Operations at Eupatoria and Kinburn. 291
safe, he left only one French Division with the English on the Upland, and spread his army along the Tchernaya, and into the valley of Baidar ; and at the same time sent a force of cavalry and guns to Eupatoria to operate with the Turks from that place against the Russian corps observing it, where some success was gained over the enemy's cavalry ; and the Allied Generals were encouraged by it to augment the forces there (of which General D'Allonville commanded the whole) by a Division of French infantry and a brigade of English cavalry.
Also, a combined operation was undertaken against Kinburn, where the rivers Dnieper and Bug flow into a wide estuary, after forming highways for transport through districts affording abundant supplies. On one of these, at Nikolaieff, was a great naval station and arsenal. An English brigade, under General Spencer, and a French brigade, under General De Wimpffen, both commanded by General Bazaine, were disembarked, under cover of a combined naval squadron, whereupon the troops and ships together brought an attack to bear which in a few hours caused the place to surrender. With it the Russian Army in the Crimea lost another important source of supply.
All this time the British Ministers were not entirely at one with the Emperor. Sharing his desire for a forward movement of the armies, they strongly opposed his idea of conserving the maritime establishments of Sebastopol. In this they had much reason. It had always been evident that Russia could have no object in maintaining a war fleet in this inland sea, where
292 Destruction of the Docks.
her commerce between shore and shore could need no protection, except to use it in prosecuting her designs on her neighbour's territory. It was quite in accordance with logic, therefore, when we had just been rejoicing over the destruction of the Russian Fleet, that we should destroy the means of restoring that fleet now that they lay in our power. As to preserving them in order to have something to treat with, no provision on paper that we could wring from so slippery an antagonist, against the undue use of his naval power, could compare in efficacy with the step of leaving him no naval power to use. Pressed by the British Government, the Emperor consented. Between Christmas and February the French and British engineers destroyed the great docks, the remaining forts and barracks on the south side of the harbour, and the aqueducts which supplied the docks.
The minor successes at Eupatoria and Kinburn by no means satisfied the desire either of the Emperor or of the British Government for a more complete and substantial triumph. The military situation, where the Allies on the one side of the Tchernaya, the Russians on the other, stood face to face, each defying their enemy to attack, presented itself under different aspects. Under one of these, it seemed as if the Allies, pent in their corner, though they had gained the immediate prize, could not claim a victory so long as a Russian army was in the field ready to fight them. Under another, it might appear that the Allies, having destroyed that standing menace to Turkey, the Russian Fleet, with its arsenal and docks, thus attaining the grand object for which
The Government's Wish to push on. 293