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    OAA THE L E1D El. [Sattibjjay , A&vY . ....

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    SIR CHARLES NAPIER AND SWEABORG. The Tim...

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    The Sebastopol Committee. Mr. Clay, The ...

    state they w * w fc * QSeusatwn . ) He beiwved the commiasMia * mighthave g <* supj ^ s , from the sowfcbam shore * of the Black Sea had ; to tried . Tlu * ; amlHilaoae * : were not -what they should be . Wtw * . h » stegkneatamyedofc Souta * i , ncr . arrange meaA ' . bad -beea dad © jwith ; regard to hospitaj * for the sick , and wounded . He had " no hesitation inc saying that the commweariat ought to be constituted a milttacy instead of a civil department . It would be better that < it should be a separate department . It . . mwsft so in . IndUk ; and ia the French army it was tut essentially military department . badThe

    O ? he tool * supplied . to the troops were very . billhooks -were s ^ uite useless . It was chiefly : in consecjwence- of this , defect that the troops were unable to supply thefaMHjLvea with fuel . The tools were sapplied by the Ordnance Departments He believed the health of the French troops was as bad as that of theEnglishw With regard to diet , rice was a very common and abundant article in Turkey ; and the only reason he could . conceive why the army was not provided with it was that it was not an ordinary soldier ' s ration . If proper reinforcements had been poured in , much of the sickness would have been presented * . _ . ¦ _ ' ..

    _ , Colonel Wilson , of the Coldstreara . Guards , denied that the men ate their meat raw . In reference to changa o € ; clothing , he said that frona the 14 th of September , > wheivhe landed in the Crimea , until the 26 th of November , when he reached Constantinople , he inevex , changed his clothes . He had no change of linen , and neverwas-led to expect , any . He did not know which to praise most * the admirable and . surpassing : bravery of the men , or their pious

    resignation . Colonel Shakeapear , captain of the Horse Artillery t was * examined before the Committee on Tuesday . The effect of hie evidence was chiefly to ahow that the men .. whom he commanded were well provided with" food , clothing , medicine , tents , and huts . He considered the commissariat good . He admitted , however ^ that he had lost several horses from overfatigue , that the state of the roads was very bad , and that the tools were not of good quality .

    Mr . Joseph . Crowe , correspondent of the Illustrated London News * testified to the disordered state of Balaklava hatbonry and contrasted it with the more favourable condition of the French quarters at Kamiesch harbour . Captain Kellett , of the Himalaya , screw steamer , used as a transport ,. made the following astounding statement : ^— A quantity of charcoal , 650 sacks—an article much wasted by the troops—was put on board at Constantinople by Admiral Boxer , and Consigned to- the agent of transports , Captain Christie , who would not recsive it ; he had to take it backwards and forwards two or three times , and finally back to Admiral Boxer at Constantinople . " This story was rather strangely received by the Committee with laughter .

    Colonel Sparks , of the 32 nd Regiment , said a large number of hie men died from cholera and the severity of-the ^ cliinate . — -Sometime 8 ,-tb « y ; were .. out in Jhe . trenches twenty-four or thirty-sir hours . Scurvy broke , out , owiiigy as he believed , to the men haying too much salt meat . There was a deficiency of medicine , and the tents were old . He thought the number of medical men sufficient , and , when he left in December * he « onceived the regiment was tolerably weU-supplied : with winter clothing . Sergeant Dumaocn , in the staff of the Grenadier Guards , « aid he < wa * wounded at Inkerman , and it was found necessary to amputate his left arm . Whea he wm wounded he was- put into an ambulancewaggon . Those waggons were very inconvenient .

    While he was being conveyed , he was obliged to lean on one side , and hold tightly by the right hand , in order ttoat his wounded shoulder might not strike on the other side . He frequently slept ia the open air during-the . line of march ia the Crimea . Many of the men ' fell ill in consequence . He was received with greatikindaesfl at the Hospital at Scutari . Good accommodation was- supplied in the ship Talavna , in which he came homev Tbe < clothing in the Crimeawas . very bad > . especially the shoes . Witness also complained of . the tools , , and said that the bills < wocid notfiufc . a bio of wood , pieces being chipped out of the « dge » an inah long ;; that the piokaxes were always coming ; off at the handles , if they did not break ; and that ttae shovels were worse than the piclojj

    Oat Wednesdays the Earl of Cardigan was ex * amined . He said no preparations were mado at Varna- ibr the reception of troops . While at Devna , his men were very healthy until the cholera broke out ^ busy woea afterwards encamped about three miles from Vanaa ^ tke health of the men was nob so good , owingy as it was reported * to the exhalations irom >« hsi lake Jmlf a mile off * . During his stay at Old JPorty m the Crimes , there was a ntfr supply of forage . The want of it commenced after the action at Balokkura , th * cause beingy as he believed ) deflcienwy ^ iatthe . transport . They were eighteen days witbawtthay . JJm believed there was a large quantity in BoUOdMrsvbutJtwaa found impossible to bring

    ituft owing to the hilly nature ; of th * country . The horses suffered very much from want ofiforage : four hundred had to be shot . In November , the sickness of the men increased very much . The hospital tents were in the rear of : the : lines . He visited them , and was sorry to-see the eondUioivof the men in them . There was no fuel foi firing , and the men had to lie on their second horse-blanketfl and cloaks usually . The horses suffered very much from exposure in November . He coald no * say that the Light Brigade ever suffered much from a deficiency of medical attendance . The duties of the commissariat were performed well as regarded his own brigade . The officers exerted themselves to the uttermost , and did

    everything in the world they could ; indeed he never saw more zealous officers . When he . left the Crimea on the 8 th of December , the clothing of the troops waa becoming very bad indeed ; and he should say a great deal of it was . worn out . No winter clothing had then been received ; but the quarter-master geaeral and non-commissioned oflBcers of each regiment had been sent off by steamer to Constantinople to buy warm clothing , and boots and shoes ; and whea he got to Constantinople they were still there , and had not succeeded ia getting the articles they required . He could not say when it was first : kno wn that the army would winter before Sebastopol , but it was not generally believed or supposed that the army

    was going to aremain there during the winter . This was after tba battle of Inkerman . It had by this time become eccbreottely wet It rained night and day . Nothing , as regarded cleanliness ^ could be worse than , the state of the harbour at Balaklava . No attempts were : made to remove the offal or dead animals . There were a great many seamen , unemployed in the harbour ; and if they had had instructions , he thought they might have cleared it in a couple of days- He was aware that large amounts of stores and forage had come in vessels to Balaklava , and ; had gone away ,: made one or two trips , and returned with the same cargo . One vessel came with the hold filled with boots * and went away with them .

    He did not know whether .-that was at the time when the men wanted boots most , but they always wanted them . With regard to the management of those harbours and ports , he was of opinion that an officer should be placed there with supreme command , and that his orders should be iastantly obeyed , whatever those orders might be . No quays were provided at Balaklava for the landing of the horses , and he remembered seeing some of them fall into the sea in consequence . Mr . Filder never came to his division to inspect it . The original number of men in the Light Division was 1250 ; but when he left the Crimea there were only 300 men and horses remaining . The tents be had were not old , and he had heard of no

    complaints against them . Mr . James Macdonald , the gentleman deputed to distribute the funds and clothing collected through the instrumentality of the Times , spoke mainly to the state of the hospitals at Scutari , which were two in number—the general hospital and the barrack hospital . ^ He could not tell how many cases there were in the two hoipitftla ; as " tliere yrere " no ¦ records kept : Of the whole number of patients , he should say that one-third wercon bedsteads and two-tMrds on the floor . In the general hospital , with the exception of want of beds , the patients were well provided for . With regard to the barrack hospital , he found that small provision had been made for

    converting it into a hospital at all . In the barrack , or supplemental hospital , he should say there were from 1500 to 1800 patients at -the time of his arrival . Not being head-quarters , it had not the repose of the general hospital or other facilities . The medical staff was insufficient . Two supplemental ship hospitals were in the Golden Horn . There were no beds for the men , except twenty-five in the Turkish convalescent hulk for severe cases . The other was catted the Bombay convalescent . The mere were very poorly clad : many of them had nothing but their coats . Those who had no beds lay on the floor in 4 ho clothes in which they came from the Crimea , or in their blankets . There were about 65 O men in-these two vessels . There were about' 2800 patients of all descriptions in the hospitals at the time of his Arrival . He vieited these hospitals before and

    afterthe battle of Inkerman . When he was first there the men were cheerful and hopeful : but on his second visit they were desponding , and on wet days they wrapped themselves in blankets and were buried in silence . The purveying department was not worthy the name . The first purveyor who w « s sent onfc was Mr . Ward , a person upwards of seventy years of age , who was exhausted by a walk from the general to the barrack hospital , a distance of a quarter of a mile . He had two assistants and two boys—a most inefficient staff . No language could describe the deplorable state of the poor fellows who came down sick and wounded—almost , without clothing , and sometimes without medicine , & c . Sometimes it happened that in bad weather the poor fellows vroro taken to tho hospitals without any covering , tho rain pouring down upon them , ( dome of tho mon who had been put on board

    at the Crimea came down to Constantinople without shoes , or with such shoes as one saw upon beggars in this country . Their shirts , were thrown awav with utter disgust at their flfthiness , or torn into shreds . Sometimes they arrived without coats at all , while others wore ' the coats of comrades who had died on the passage . If it had hot been for the supplies which he was the means of affording , the poor fellows must-have gone without . During the first five weeks after his arrival in the East there was no washing . The patients' clothes were put under their beds , covered , not only with vermha , but with discharges of wounds and maggots . ( Sensation . ) There were no means of washing the hospital floors :

    but Miss Nightingale made a great change in these matters as soon as she arrived . He attributed the mismanagement of the hospitals to want of organisation under a single head . While at Balaklava he noticed the state of the harbour . Unlike the rest of the Euxine , the water of which was black , the water in the harbour was grey and green . In fact , it was a great cesspool . There- was a terrible effluvium from the burial grounds ; but that met one in every part of the Crimea—at least , as far as our positi on was concerned . He returned to Scutari in February ,

    and found great improvements . Dr . Cumming had become medical inspector , and for the first time the hospitals had a head . New hospitals had been opened at Rhodes and Smyrna , and additional supplies had been sent out . No arrangements had been made for hospitals previous to the arrival of the English armies , but the French had * previous to their armies being sent out , provided hospitals which , in their general arrangements , were as good as hospitals in London or Paris . There was a great deal of submission and resignation on the part of the patients , none of whom were ever heard to complain .

    The examination of Lord Lucan , on Thursday , elicited no new facts , but added confirmation to those already stated by other witnesses . His lordship spoke of the gross deficiency of the Commissariat > many of the officers being youths from the Treasury ; of the want of proper arrangements for landing at Old Fort ; of the scarcity of forage , of which they never had more than one day ' s store on hand , though ships full of hay and barley were in the harbour ; of-the suflferingsrof the horses from insufficiency of food , and exposure to the weather ; of the inattention of Mr . Commissary-General -Filder to his lordship ' s urgent representations ; o the ragged condition of the men ; of the imperfect nature which he

    of the transport service , for the remedy of made a proposal to Lord Raglan , which was not heeded ; of the defective character of the ambulance waggons ; and of the general absence of management and supervision . With respect to their want of forage , his lordship said—" Between the 14 th and 20 th of November , General Canrobert was kind enough to furnish them with chopped straw sufficient for thirty days . In January , the French were short o forage ; but they complained that this was caused in consequence of our commissaries not fulfilling their engagements , and returning the chopped straw they lent to the-English . " ( Murmurs-of-disapprobation from the public . * )

    Oaa The L E1d El. [Sattibjjay , A&Vy . ....

    OAA THE L E 1 D El . [ Sattibjjay , A & vY . . ^ ; . ¦ ¦ ¦ ' - ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ - •¦ m ¦ ¦¦ — ir ^^____ ^

    Sir Charles Napier And Sweaborg. The Tim...

    SIR CHARLES NAPIER AND SWEABORG . The Times of Monday last-contains a letter from Sir Charles Napier , giving his reasons for not attacking Sweaborg and the other fortified places in the Baltic . One of the main difficulties he conceives to have arisen from the sunken rocks and shoals , on which heavers that it is impossibledn winterto place buoys and beacons ; Several days , he states , would bo required for this operation , while the men employed would bo under fire night / and day . He adds that the Russians themselves could not navigate these seas without beacons * and that they have taken care to remove them all . Sir Charles also complains of " having hod meitlier giro-boats nor mortar-boats to cover the approach of the vessels . " With respect to tho much-mooted topic of " discretion" versus " daring" he observes : — " I served with Sir Sydney Smith on his attempt on Boulogne in November , 1805 . Ho did not weigh difficulties and forcatal contingencies , and ho lost all his boats , and very nearly lost his ships . Nelson had not my difficulties to contend with , either at tho Nile or Copenhagen . At tho former , his enemy was at anchor in an open roadstead in August . At Copenhagen , in the month of April , he had a aafe harbour to lie m to make his arrangements ; no gales of wind could affect either his ships or boatshe could choose his day—as the

    , : _„_ _* ii . a A , i « :.. un 4-r . lA n . n tst An in tho month wise mon at the Admiralty told mo to do in tho month of October—but I will engage not one of thorn would have found the day had they been in my place . J ^ orU Exmouth attacked Algiers in the middle of summer , nnd there were neither rocka nor shoals there . He dul not capture it , and I doubt whether ho would have tried it again . At Aero tho weather was flne nnd no difficulties , and , had the Egyptians held out , notwithstanding the explosion , its capture was donbtftfl , and with a Russian garrison impossible . Sir James Saumaroz , with a very superior force , was boat oil" at Algqsinw , and lost a ship ;

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), March 17, 1855, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_17031855/page/6/