Sixty Years a Queen Part 16

UNIFORMS OF THE BRITISH ARMY IN 1897.]

[Sidenote: Great Britain and France Declare War with Russia.]

On February 7 the Russian Ministers left London and Paris; the English Minister left St. Petersburg on the same day. On the 27th the ultimatum of England was despatched to Count Nesselrode. On March 24 Her Majesty's formal declaration of war against the Emperor of Russia was read from the steps of the Royal Exchange, and the reasons for this act were published at length in the _London Gazette_. England had been slow--culpably slow, declared Derby and Disraeli--in resorting to an appeal to arms, but, having made it, the spirit of her greatest poet pervaded the Councils of her Ministry:--

"Beware Of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, Bear it, that the oppressor may beware of thee."

[Sidenote: State of British Armaments.]

Before the actual declaration of war, large numbers of British troops had embarked for the East, and a powerful fleet had been a.s.sembled at Spithead for service in the Baltic under Admiral Sir Charles Napier. To Prince Albert's watchful influence must be attributed the degree to which the nation now found itself prepared for the coming struggle. For the warlike habits of our people had been lulled by the peace which, uninterrupted for nearly forty years, had prevailed between England and other European powers. It would be difficult to realise at this day how far the nation had lapsed into unreadiness. Prince Albert incessantly strove to arouse it from this perilous lethargy. One result of his efforts had been the establishment during the summer of 1853 of a temporary camp of exercise at Chobham, a complete novelty to the generation of that time. Aldershot, as a place of arms, had no existence then, but the system initiated at Chobham has become part of our regular military organisation. Another result had been the establishment of a permanent Channel Fleet, which was reviewed by the Queen at Spithead on August 11, 1853, and described by Prince Albert as "the finest fleet, perhaps, which England ever fitted out; forty ships of war of all kinds, all moved by steam-power but three.... The gigantic ships of war, among them the _Duke of Wellington_ with 131 guns (a greater number than was ever a.s.sembled before in one vessel), went, without sails and propelled only by the screw, _eleven miles an hour_, and this against wind and tide! This is the greatest revolution effected in the conduct of naval warfare which has yet been known ... and will render many fleets, like the present Russian one, useless." Speaking of men-of-war fitted with the auxiliary screw, he went on: "We have already sixteen at sea and ten in an advanced state. France has no more than two, and the other Powers none.... I write all this, because last autumn we were bewailing our defenceless state, and because you know that, without wishing to be _mouche de coche_, I must rejoice to see that achieved which I had struggled so long and so hard to effect."

[Ill.u.s.tration: _J. Tenniel._} {_From "Punch."_

WHAT IT HAS COME TO.

Lord Aberdeen holding back the British Lion.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _W. A. Krell._} {_In the Royal Collection._

REVIEW OF THE CHANNEL SQUADRON BY HER MAJESTY, August 11, 1853.]

Great Britain, then, at the outbreak of the Russian War, possessed a fleet stronger than the combined flotillas of any other three Great Powers. Her land forces were far less satisfactory, for though they were perfectly disciplined and well-equipped according to the existing state of military science, they were few in numbers and almost totally without reserves, for the new Militia could not count for much as yet.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GUN SHOP AT THE ELSWICK WORKS.

A few guns of 4'7 in. and 6 in. calibre awaiting inspection.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Sir E. Landseer, R. A._} {_From the Royal Collection. By permission of Messrs. Graves, Pall Mall._

ROYAL SPORTS.--THE QUEEN AND PRINCE CONSORT, WITH THE PRINCE OF WALES, IN THE HIGHLANDS, 1853.]

CHAPTER IX.

1854-1856.

Mr. Gladstone's War Budget--Humiliation and Prayer--The Invasion of the Crimea--The Battle of Alma--A Fruitless Victory--Effect in England--War Correspondents--Balaklava--Cavalry Charges by the Heavy and Light Brigades--"Our's Not to Reason Why"--Russian Sortie--Battle of Inkermann--Breakdown of Transport and Commissariat--Hurricane in the Black Sea--Florence Nightingale--Fall of the Coalition Cabinet--Lord Palmerston Forms a Ministry--Victory of the Turks at Eupatoria--Unsuccessful Attack by the Allies--Death of Lord Raglan--His Character--Battle of Tchernaya--Evacuation of Sebastopol--Surrender of Kars--Conclusion of Peace.

[Sidenote: Mr. Gladstone's War Budget.]

When Mr. Gladstone introduced his War Budget on May 8, he said that the prosperity of trade and elasticity of the Revenue warranted him in meeting the expenses of the campaign out of current taxation. He calculated on this being possible by doubling the Income Tax and increasing the duty on malt and spirits. Lord Aberdeen, replying to Lord Roden in the House of Lords, stated that a Day of Humiliation and Prayer would be set apart for the success of British arms. The Queen immediately wrote to the Prime Minister, reminding him that she had not been consulted about this, and objecting to the term "humiliation."

"To say (as we probably should) that _the great sinfulness of the nation_ has brought about this war, when it is the selfishness and ambition and want of honesty of _one man_ and his servants which has done it, while our conduct throughout has been actuated by unselfishness and honesty, would be too manifestly repulsive to the feelings of everyone, and would be a mere bit of hypocrisy. Let there be a Prayer expressive of our great thankfulness for the immense benefits we have enjoyed, and for the immense prosperity of the country, and entreating G.o.d's help and protection in the coming struggle. In this the Queen would join heart and soul. If there is to be a day set apart, let it be for Prayer in this sense."

The Day of Solemn Fast, Humiliation, and Prayer was fixed, but, in accordance with the Queen's feeling, there were no abject expressions used in the Prayers prescribed, only a committal of the cause of England into the hands of the Almighty to "judge between them and her enemies."

[Ill.u.s.tration: _R. Thorburn, A.R.A._} {_From a Miniature in Her Majesty's possession._

HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN, 1841.]

Varna, a fortified seaport of Bulgaria, on the sh.o.r.e of the Black Sea, half way between the Bosphorus and the mouth of the Danube, was the rendezvous appointed for the British and French forces. Lord Raglan, who, as Lord Fitzroy Somerset, had lost an arm under the Great Duke at Waterloo, was Commander-in-Chief of the British Army; Marechal Saint-Arnaud that of the French; and the veteran Omar Pasha that of the Turkish. The Russian commanders had learnt that, whatever might be the incapacity of the Sublime Porte for rule, its troops were composed of excellent fighting material when well commanded. The Turkish garrison of Silistria, on the Danube, maintained such a stubborn defence for many weeks under two English officers, Captain Butler, of the Ceylon Rifles, and Lieutenant Nasmyth, of the East India Company's Service, that at last the Russians had to raise the siege, on June 22, after losing more than 12,000 men. At Giurgevo, again, on July 7, General Soimonoff (who afterwards fell at the Battle of Inkermann) was badly beaten, and soon afterwards the whole of the Russian forces were withdrawn beyond the Pruth, and Turkish territory was free from invaders. This movement was due, no doubt, in some measure, to the action of Austria, who had demanded the evacuation of the Princ.i.p.alities, backed her demand by a threatening movement of troops, and actually concluded a convention with the Porte on June 14.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _H. E. Dawe._} {_From an Engraving._

HER MAJESTY IN THE ROYAL PEW, ST. GEORGE'S CHAPEL, WINDSOR, 1846.]

The great a.r.s.enal and harbour of Russia was Sebastopol in the Crimea, and it was on this point that the attention of Ministers in London and Paris was chiefly concentrated. There has been great variance in the accounts of how it came to be decided that the attack of the Allies should be directed on that town. It is sufficient to state here that, on June 29, a despatch was sent to Lord Raglan, strongly urging the necessity of a prompt attack upon Sebastopol and the Russian fleet, but leaving the final decision to the discretion of the Allied Commanders.

Lord Raglan did not read these instructions as leaving him any choice, but regarded them, as he afterwards stated, as "little short of an absolute order from the Secretary of State," and prepared to obey it. He was a veteran soldier, it is true, but he had acquired his experience in campaigns before the days of steam and electricity, and the incessant and rapid interchange of despatches between Downing Street and the seat of war no doubt was somewhat bewildering.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _R. Simkin._} {_From Contemporary Prints._

A. Corporal.

B. Sergeant.

C. Officers--Undress.

D. Full Dress.

E. Privates.

UNIFORMS OF THE ROYAL MARINES, 1837.]

[Sidenote: The Invasion of the Crimea.]

The French Commander-in-Chief, Saint-Arnaud, received similar injunctions from the Emperor Louis Napoleon, who was as strongly in favour of the project as Palmerston and the Duke of Newcastle; Lord Raglan, therefore, encountered no opposition from him on the score of strategy. After three months of inaction at Varna, during which the troops suffered severely from cholera, the invasion of the Crimea was undertaken; the Allied Forces set sail for Eupatoria, and on September 21 the Duke of Newcastle telegraphed to the Queen that 25,000 English, 25,000 French, and 8,000 Turks had safely disembarked at Kalamita Bay, near the mouth of the River Alma, about eight miles north of Sebastopol, without meeting any resistance. The advance on Sebastopol began on September 19, and on the 20th the Allies encountered the Russian army, under Prince Menschikoff, strongly entrenched on the heights south of the River Alma. Menschikoff of deliberate purpose had allowed them to disembark unmolested; he had chosen what he believed to be an impregnable position, where he intended to keep them in play till the arrival of reinforcements should enable him to leave his entrenchments and overwhelm the invaders with superior numbers; he watched them crossing the stream below his position in full confidence that they were entering the trap prepared for them. But he had underrated the individual prowess of British and French soldiers. They had discipline, individual gallantry, and physique in a high degree, but these are often only so many contributions to the aggregate of disaster unless directed by sagacious generalship, and the tactics of the Allied Forces at the Alma were of the headlong character of a schoolboy's playground.

Marechal Saint-Arnaud was in an agony of illness of approaching death, as it turned out--and there was little cohesion or concert between the English on the left and the French on the right of the attacking line.

Only one thing was plain to the men of both armies--there were the Russian batteries, on the heights beyond the river, with heavy columns of infantry hanging like a grey cloud along the crests--the one thing to do was to get at them. Saint-Arnaud, addressing his Generals of Division, Canrobert and Prince Napoleon, said: "With such men as you I have no orders to give; I have but to point to the enemy!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: _R. Simkin._}

Royal Marine Artillery-- A. Company Sergeant-Major. B. Gunner. C. Officer.

Royal Marine Light Infantry-- D. Officer. E. Drummer. F. Sergeant. G. Private.

UNIFORMS OF THE ROYAL MARINES, 1897.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Chevalier L. W. Desanges._} {_In the Victoria Cross Gallery, Crystal Palace._

COL. BELL, OF THE ROYAL WELSH FUSILIERS,

Obtained the Victoria Cross for gallantry in the Battle of the Alma, when he seized upon, and captured, a gun which the enemy was carrying off the field.]

[Sidenote: The Battle of the Alma.]

At two o'clock the Allies crossed the river under a plunging fire, and advanced up the opposing slopes in face of the batteries and a searching fire of musketry; the great redoubt was carried by a.s.sault; the British battalions, deployed in double rank, according to the unique practice of English field drill, poured a withering fire into the solid columns of the enemy and plied the deadly bayonet at closer quarters. About four o'clock the Russians wavered, fell back, and broke; the position was carried and the first European field since Waterloo had been won.