Naval guns mounted in shore batteries played a most distinguished part in the Crimean War. They were manned both by seamen and by marines, and were employed at the bombardment and capture of Bomarsund in the Baltic and in the trenches before Sebastopol. At the latter place, although a brigade of the Royal Marines had been encamped on the heights above Balaclava, and though they and the Royal Marine Artillery manned the guns in the redoubts built to secure our right flank from a Russian attack, it had not been intended to place naval guns in the siege-batteries. But when our siege-train found that they had all they could do to contend with the unexpected efficiency of the Russian guns, it was hurriedly determined to call on the navy for assistance. Fifty heavy guns were at once landed, with 35 officers and 732 seamen under Captain Stephen Lushington. The reinforcement was most valuable. The guns were powerful and the seamen's fire most accurate. The brigade did "yeoman service", and sustained by the end of the siege the loss of 7 officers and 95 men killed, and 39 officers and 432 men wounded. Perhaps the most famous naval brigade in history is the _Shannon's_ brigade, under Captain Peel, which made such a glorious record in the strenuous days of the Indian Mutiny. Although nearly all accounts would lead the reader to believe that it was entirely composed of seamen, it consisted, in point of fact, of 450 seamen, 140 marines, and 15 marine artillerymen, drawn from both the _Shannon_ and the _Pearl_. The guns which they took with them and which did such invaluable service were twelve in number--ten 8-inch guns--pretty heavy pieces to haul along--and a couple of brass field-pieces. The brigade participated in the action at Kajwa, 1st November, 1857, when Peel took charge of the operations on the death of Colonel Powell of the 53rd, and brought them to a victorious conclusion. On the 13th of the same month eight heavy guns and 250 of the brigade, with Peel himself, arrived before Lucknow, where they formed part of the army under Sir Colin Campbell which had advanced to the relief of the Europeans besieged in the Residency. After the capture of the Sikander Bagh, the relieving-force was checked in a narrow way by the desperate resistance offered by the garrison of the Shah Najif, "which was wreathed in volumes of smoke from the burning buildings in front but sparkled all over with the bright flash of small-arms".[64] The guns could make little or no impression on it; retreat was impossible along the narrow crowded lane by which the advance had been made. Desperate measures were necessary. Peel was equal to the occasion. While his marines and the Highlanders did their best to keep down the fire from the rebel loopholes, his seamen man-handled two of their big guns to within a few feet of the walls. But they had to be drawn off again under cover of the fire from a couple of rocket tubes, which were brought into action for the purpose.