Friedrich Engels

The Siege of Sevastopol

Written about 30 October 1854.

Translated from the English.

["New-York Daily Tribune" No. 4236 of 15 November 1854, leading article]

The greatest achievement of the Allies in the Crimea, besides the Battle of the Alma, was Lord Raglan’s famous flank march from the Alma to Balaclava, by which he transformed the ostensible objective of the campaign—the capture and occupation of Sevastopol—into a _coup de main_ [surprise attack] against a portion—and, moreover, the weaker portion—of the fortifications; the destruction of the Russian fleet, dockyards, and arsenals is naturally included, but it requires the withdrawal of the Allied troops as soon as this objective has been attained. That this must be the case became clear from this whole movement. It was an abandonment of the notion of attacking the northern front of the fortress, which is the commanding front and where alone an attack could be truly decisive; thus, it was openly admitted that the expedition was incapable of carrying out what it had laid down in its programme—the complete capture and occupation of Sevastopol. Nevertheless, as stated, this very march has been glorified in column-lengths of bombastic phrases and rhetorical gibberish as a stroke of particularly ingenious generalship, and even the great London newspapers, with their correspondents on the spot, only discovered the truth a month later, after the government had probably dropped them a hint about it. Thus, the “London Times” only had its eyes opened to the true state of affairs on 28 October, and it timidly intimates that hitherto only the lesser task of the campaign has been accomplished and that the forts on the north side of the bay, unless they surrender voluntarily, can hardly be taken. But the “Times”

hopes they will behave decently and surrender, for all dependent fortifications would have to yield once the main part of the fortress had been taken. In truth, however, it is not the North Fort that depends on the town of Sevastopol, but the town of Sevastopol that depends on the North Fort, and we fear that this paper’s arguments will hardly suffice to conquer so strong a fortress.

It is true that, since the celebrated “glorious march”, the Allies have accomplished nothing of which they could boast in any way, and one cannot, therefore, blame our transatlantic friends for making such a fuss about it. The progress of the siege itself so far belongs to those things of which they rightly believe that the less said about it, the better. But as we are pledged to nothing other than an impartial judgement of events, we shall not be so delicate. In this altogether very strange war, the siege is truly one of the strangest affairs. The characteristic feature of the war seems to be the belief that field fortifications are impregnable. At Oltenitza, the obsolete method of a cannonade was first applied for some hours, and then the works were stormed, but unsuccessfully. At Calafat, the Russians did not even venture an attack. At Silistria, a simple earthwork bore the brunt of the battle and withstood the furious assault of the enemy even when it was already almost levelled to the ground. And now, at Sevastopol, a simple line of field fortifications is being honoured with stronger breaching batteries and much heavier guns than were ever brought into the field against the most regular fortress. This siege is a clear proof that, to the same degree that the material of war has improved through industrial progress during the long period of peace, the art of war has declined. Had a Napoleon seen the batteries before Sevastopol, bristling with eight- and ten-inch guns, he would have burst out laughing irresistibly. But this is by no means all.

Around 1 October the Allies had taken up their positions, but it was not until the 8th or 9th that the siege works were begun, and no shot was fired before the 17th. The reason for this delay was that the guns could not be brought up sooner. A terrain of only four to five miles had to be overcome, the ground was quite favourable and firm, with slight undulating elevations, and partly provided with a tolerably good road. There were, however, no draught animals. No draught animals in the Crimea, the most cattle-rich land in the world! In the Baidar valley, within sight of the heights of the Chernaya, there were more oxen than would have been needed to haul the entire Allied fleet over the mountains. But the Baidar valley was accessible to the Cossacks, and the Allied cavalry, in covering a foraging raid, might have exposed itself to these terrible opponents. Moreover, the Allies must remain on good terms with the population and must not lay hands on their property. With such subterfuges our English papers try to conceal the truth, that Raglan and Canrobert, while blockading Sevastopol on the south, are themselves blockaded by Menshikov’s outposts on the Chernaya. That this is so follows from the simple fact that, up to the time of the last report, the Allied troops still had to live on salt meat, as no fresh meat was at hand.

On 3 October five Russian battalions crossed the Chernaya at Inkerman, and they were allowed to enter the fortress from the south, “because this could only be advantageous for the Allies”. An original kind of warfare! The enemy, who is depicted as beaten, demoralised, annihilated, sends 3,000 men into Sevastopol, right under the noses of the Allies. He must have had a reason for it. But if he has his reasons for sending the troops, Raglan has his reasons for ushering them in. He assumes the place to be overcrowded; on what he bases that, however, is not clear. In any case, besides the four square miles within the Russian lines, there is the whole north shore and the entire country behind it, to which any surplus of troops can be sent within ten minutes. To call a place overcrowded that is blockaded from only one side—that is surely the height of absurdity.

When we first heard of the landing, we declared that disease would be the most dangerous enemy of the Allies if the campaign dragged on. Now, diseases in their very worst forms are raging there, and hand in hand with them goes the very worst provisioning, at least among the British. On this account, the sick have really been neglected to such a degree that Lord Raglan found himself compelled to issue a very energetic reprimand to the medical staff. But that is not enough. The doctors are in Constantinople, the medical supplies in Varna, and the sick in Balaclava. Is that not a magnificent illustration of the new military doctrine that Louis Bonaparte recently expounded in Boulogne, according to which every army must be drawn up in a triangle in order to have a good position? The diseases increase with the harsh season, the regiments are wasting away—a British regiment that was sent out 1,000 strong can now muster no more than 600 fit for duty—yet the operations continue at their slow pace. The routine of the high command, the fruit of forty years’ peacetime training, will not be disconcerted by such trifles. Let the army perish, so long as Sevastopol is taken according to Her Majesty’s Regulations!

In ordinary sieges, the besiegers attempt to establish their first batteries as close as possible to the enemy works, and six hundred to seven hundred yards is already considered a great distance. In a grand siege such as this, however, especially when it is directed against simple field works, in Raglan’s view precisely the opposite should be done. The enemy permits us to approach to seven hundred yards; but we must never do what the enemy desires of us. Thus thinks Raglan, and he places his batteries at distances of 2,500 and 3,000 yards—a fact we would not have believed possible had the reports about it admitted of even the slightest doubt. After that, he advances to 1,500 to 1,200 yards and then declares, as the reason why he does not open fire, that breaching batteries, to be effective, must be three hundred or four hundred yards from the works to be stormed! The distant batteries must be armed with Lancaster guns and long-range ten-inch guns, for, as it seems, the British artillerymen are of the opinion that these guns, like telescopes, are only usable from a great distance. In fact, this question of great range, which is perfectly in place with naval guns, has caused more confusion and mischief than actual good in the case of land artillery; an example of this is these ridiculous batteries.

The landward fortifications of Sevastopol, which have provoked these outbursts of genius and acumen, consist of the following works: On the west side (which is being attacked by the French), one or two faces of the Quarantine Fort are exposed. Behind this lies a loopholed wall, which extends as far as the tip of Quarantine Bay and ends on a hill in a round tower that forms a réduit for an earthwork erected all around it. From there, a wall of an average thickness of three feet runs to the upper end of the harbour, thus closing off Sevastopol to the south-west. This wall is said to be unsuitable for any kind of defence, although it could easily have been adapted for it; it is therefore covered by small advance earthworks. From the end of the harbour eastwards as far as Dockyard Creek (the British attack front), there is no regular defence at all, apart

from two towers which, similar to the one described above, are surrounded and protected by lunettes. In addition, there are a few hastily thrown-up earthworks, and the whole constitutes an entrenched camp that does not meet any great demands, if one may believe the sketches published by Captain Biddulph, which were taken on the spot. At all events, these show only a single line of defence, consisting of works open at the rear; we see no closed redoubts, which the Russians otherwise usually love so much. We cannot, however, believe that this is so. Were there really only this single line to be taken, the British should have conquered it with the bayonet long ago. There must be a second line of redoubts lying behind it.

All the Russian works have been armed with the heavy naval guns – the Russians could not have used the guns to better purpose. To be sure, they fire with them beneath all criticism. Day and night they bombard the enemy, and one shot in a hundred at best hits the mark. This poor shooting perhaps induced Lord Raglan to open his trenches from the safe distance of 3,000 yards. After a three-day bombardment by the allied fleets and armies, it is said, the British had made a breach on their side, while the French had not yet completed theirs. As soon as this, too, was done, the assault was to begin. That 200 guns of such enormous calibre should require three or four days to make a breach in such defensive works would be incredible, did we not know from an authenticated source at what a respectful distance the allied batteries had been erected. So much for the results achieved so far; but whatever event crowns the operations, one thing is certain, the siege of Sevastopol will have no equal in the history of warfare.