| Description | "Here we are! three of us in the jolly little Fury steamer away for our very lives to Sebastopol; we have 200 men and are as happy as possible. The officers of the ship are so kind & civil that we shall be really & truly sorry to leave them for hard work again on shore - "Fury" was the ship that carried the French generals & Sir George Brown close in shore for survey - exchanged shots with the Russians - "If the Russian fleet comes out when we appear I shall not be surprised if we get a little sea fighting as well as shore work. These small steamers are very heavily armed. The Fury has 10 guns, two of them 64 pounders, just twice the size of those large ones you will remember on the battery at Portsmouth. I was not sorry to leave the "Emperor" for the cholera broke out again on board of her and the poor Captain was seiz'd and dead in a very few hours. It has been dreadful in the fleet. The "Britannia lost near 200 men & many others were as bad. There are so many buried all about Varna that they were beginning to come up again & they float half out of the water in all directions - it is a horrid thing" - started from Balzik Thursday with more than 500 ships in 6 lines flanked by warships. "The appearance is like "Birmingham at a distance" - as far as the eye can see all around nothing but smoking chimneys ... 15 miles would hardly cover our fleet .... Each steamer tows two sailing ships ... a perfectly smooth sea & very little wind." 70,000 men altogether including 15,000 Turks "who have volunteered to be blown up" - 10 September, anchored 50 miles off shore to avoid Russians warning Sebastopol by bonfire - a strange thing to anchor in the middle of the sea in range of an enemy fleet - "the smoke makes one fancy oneself near some large town - Bands are playing on board nearly all the ships & it only wants a few river steamers & some ladies in pink bonnets & muslin gowns to make it at once into a large picnic, instead of a lot of men on the eve of one of the greatest undertakings that ever took place on earth" - French delayed due to lack of steamers for towing - Landing tomorrow - everyone seems totally ignorant of opposing forces - 200,000 or 50,000 men - many officers invalided home or dead through climate - "we alone have lost 2 by death (one by cholera & 4 totally incapable of work." "Tuesday 12th - "at last we are in sight of Sevastopol!!!!! Not near enough to distinguish objects but near enough to be seen. I hope we have spoilt their breakfasts for them." - unfortunately the Fleet dispersed by squalls during the night - steamers had to cast loose the tow ships - Russian fleet cd. have wrought havoc - no men of war in sight - delay in concentrating Fleet will allow enemy time to prepare. [Date illegible] - "We land today ... the country looks barren and disconsolate to a degree. I can see no trees or sign of human habitation and Eupatoria looks as if it had been recently burnt". |