here. It came at a time when Houghton's Brigade, being practically
worsted in an assault on the ridge, were failed by Beresford, but
succored by Colonel Hardinge, who, on his own responsibility, ordered
the advance of General Cole's Division against the enemy. This, the 4th
Division, consisting mainly of British fusiliers, succeeded in turning
the tide of battle. Cole himself led the fusiliers up the hill, on the
crest of which the French with their artillery were stationed in force;
and, as if that were not superiority enough, the whole of Soult's
reserve was advancing in mass to support the columns on the ridge.
Houghton's Brigade held on in what seemed a losing fight. The ground
was heaped with dead, and the Polish lancers were beginning to gather
round the British guns. The brigade saw defeat and destruction staring
it in the face. But they endured for sheer tenacity's sake, not knowing
that but a few moments more mattered everything. The Royal Welsh
Fusiliers swept steadily upwards, attacked the savage lancers, charged
their gathering hosts, and put the enemy to rout. It was Houghton's
Brigade that had borne the brunt, but it was the Welsh Fusiliers that
decided the victory.
Napier has pictured this glorious passage of arms so vividly that it is
no man's presumptuous task to describe it independently. "Such a
gallant line," he says, "issuing from the midst of smoke, and rapidly
separating itself from the confused and broken multitude, startled the
enemy's heavy masses which were increasing and pressing onwards as to
an assured victory. They wavered, hesitated, and then, vomiting forth a
storm of fire, hastily endeavoured to enlarge their front, while a
fearful discharge of grape from all their artillery whistled through
the British ranks. Sir William Myers was killed. Cole, and the three
Colonels: Ellis, Blakeney, and Hawkshawe, fell wounded, and the
fusilier battalions, struck by the iron tempest, reeled and staggered
like sinking ships. Suddenly and sternly recovering, they closed on
their terrible enemies, and then was seen with what a strength and
majesty the British soldier fights. In vain did Soult, by voice and
gesture, animate his Frenchmen; in vain did the hardiest veterans,
extricating themselves from the crowded columns, sacrifice their lives
to gain time for the mass to open out on such a fair field; in vain did
the mass itself bear up, and, fiercely arising, fire indiscriminately
upon friends and foes, while the horsemen hovering on the flank,
threatened to charge the advancing line. Nothing could stop that
astonishing infantry. No sudden burst of undisciplined valour, no
nervous enthusiasm weakened the stability of their order; their
flashing eyes were bent on the dark columns in their front; their
measured tread shook the ground; their dreadful volleys swept away the
head of every formation; their deafening shouts overpowered the
dissonant cries that broke from all parts of the tumultuous crowd as,
foot by foot, and with a horrid carnage, it was driven by the incessant
vigour of the attack to the farthest edge of the hill. In vain did the
French reserves, joining with the struggling multitudes, endeavour to
sustain the fight; their efforts only increased the irremediable
confusion, and the mighty mass, giving way like a loosened cliff, went
headlong down the ascent. The rain flowed after in streams discoloured
with blood, and 1,500 unwounded men, the remnant of 6,000 unconquerable
British soldiers, stood triumphant on the fatal hill."
It must be added to this classic word-picture of the fight on the ridge
that Marshal Beresford in his despatch to Lord Wellington, dated
Albuera, 18th May, said, "It was observed that our dead, particularly
the 57th Regiment (the "Die Hards" of Albuera), were lying as they had
fought in the ranks, and that every wound was in front."
BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN
"The Cavalry do as they like to the enemy until they are confronted
by thrice their numbers....
"Our Artillery has never been opposed to less than three or four
times their numbers."--_Sir John French at the Front._
The majority of the Expeditionary Forces now at the front carry in
their hearts if not on their standards the glorious legends of
Balaclava and of Inkerman. At a time when it has become so evident that
the tendency of the Prussian military system is to crush individual
initiative, while that of the British system is to encourage it on
equal terms with a free and unhesitating obedience to the will of the
commander, the battles of Balaclava and Inkerman are of peculiar
significance, for, while Balaclava contains a glorious instance of
blind obedience, Inkerman stands alone as a sanguinary conflict in
which, to quote an eye-witness, "every man was his own general." For
this reason it has been called a "soldiers' battle," and as such it
forms a useful example, not only of the fine behaviour of our soldiers
when thrown on the limit of their own individual resources, but also of
the self-reliant valour and do-or-die spirit that has brought them
through so many desperately prolonged struggles before and since. The
fact that Inkerman was fought and won in a thick fog makes it all the
more wonderful and satisfactory that the units, and even individuals,
of our army on that occasion co-operated well within the boundaries of
a sound and discreet initiative. Many full descriptions have been given
of Balaclava and Inkerman. Our space here will not allow of more than a
brief account of some of the glorious deeds on those fields of victory.
On October 25th, 1885, the Russians made a bold attempt to take
Balaclava, and the tale of their defeat is the immortal tale of two of
the finest cavalry charges ever known in the history of war.
Immortalised in verse by Tennyson, the "Charge of the Light Brigade" is
a deed bringing honour and glory for all time; yet the charge of the
Heavy Brigade earlier on the same day was an affair even more deadly to
the enemy and more responsible for the final victory.
At the first attack of the Russians the 93rd (Sutherland) Highlanders
were called upon to face them and defend the foremost approach. Eight
Squadrons of General Scarlett's Heavy Brigade on the left wing were at
once ordered to their assistance. Of these the Scots Greys and
Inniskillings were diverted to check the advance of a body of Russian
cavalry 3,000 strong, which was descending from the hill into the
valley. It all happened on the spur of the moment. As soon as Scarlett
became aware of the meaning of those 3,000 of the enemy he made up his
mind in a flash. It was one of the intuitions that determine the
fortune of war. "Left wheel into line!" and the Greys and Inniskillings
were ready. They saw the cause and understood the intention. They
wheeled into line, and as they formed up with quick, cool decision, the
Russians paused, as if to calculate, some 500 paces away. "Charge!" And
the Greys and Inniskillings, with Scarlett at their head, thundered
forward on the enemy.
It was a gallant and almost desperate undertaking, for the two
squadrons were greatly out-numbered by the opposing force; but it was
so sudden, unexpected and headlong, that the Russians were thrown into
hesitation and scarcely knew on the spur of the moment the best way to
meet it. After the terrible clash of meeting they could do no more than
try to close in on the English, and in this, by dint of superior
numbers, they must in the end have wiped our men out had it not been
that in the very thick of it help came from several sides. First, small
detachments of other "Heavies" came up rapidly and fell upon the
enclosing Russians so fiercely that their plan was weakened. Then a
whole squadron of Inniskillings from our right swept down on the
enemy's left and completely frustrated its encircling movement.
Finally, from different quarters, the 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards and
the Royals came up like a whirlwind, and the result of it all was a
fight of the wildest and most terrible kind. In the thick of it were
Scarlett and his two squadrons, and the enemy were cut up and swept
away like chaff before the terrible onslaught within and without, until
at last they broke and fled in utter confusion back over the crest of
the hill. So, in glorious victory, ended the Charge of the Heavy
Brigade, a splendid feat of generalship and valour which, though unsung
by Laureates, nevertheless throws a tremendous weight of tradition into
the spirit of the "Heavies" who, with three of their regiments--the
Scots Greys, and the 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards, are to-day repeating
such deeds at the front without being aware that they are doing
anything extraordinary.
The Charge of the Light Brigade is a matter that all the world knows
while all the world wonders--in one sense, that it was ever undertaken,
and, in another, that mortal flesh and blood could dare so desperate
and unwarlike a deed at the behest of discipline and still succeed in
turning it to glorious account. What happened is household reading, but
who could be restrained from relating it, and who can refrain from
reading it yet once more?
The Light Brigade, with the 13th Light Dragoons and the 17th Lancers in
the first line, the 11th Hussars in the second, and the 4th Light
Dragoons and the 8th Hussars in the third, was drawn up two deep as
soon as the ambiguous order arrived. The Heavy Brigade was in readiness
to support, with Lord Lucan commanding in person the Greys and Royals.
A brief question as to the meaning of the order and a quick reply that
it was no time to question, but merely to obey, and then the trumpet
rang out for the charge. It had no uncertain sound and every man
prepared to do and die as they went down the hill with Lord Cardigan at
their head at a speed approaching twenty miles an hour. Sheets of
flame, and a hail of lead, leapt out upon their flanks from the Russian
infantry. Captain Nolan darted out across their front, shouting and
waving his sword in the futile effort to explain that it was all a
mistake. But their minds were made up and they did not heed or could
not understand his gestures, at so swift a pace; and then, swifter
still, a fragment of shell tore its way through Nolan's heart and his
horse wheeled and bore him, dead, but still upright, through the
advancing ranks before he fell.
Meanwhile the brigade hurled forward, through the dense pall of smoke
before the guns, into that dreadful impact which has shown the nations
for ever what our heroes can do. Those who passed between the shot and
shell passed also between the guns, sabring the gunners as they went,
until they launched upon the squadron beyond. Then ensued a mighty
conflict for the possession of the guns. While those in the first line
fought fiercely with the enemy's cavalry the second and third lines
thundered in and made their business plain. It was to silence the guns,
and with all the courage of their kind they did it. Their tracks could
be traced next day on the field by the lines of dead whose heads were
not left upon their bodies, or were cloven "from the nave to the
chaps." The fight was unequal, but they did not seem to realise it, for
they fought their way back with a persistency that sent an undying
thrill through all the world. These heroes fought on, and would have
done so to the last drop had it not been for a timely charge of the
French Chasseurs d'Afrique upon the pressing hosts of the enemy. Thus
they were extricated--all that were left of them. "Then they rode
back"--some 170 in formation.
When they lined up in their original position and Lord Cardigan counted
them in a glance, he said "Men, it was a mad-brained trick, but it was
no fault of mine." Later, when the French General was asked his
opinion, he replied, "It was magnificent, but it was not war." Later
still, when Lord Cardigan came home, Queen Victoria asked him simply,
"Where is my army?" Yet, though critics may speak of "absolute
inutility," and calculating militarists of "sheer waste of life," it
still remains that the crowning glory of the Light Brigade, born that
day at Balaclava, has outlived all the survivors of that deathless
fray, and will still live on when the sword of the conquered has been
beaten once more into the ploughshare of peace. Ask any man of the 11th
Hussars fighting at the front to-day what he thinks about the Charge of
the Light Brigade, and, whatever he says, he will stand an inch higher
while saying it. And so it is with the nation. In these days, from the
Secretary for War to the latest recruit--even to the humblest
non-combatant grimly enduring--we are greater, stronger, more
whole-hearted for the memory of that glorious episode. It is far
reaching. It is immortal.
"When can their glory fade?
Oh! the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honour the charge they made,
Honour the Light Brigade;
Noble Six Hundred!"
Ten days had elapsed since their defeat at Balaclava when the Russians
planned an over-whelming attack on our besieging army. Their objective
was Mount Inkerman, their methods were secret, and their men 60,000.
The event shows that they hoped, by sending a strong force to the west
of Sevastopol and some 20,000 men to engage our army in the field, to
carry Inkerman, and so compel us to raise the siege.
Through the mists of the cold November morning the Russians, stirred to
the highest enthusiasm by the priests, advanced on Inkerman, and a
fight of the most desperate character ensued. Our Second Division, sore
pressed by overwhelming numbers, was suffering heavily, when,
notwithstanding the fog, the enemy's strategy became apparent, and the
Rifle Brigade were sent hurrying up from the field to their assistance.
The 50th followed, and the battle round Inkerman, now a trifle less
unequal, eddied and swirled and locked, turning now in favour of one
side and now the other. All sides belched flame and in turn were
bespattered with lead. Here a heap of Russian slain, and there, through
a rift of the mist, a fitful gleam of serried bayonets. The British
broke ranks and formed squares, and, in this formation, every square
found work of its own in repelling the fierce and sudden rushes of the
enemy. A couple of 18-pounders were brought up and long gaps were hewn
out of the deep ranks of the attacking host. Small groups found
antagonists by instinct in the mist and fought to a finish on their
own. Commanders became fighting-men, and every fighting-man his own
commander. It rested with each and all who had in common, not only the
fog, but a general purpose, to see that they kept their place between
anything Russian and the summit of Inkerman; and, in the process of
this, hand-to-hand combats as heroic as any in the Trojan War were
joined. "A series of dreadful deeds of daring," says Davenport Adams,
"of sanguinary hand-to-hand fights, of despairing rallies, of desperate
assaults in glens and valleys, in brush-wood and glades and remote
dales, from which the conquerors issued only to engage fresh foes, till
the old supremacy, so readily assailed, was again triumphant and the
battalions of the Czar gave way before our steady courage and the
chivalrous fire of France."
_Wyman & Sons Ltd., Printers, London and Reading._