned officer. For many
years he was the confidential clerk of Sir Frederic Smith at Chatham,
where, associating himself with a temperance society, he became an
able advocate of its principles, and received from its members a
silver medallion in testimony of his talented lectures on the subject.
After serving a few years at Malta, he was sent to the Crimea; and in
the trenches before Sebastopol, earned the good opinion of his
officers for fearlessness, ability, and success as an overseer. At
that time he was considered the ablest and readiest sergeant of
sappers in the front. On the 10th of November he was wounded at the
siege by a shot striking his shoulder, and breaking his collar-bone.
The wound was an eccentric one. It did not draw blood, but made an
insignificant contusion on the shoulder, from which it was expected
that the injury was slight. It turned out otherwise. Removed on board
the ‘Avon,’ he was much shaken in the storm of the 14th, and died of
his wounds on the 22nd of November, off Scutari.
Footnote 164:
See Debates of 3rd March and 8th April, 1855. Also leaders in the
‘Times’ of 2nd and 23rd June, 1855. The leading article of the 23rd,
while it vindicated the formation of the Army Works Corps as the
readiest and best expedient under the circumstances of the pressure,
and afforded reasons for assuming its superiority as a working force
to the sappers, nevertheless made admissions which were highly
commendatory to the latter.
1855.
1st January-8th April.
SIEGE OF SEBASTOPOL.
Sanitary state of companies—Warm clothing—Collecting detachments in
England to forward to the siege—Services of party with Omar Pasha’s
army—Granted medals by the Sultan—Mishap on the Tchernaya—Destruction
of the village of Inkermann—Exertions of sappers in the trenches
during snow storms—Anecdote, Corrigan’s charcoal—Obstructions to the
trenches by mud—Arrival of first company—Hut stables for the cavalry
horses—French build No. 9 battery; right attack—Conduct of corporal
Lendrim—Sappers share of the work—The parallels-Huts—French sappers
entertained at Southampton—Casualties—Reforming works to counteract
enfilade fire—Nos. 7 and 8 batteries, left attack—Moving guns to the
front—International parallel; zeal of non-commissioned
officers—Destroying a rifle screen—Completion of the parallel—Death of
captain Craigie—Sir John Burgoyne’s farewell address—Sorties—Bearing
in a wounded Russian—Augmentation to corps—Driver troop—Efforts to
obtain recruits; militia men—Sergeant Docherty captured on
suspicion of being a Russian spy—Countermine under cave
magazine—Casualties—Zigzag from right rifle pit in advance of second
parallel; wound sustained by a singular agent—Death of Lieutenant
Bainbrigge—Third parallel, right attack—Progress of the
works—Faultless energy of sappers in building a two-gun battery in the
third parallel, left attack—Two corporals singularly escape from a
shell which destroyed the magazine they were erecting—Embrasures of
No. 7 battery opened—Preparations for a bombardment—The weather.
From the laborious nature of the duties in the trenches, the sappers
were absolutely ragged, and as the frost had set in, late in December,
with unusual rigour, it is surprising they possessed stamina and spirit
enough to bear up against the exposure to which they were subjected.
Nevertheless the sickness was trifling compared with the appalling
details of casualties reported in other corps; for on the 1st January,
out of a strength of 639 non-commissioned officers and men, only
ninety-two were in the field hospitals and at Scutari. Diarrhœa,
fever, and frostbite were, however, very prevalent during the month, and
the increase in the sick was considerable. In that period no less a
number than 273 had been under treatment, exclusive of the invalids sent
to the hospitals on the Bosphorus. The number available for the siege,
including the sick present, was 519. The remainder were detached to
Balaklava, the Monastery of St. George, Gallipoli, Scutari,
Constantinople, and Bucharest.
As soon as it was determined to provide the troops with winter clothing,
an ample supply was furnished for the sappers and miners at an expense
of 4,260_l._, which enabled the following articles to be issued to each
man:—
2 pairs of worsted stockings.
2 pairs of woollen drawers.
2 pairs of woollen mitts.
2 woollen guernseys.
1 woollen neck-comforter.
1 blanket-cover.
1 railway-wrapper.
1 fur cap.
1 overcoat.
1 pair of long boots.
All the articles were excellent in quality, strong, warm, and adapted to
the Crimean climate. Previous to the supply arriving, the sappers, to a
certain extent, were furnished with buffalo skins for beds, heavy
Turkish gregos with hoods for trench duty, rugs, Jerseys, &c.
Driven for men to send to the war, some of the stations by degrees were
either wholly denuded of their forces or considerably reduced. The half
company at Hong Kong was first removed, landing at Woolwich on the 3rd
January. During its service in China its character was so uniformly
exemplary that Sir John Burgoyne complimented the men in a general
order. On embarking for England Captain Whittingham, the commanding
royal engineer, made a flattering report of their conduct. “The proofs,”
he wrote, “are patent in the few deaths, in the few cases of
intermittent or other climatal diseases, and in the absolute cessation
of courts-martial, although the ratio of exposure to a tropical sun—the
engendering cause of disease and drunkenness—has been far greater than
those of other troops and has almost exhausted the stamina of the men.”
“Their extreme good conduct” was also the subject of a report from
Lieutenant and Adjutant Lloyd, 59th regiment, who commanded the troops
on board. A few years ago three privates superintended under the
colonial clerk of works the erection of the Government offices. From
December, 1852, three other men were employed under Mr. Cleverley, the
surveyor-general, as overseers in building the Government-house; and on
quitting the island, he testified to the very great benefit that had
been derived from their supervision of the works. For more than eleven
years a small force of the corps had served in China, the first party
having landed in October, 1843. The total number which had been sent
there amounted to 113, of whom 33 died, 27 were invalided, 1 was
discharged in the colony and died, 7 deserted, 23 returned to England by
reliefs, and 22 reached home on the final removal of the detachment from
Hong Kong.
The small party at Spike Island was withdrawn the same month. Four
months later the Melbourne detachment returned to England; then followed
the seventeenth company from the Cape in July; and gradually Gibraltar,
Corfu, and Bermuda were left with only invalid nuclei unfitted for the
stern vicissitudes of campaigning but able for the works of the
stations. A detachment of unmarried men was also ordered from the remote
settlement of the Swan River, but arrived too late to share in the
glories of the siege. This shearing, however, furnished but a unit of
accessible sappers—for it brought to this country a number of men who
required to be physically renewed before sending them on a hard service,
where the trials of weather alone were likely to break them up without
subjecting them to the severities of the trenches.
Two sapper divers landed at Balaklava from the ‘Robert Lowe,’ on the 4th
January, under the command of Captain De Moleyns, having in charge Mr.
Rendel’s loaded cylinders to be applied for blasting the sunken ships at
the mouth of the harbour.[165]
The small detachment under Major Bent, of the engineers, joined at the
camp about this time from Bucharest, marching with the Turkish army; and
the following dispatch from his Highness Omar Pasha, so complimentary to
its efficiency, was communicated by Lord Raglan to the Minister of War:—
“_Varna, January 8, 1855._
“MY LORD
“His Highness Omar Pasha has requested me to write to your Lordship,
to return his best thanks for the services rendered to his army by
Major Bent, of the royal engineers, and the detachment of sappers
under his command.
“His Highness desires me to express his regret at the losses which
have been sustained by this small detachment, who, under the direction
of Major Bent, have well sustained the character of the British army.
“His Highness has already expressed to your Lordship his regret at the
loss of Lieutenant Burke, of the royal engineers, whom His Highness
considers to have been an officer of much merit.
“His Highness desires me to inform your Lordship, that he has done
himself the honour to write to the Turkish Ambassador at the Court of
St. James’s expressing the desire of His Majesty the Sultan that
private Andrew Anderson, of the royal sappers and miners, may receive
and wear the decoration of the fourth class of the order of Medjidie,
in commemoration of his gallantry in recovering the body of Lieutenant
Burke, after he was killed at the passing of the Danube on the 7th of
July last. In the meantime he has presented private Anderson with the
decoration, and trusts your Lordship will allow him to wear it until
the commands of Her Majesty may be received.[166]
“His Highness further desires me to express to your Lordship his
entire approbation of the manner in which Major Bent has conducted his
duties.
“He desires me to inform your Lordship that this officer showed great
energy in his endeavours to enter Silistria before the siege was
raised; that he subsequently showed great gallantry at the passage of
the Danube, when he was the first to land on the left bank, and
covered the landing of the Turkish troops with a detachment of
riflemen, who maintained their ground under a heavy fire until the
disembarkation of the supports was effected.
“Major Bent and his sappers were subsequently of great service in
throwing up the tête de pont at Giurgevo, and in the construction of
the bridge across the Danube.
“His Highness desires to take this opportunity of expressing to your
Lordship his high sense of the services rendered by Lieutenant Glyn,
R.N., and H. S. H. Prince Ernest of Saxe Leiningen, with the
detachment of sailors of Her Majesty’s fleet under their command, in
the construction of the bridge across the Danube.
“His Highness considers that the success of the construction of this
bridge is in great measure attributable to their well-planned
dispositions, which, although executed with limited means, proved
fully effective to resist the storms and strong currents of the
Danube.[167]
“He desires me to say that he is fully satisfied with the zeal and
energy of this detachment of Her Majesty’s fleet under the able
direction of Lieutenant Glyn, whom he considers a very promising
officer, and entirely worthy of the confidence of your Lordship.
“His Highness desires me to add, that it would be very gratifying to
him if Her Majesty could in any way reward these officers for the able
services they have rendered to the Ottoman army and the common cause.
“I am, &c.
(Signed) “J. L. A. SIMMONS,
“Field-Marshal Lord Raglan, G.C.B., &c. Lieut.-Colonel.”
This encomiastic testimonial was apparently insufficient to mark the
appreciation of their military services, and decorations were added to
commemorate the campaign. In the brigade orders of the 23rd July, 1855,
the Sultan’s gift was thus alluded to:—“The Turkish government having
awarded a certain number of medals to the officers of royal engineers
and the royal sappers and miners who were engaged in the campaign of
1854 on the Danube, the Major-General commanding has much pleasure in
publishing the following extract from a letter addressed by his Highness
Omar Pasha to Lieut.-Colonel Simmons, Her Majesty’s Commissioner with
the Turkish forces.”
“I beg you will distribute these medals amongst the officers and men
according to the accompanying list, as a mark of the great satisfaction
my Sovereign has always experienced from the manner in which they
conducted themselves whilst sharing the dangers and fatigues of the
campaign of 1854 against our common enemy.”
The non-commissioned officers and men who received the medals were—
Colour-sergeant John F. Read.
Corporal James Curgenven.
” James Cray.
” Joseph J. Stanton.
2nd corporal Robert M. Rylatt.
Lance-corporal Michael Westacott.
Private John Boyles.
” John Bramley.
” John Doran.
” William Henderson.
” Alexander McCaughey.
” William Morrison.
” George Scown.
” William Allen.
” James Bland.
” John Piper.
These sixteen sappers were the only British soldiers honoured with the
distinction.