Jack Archer: A Tale of the CrimeaHenty, G. A. (George Alfred)
General
Jack Archer: A Tale of the Crimea
Henty, G. A. (George Alfred)
Crimean War, 1853-1856 -- Juvenile fiction
Happily the success of the French, and our own failure, did not create
any feeling of unpleasantness between the troops of the two nations.
As the remnants of the French regiments, engaged in the Malakoff,
marched in the morning to their camps, the second division was drawn
up on parade. As the leading regiment of Zouaves came along, the
English regiment nearest to them burst into a hearty cheer, which was
taken up by the other regiments as the French came along, and as they
passed, the English presented arms to their brave allies and the
officers on both sides saluted with their swords.
The next day the officers thronged down to see the ground where the
fighting had taken place. Around the Malakoff the ground was heaped
with dead. Not less had been the slaughter outside the work known as
the Little Redan, where the French attack had been repulsed with
prodigious loss.
The houses of the portion of the town nearest the batteries were found
full of dead men who had crawled in when wounded in front. As a
considerable number of the Russian steamers of war were still floating
under the guns of their batteries on the north side, preparations were
made at once to mount two heavy guns by the water-side; but the
Russians, seeing that the last remains of their fleet would speedily
be destroyed, took matters in their own hands, and on the night of the
11th the six steamers that remained were burnt by the Russians.
After the din which had raged so fiercely for the previous four days,
and the dropping fire which had gone on for a year, the silence which
reigned was strange and almost oppressive. There was nothing to be
done. No turn in the trenches or batteries to be served, nothing to do
but to rest and to prepare for the next winter, which was now almost
upon them.
A week after the fall of Sebastopol the anniversary of the battle of
Alma was celebrated. What great events had taken place since that
time!
None of those who had rested that night on the vine-clad hill they had
won, dreamed of what was before them, or that they were soon to take
part in the greatest siege which the world has ever known. Small
indeed was the proportion of those who had fought at the Alma now
present with the army at Sebastopol. The fight of Inkerman, the mighty
wear and tear in the trenches, the deadly repulses at the Redan, and
above all, the hardships of that terrible winter, had swept away the
noble armies which had landed in the Crimea, and scarcely one in ten
of those who heard the first gun in the Alma was present at the fall
of Sebastopol.
The naval camp was now broken up, the sailors returned on board ship,
and the army prepared to go into winter quarters, that is to say, to
dig deep holes under their tents, to erect sheltering walls, and in
some instances to dig complete subterranean rooms.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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