No sooner did Lord Kaglan, who was posted in the advanced trench at a point which commanded a near view both of the Redan and Malakoff, perceive through the glimmer of early dawn the serious opposition encountered by the French, and the turn affairs were likely to take, than, with a feeling of chivalry, which does him eternal honour, he anticipated the moment fixed for the assault, and ordered the English columns to move out of the trenches upon the Eedan. These columns, three in number, and each containing four hundred men, consisted of detachments of the Light Second and Fourth Divisions, under the command of Lieutenant-General Sir George Brown. The right column was to attack the left face of the Redan between the flanking batteries; the centre one was to advance upon the salient angle; and the left one upon the re-entering angle formed by the right face and flank of the work; the first and last preceding the centre column.
Each column was accompanied by artillerymen to spike the guns or turn them on the enemy; and the scaling-ladders were carried by a party of sailors, who, with Captain Peel in command of them, had volunteered for this dangerous service.
No sooner had the flanking columns issued from the trenches, preceded by covering parties from the Rifle Brigade, and by the sailors, than they were assailed by a most murderous fire of grape and musketry, more heavy and continuous. Lord Raglan declared, than he had ever before witnessed. The sailors suffered severely, and Captain Peel himself was wounded. In the attacking columns the men in advance were either killed or wounded, and the remainder, finding it impossible to proceed, lay down on the ground and fired into the embrasures of the Redan. Major-General Sir John Campbell, who had for several months commanded the Fourth Division, and whose kindliness of manner and cheerfulness of disposition had deeply endeared him to the men, led the left column sword in hand up to the abattis, only to be shot dead beneath it. Colonel Yea, the beloved commander of the Royal Fusiliers, who led the right column, and Colonel Shadforth of the 57th, in command of the storming party on this side, both shared a similar fate. Lieutenant-Colonel
THE EAST.
Tylden, of the Engineers, of whom Lord Raglan so frequently made honom'able mention in his despatches, was severely wounded; and Major-General Jones, on whom the supreme direction of the siege operations had devolved on the return of Sir John Burgoyne, was struck, though not severely, by a grape-shot in the forehead. Meanwhile the pitiless storm of grape still continued to pour with unremitting fury on the devoted men in front of the Eedan, who, after holding their ground with unparalleled tenacity for nearly half-an-hour, at length relinquished the struggle, and the scanty survivors ran back through the same appalling lire to the trenches, w^here the reserves had suffered almost as severely as themselves. Any renewal of the attack was hopeless, as about the same time the French, whose reserves had been brought up only to be swept away, but who still clung with reluctant obstinacy on the slopes of the work, to enter which was now an impossibility, were recalled from all points by General Pelissier, who, seeing that all chance of success was at an end, ordered a general retreat to the trenches. This was effected without any further loss of consideration under cover of an admirable artillery fire from our batteries, which contrived to monopolise completely the attention of the enemy.
It was now half-past eight a.m. and the combined attack, of which so many sanguine anticipations had been formed, which was to terminate the long and weary labours of the siege, and give Sebastopol to the Allies, had ended in failure and disappointment. Several causes, many of which it is now impossible to trace, had contributed to this deplorable result; but two of them stand out in bold relief, and claim a pre-eminence which precludes the necessity of further investigation. These, which have been already sufficiently indicated, were — the abandonment of the proposed renewal of the bombardment on the morning of the assault, and the absence of simultaneity in the three French attacks. The former enabled the Eussians to all but annihilate their assailants by an overwhelming artillery fire, which disorganised them from the moment they quitted their own trenches: and the latter caused the French to be beaten in detail; while their defeat entailed that of the English as a necessary consequence. The mortification attendant on our own reverse was in some measure modified by the news of the splendid conduct and extraordinary success of one of the brigades of the Third Division, which had been ordered to co-operate on the left with the main attack.