The Crimean War Between Russia and Britain

by M. Concannon

Perhaps the most purposeless war of the modern era is the Crimean War of 1854-1855. For the Russians, the war is another example of its defence against invaders. For the British it says a lot about our ability to succeed even when things go wrong.

After the Napoleonic wars, Russia was growing as a world power. She was gaining land in the Far East, regions which are now former Soviet Republics. Britain, too, was a world power, but was more interested in its navy. Both countries wanted to dominate foreign markets with their manufactured goods.

Naturally, these two expanding powers were going to clash at some point. Turkey’s weakness was a threat to both powers. Its collapse would have threatened Russia’s southern borders, and for Britain, Russia in Turkey would bring a rival to the Mediterranean.

Britain and France collected an Army to stop Russia in Turkey. But Britain’s Army had been small since the Napoleonic wars, thirty years before. Its generals were now too old, and its command structure was weakened by arguments and personal hatred. The cavalry commander, Lord Lucan, and his deputy commander, Lord Cardigan, hated each other intensely. The overall British Commander, Lord Raglan was mad. He still believed that the French were the enemy: “The French are in the yard! The French are in the yard!” His advisors had to remind him that this time it was the Russians who were the enemy, and the French were in fact his ally.

The British and French landed near Sevastopol in 1854, and the Russians retreated into the protecting walls of the fortress of Sevastopol. The British and French moved around to the south to make a naval base at Balaklava for re-supply. The city’s fortifications had strong, modern walls of earth and brick, and heavy defensive guns. The British and French did not imagine that they would spend a year outside these walls, looking for a way in. The Russians tried to break the siege, cutting off the British and French from their base in the battle of Balaklava.

Why does every Englishman know the name of the small Crimean town Balaklava? Two incidents have stuck in our national psyche. The first shows British determination. After capturing some Turkish guns, a division of Russian cavalry charged but was defeated by a single Scottish infantry battalion of the 93^rd Highlanders. People called this: ‘The thin red line’, because of the line the Scots formed into, and their red jackets. They should have been cut to pieces, but instead they stood like a wall, and held. Ever since, people in English have used the phrase 'Thin Red Line' about situations where a small force prevents some terrible thing from happening. In Britain and America this phrase has changed into ‘The Thin Blue Line’ to talk about the police.

Secondly, the infamous British ‘Charge of the light brigade’ (гусары) immortalised in Tennyson’s poem, and in Lady Butler’s melodramatic paint­ing, says a lot about our national sense of fatalism. Due to a confused order and arguments between commanders, the British light cavalry brigade charged into a valley, and was sur­rounded by Russian artillery and infantry. It was suicidal for the British. The phrase ‘The Charge of the light brigade’ has been used by Brits ever since, to express a costly mistake.

Although the charge was costly, it was nothing compared to the losses because of cold and unsanitary conditions in the British camp. Losses due to illness, inadequate winter clothing and starvation were preventable, and hard to understand today. By February 1855, the original army of 51,000 had been reduced to just 12,000, most dying of sickness.

Balaklava itself is also in our modern British vocabulary. The ‘Balaklava helmet’ is a long woolen hat, which had been invented by women back in Britain, knitted, and sent to keep British troops warm during the winter. Today this hat is mainly used by bank-robbers, who want to hide their faces!

The scandal of British incompetence resulted in two institutions. First was the world’s first professional war correspondent, William Howard Russell of the London Times. Russell brought the British government to its knees with his truthful stories of the suffering of British troops. Second was the beginning of professional nursing. The most well known nurse was Florence Nightingale, who revolutionised the care for the sick and wounded by establishing permanent, properly run hospitals. She has been immortalised by her painting appearing on British five-pound notes.

The effects of the war, politically, were few. Russia retreated to its pre-war borders, and Turkey continued its decline. France and Britain were unaffected. Only in the language, and the establishment of nursing and the presence of the press on the battlefield, did we gain something useful from this bitter war.

	5.18. Martin Luther once said that any war was ‘the greatest plague that can afflict humanity; it destroys religion … states … families.” But some people say that ‘combat and life are identical, for when the will to fight is gone, so is life itself” (Oswald Spengler). What do you think about these points of view? Which one do you agree with? Why?
	5.19. a) Wars usually bring devastation at least to one of the parties of the conflict, but not all countries of the Third World are war-stricken at the moment, though their population suffer from hunger, thirst, and poor sanitation resulting in diseases and early deaths. A number of organizations are trying to help poor people nowadays through using new technologies. What do you think about the role of technology in alleviating poverty? Can this and the related problems be solved only through applying new highly-technological ideas? b) Work with a partner. Look at the paragraphs below and decide which of these solutions are being described.

growing high-yield crops	biological control of pests
alternative energy sources	practical preventive measures

A:	A recent survey showed that 60% of Masai children suffer from trachoma. One way it can be spread is by the use of polluted water or communal water already used by people with the disease. Flies are the main carrier, lured by the milk around a child’s lips and nose. An empty tin with a small hole in the bottom is a simple way to combat the problem. A cupful of clean water is poured into the tin. Children then use drops of clean, uncontaminated water to wash their eyes.
B:	Agricultural experts have developed a new prolific variety of cassava, but, unlike Asia’s wheat and rice, the cassava needs no fertiliser or irrigation. The plant has long roots that tap soil moisture deep in the ground, helping it to survive in the droughts that have become common in Africa.
C:	The greyback beetle is a serious threat to sugar-cane crops throughout the world. We depend on cane as the raw material from which sugar is made. Marine toads were originally brought over to Puerto Rico and the West Indies in the 19^th century to control the beetles and other sugar-cane pests. When the toad was introduced into Australia, it soon posed a threat to Australian wildlife. Native species were displaced, and lizards, snakes, koalas and even crocodiles were attacked.
D:	The technical experts and the politicians agree that the barren, windswept cliffs of Scotland are ideal sites for the huge wind turbines which will help to meet Britain’s growing need for power. Some even argue that the scale, shape and motion of the turbines will improve the environment in the same way that a beautiful statue enhances a garden. Locals, like Jim Campbell, are not convinced: “I can see that one of these things on its own might look good to some people, but when you get a hundred of them threshing away then it’s just an eyesore.”

c) What are the benefits and drawbacks of the solutions in each of the situations described? d) Think of any other solutions, for example antibiotics, which could be used instead of the solutions described in A-D? Which solutions look more preferable?

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