The Express.
London, England, 1855-11-29 00:00:00

(Stamped id. Additional.) [TWOPENCE.

appears to be the best authenticated attributes it t°
the clueless cariosity of aFrench soldier, who sought
to improve an idle moment by investigating the
contents of • Russian 13-inch shell. After the
capture of the town, I may mention, when the am-
munition found within the enemy's magazines
was divided between ourselves and the French, our
Quartermaster General, Sir William Airey, di-
rected our share of the powder to be thrown into the
harbour, but our thrifty allies interfered, and carried
off the whole. The greater part of this, with a large
proportion of the shot and shell that had fallen to
their share, was brought up to the camp of General
de la Motto Rouge's command, near Inkermean—on
the immediate right of our Light Division—and there,
class by the walls of the often-mentioned windmill,
the explosion took place on Thursday afternoon.
Separated from this only by an open, some ban-
tired and flltj yards mess, are the tents, huts, guns,
nand entire stores of our own right siege train. There,
Ms, ear allotted the general hospital of their Right
Attack, from which, most providentially, several hun-
dred sick and wounded were sent off only about eight
days egos had these poor fellows been on thespot at
the time of the accident, these is reason to fear that
leaf few of them would be at this moment alive: To
recur, however, to the origin of the disaster
it appears that the inquisitive Frenchman
had tam one from a pile of Russian live'
shell, sad was hard at a course of experimental
probing of the fuze with his bayonet, when the shell
exploded, and igniting a quantity of loose powder
which was lying about the tent, communicated with
the pile outside, the explosion of which again set flee.
to the magazine in its neighbourhood, and to our own
storm of shell and rockets across the way. The result.
se I have said, was the most terrific blow-up that any
individual in either army has ever witnessed. I know
not how to desoribe it. To say that it equalled in
violence the combined salvors of a thousand parks of
artillery might seem extravagant; and yet the simile
would but feebly convey an idea of the volume of
thundering sound that shook the earth for miles
around, tearing down the most substantial masonry
and wooden huts, and levelling tents as by the
sweep of some invisible giant-arm. I had seen the
explosions on and after the Bth of September, which
se many pens have since described; but no half-
amen of them together would have equalled this
one, either in force or sound. Over an area of nearly
half-a-mile from the spot of its occurrence, the air
was one huge column of powder smoke and cast-up
earth, up into and athwart which ignited or exploding
shells and rockets d anon darted and flashed by
hundreds, spreading destruction to nearly everything
animate and inanimate, within a radius of more than
• thousand yards. Heavy siege guns were wrenched
from their carriages and thrown many perches from
where they had been standing, whilst the carriages
themselves, torn asunder, as a strong man might
rend bird-cages, were flung high into the air, and
fell iu scattered fragments far away amongst the
surrounding tents. It seemed, also, as if whole
piles of round shot and grape were similarly caught
up into the air and showered far and near, for I can
personally testify that, more than 500 yards from
the stone of the explosion, they and pieces of burst
shell fell and ploughed up the earth nearly as thickly
as if all the Russian batteries on the north side
had been transferred to Inkermann, and brought
into random play against the Light Division at the
time. This may sound extravagantly, I know ; but
it no more than describes the terrific, but happily
brief, storm of missiles vomited around on all sides
by this disastrous blow-up. In instantaneous sums?
sion to the first grand explosion of the French magazine
followed the minor ones of their and our own detached
packets of amallarm ammunition and piles of live
shell—with all the tepid regularity of musketry file-
firing---succeeded in their torn by the thundering
echoes of the whole rolling down in a vast storm of
sound through the ravines to Sebastopol—a right
musical roulade to our brave foes across the harbour.
Both within our own %closure and that of the
Wench, great heaps of firewood, old gabione, and
other combustible materials had been collected; and
these, dry as tinder from many days' sun, speedily
ignited. As night came on, the whole broke out into
pest sheds of flame, which, with just enough of a
meedises wind to fan it into clearness from the
immoke, era in a lambent stream from heap to heap,
Biagio, showers of sparks about, and firing the
piles of ammunition as it rolled along. Some7= minor explosions were attended by really
epiamlid pyrotechnic effect, those of the rockets
411Plially : few of these list rose high into the air,
but nearly all went off with a regularity
Vida produced a result resembling nothing so
math as a vast fiery free de ha ; whilst
many of the shells whizzed and flickered aloft into
the sir as in old times over the Malakhoff and the
Ilea& Perches off from this burning centre, little
patches of flame showed where tents had been set fire
to by the sparks and scattered pieces of burning wood,
and in every such instance wholesale destruction of
the thickly-clustering smear tenements around was
only escaped by tearing down those nearest the one
on fire. This, however, was done in only a few oases;
as, after the (incursion of the first great shock wee
recovered from, all fled for very life beyond the range
of further harm, leaving tents, arms, furniture,
clothing, and everything else to take their chance.
As a consequence, many a squire perch—amongst
the French especially—was burnt as naked se any
piece of far-western savannah by the desolating tide
of a prairie fire. It was not tilt the tiro had nearly
burned down, about 8 o'clock, that the individual
explosions of shell and single heaps of powder entirely
ceased; and even then, ea it was unknown what
remained to furnish food for others, no attempt was
made to approach the some of the catastrophe. The
troops had, indeed, returned to their tents from
their refuge ground behind the Victoria Redoubt,
but all effort to extinguish the smouldering remains
of the fire were wisely abstained from till the follow-
ing morning, when danger was no longer to be feared.
Immediately after the first great explosion, however,
when it was ascertained that the windmill itself—
which forms our main magazine in this part of the
camp, and contains some hundred and eighty tons of
powder—had escaped, General Stranbenzee, who
commands the brigade, hurried up to the tents of the
7th Fusiliers and asked if any of the men would
volunteer to mount the wall of the mill and cover the
roof with wet tarpaulins and blankets as a protection
(PROM OUR OWN CORBwor....— _ against the thickly flying sparks and burning wood.
CAMP, SEBASTOPOL, Nov. 17. Now, the concussion had literally thrown the roof off
A calamity, the resultant casualties of which are the old building, and there it stood in the very centre
f the spreading flames, exposed every minute to a
not yet ascertainable, has unfortunately occurred to
thousand chances of instantaneous destruction. Hardly
furnish subject-matter for a short letter by this mail, anything could exceed the danger attending such a
when everything else that could have supplied mate- mow as the general proposed, but, notenthatand-
rial for a paragraph was, and is, at the most complete big, Lieutenant Hops (senior) and twenty-five
stied still. Shortly after 3 o'clock oa Thursday after- men at once respondeda to the
mbreri
I;tuilirgnappesAl award
Men the whole camp, from lokermann to far beyond Proceeded with sill. • party
Oatlicart's Hill, was literally shaken throughout ff
of the 34th Regiment, were induced to accompany
every square foot of its area, by the most tremendous t and some
them; and, within ten minutes from the first great
mtehemPerofertie Rifles,
syllogism that has ever echoed through these CH- blow-up, Mr. Hope was on the walls of the mill
was hills—many as they have listened to during piling the wet coverings over the exposed powder-
the past twelve thundering mouths. Happily bo
h optsxtheir i6ig shelfecle
tasutord
mbeutihneinwghtiatreood While
though we have shared largely in the lose of life tt_ re
h er and some half-dozen of the men were thus
aDdlisa4l/144 whatever.,__ blame attaches the °°°°° of
employed, the remainder carried water 'o throw upon
this calamitouscalamitous oss•utt belongs exclusively ,__°lll the blankets and bars rafters of the mill, and in little
laim. llemel envies, of the mite tit the "Mr' more than half-an-hour this vast pile of powder was
lase we swat thrash the can, bat that which as well protested from the thickly flying spathe owl

the men, and the daily occurrence of casualties,
mused the practice of Otis customary honour to be
discontinued.
On the same day., an explosion occurred in one of
the expense magazines in the Roden. Two men of
the Coldstream Chards, who were on duty in
pardwg. the Rahn, were exploring one of the an-
,
derground " bunks " in which ammunition had hem
stored. Whether they made ass
.of a light is not
known ; bat suddenly the oompresOld mod of an
ezplosian of gonpowdm was heard, and the earth
above the bunk was observed to be upheaved sad
broken, and then to mink in. There was
not gunpowder enough to mattes the tim-
ber and stones around, or in al prebabi-
lity more accidents most hare occurred. The
first soldier who was dug from beneath the rain was
found to be blackened by the exploded gunpowder,bad
and gaits dead from the injuries which be bad re.
Delved; the other was still alive, but little hopes were
entertained of his recovery. A sergeant who was
near the entrant* of the magazine had his face and
hands scorched. There are still many "live" shells
lying about the batteries of the Roden, and, consider.
lag the number of persons who have wandered
through the work and the careless habit of smoking.
itisenribas that they have not led to any accidents.
The rains which we have now every right to expect
from day to day will soon destroy all risk oniret
account. _ . _

-----
November 18.—All the divisions to the right of
the British cam p were =der arms before daylight
this morning. It was ordered last night that the
regiments should parade at half-past five, bat this
was afterwards changed to an earlier hour. It was
thought possible that the enemy, if contemplating an
assault at all, might attempt it now, hoping to gain
some advantage from the destruction of oar ammuni-
tion which be witnessed yesterday. Naval Old-
rington passed before six a.m. towards Inkernseaa is
reconnoitre the enemy's movements. The morning
passed by, however, without any demonstration on
the part of the Russians.
On visiting the ground where the explosion w-
owed, the signs of devastation are hardly so great
les might have been anticipated. The explosion had
not formed any funnel-like excavation, =eh as was
caused by the destruction of the Russian magazines.
This wits of course attributable to the French maga-
sine being above ground, consisting of powder 0901141
piled one above the other, and simply protested by
an appropriate shed, while the Rumen magazines
were deeply buried. Some of the shells had been pro-
jected upwards to an amazing height, and in a direst
line, judging from the position and great depth rd
some of the shell-holes in the ground when the
depot bad been. Pieces of charred timber, brakes
gams in which were packed new artillery shakes,
broken carbines, tin MOB rent into fragments, pleas
of shell boxes, portions of gun carriages, heavy shot
whitened by the salts from exploded gunpowder, were
strewed about the place where the French siege train
stood. The destruction in the English siege train
depot was lass than had been supposed, but a great
part of the stores had seemingly been destroyed.
Sappers .were at work pulling down some of the
shattered huts on one side, and fatigue parties of line
soldiers were busily employed is clearing the ground
at other parts, or assisting the combustion of still
unoulderiog heaps of rubbish. The French commis-
sariat depot and ambulance across the ravine pre-
sented an extraordinary spectacle. Nearly every tent
was blown over, and hut stove in or shattered. It ap-
peared as if the blast of a hurricane had pawed
over it. One hut was singularly demolished. The
two sides had bulged outwards, and the roof had
fallen in. The ridge-beam had fallen to the ground
along the middle passages of the hut, but the sides of
the roof had maintained their connexion with the
aide walls. The roof thus appeared inverted, and the
patients in the beds along either aide of the hut, if
they remained quiet, must have been protected from
harm. The huts of all the regiment. of the Light
Division are more or lea strained or injured, than
nearest to the centre of explosion being the most so.
Some have been so twisted and torn that they are
quite untenable; in some the roofs have been partly
turned round, or forced inwards; many have been
perforated by shot or fragments of shells. Many of
the tents also have been perforated. The quantity of
fragments of shells sad grape shot strewed about in
some parts reminds one of the former state of the
ground in the neighbourhood of the advanced
trenches.
The number of caanalties reported is favourable
beyond all expectation. Of the artillerymen en-
camped at the siege train depot, the number killed is
said to be nine, while 40 are known to be wounded,
or are missing. In the Light Division there are 10
killed and 88 wounded. Three of theme deaths Go-
ner= in the camp of the 77th Regiment. Only two
sick men in hospital were wounded, and one of these
was a man of the 34th Regiment, who ran out abed
into the camp ground, and was struck in the arm by
a fragment of shell. The number of patients in the
hospitals is said, however, to have been very limited,
and the absence of so many men from the amps en
fatigue duties will explain the remarkably few mei-
dents among the troops, compared with the number
which might have been anticipated. The amount of
gunpowder lost by the English is very small—only
two tumbrils full, which were kept ready for immediate
nee at the depot. There is room for mach gratitude
on our side that so frightful an explosion was not
attended with more fatal results. It is greatly feared
that our allies suffered much more severely.
Ths weather has continued most favourable. No
rain has fallen, and the temperature has continued
comparatively mild. This has been of the utmost
importance in enabling the troops to bring up huts
and commissariat stores. Many of the new hut' are
now occupied in various parts of the mop. Oa die
14th instant, the anniversary of the great storm of
last year, no greater contrast could be imagined than
was afforded by the weather of this year. The day
was bright, mild. and clear, there was scarcely a
breeze of wind, the sun spread around a genial lode-
mice, and the atmosphere was exhilarating in the ex-
treme. It was the very perfection of an autumnal
day. Every road and communicatioo was in
excellent order, while last year the passage of a
vehicle was the work of almost insermenninhie
labour, for the whole plateau was a pool of med. Led
even in the calamity of yesterday there is, es already
mentioned, great reason for thankfulness. This is
not only true in the comparatively limited number of
fatal =Gideon ; for had it occurred during the carry-
ing on of the siege, how mach more grave might
have been its consequences on the progress of the
campaign P and had it been attended with a strong
wind, such as might well have been expected at this
time of year, who can say in what part of this wide-
spread camp of wood and canvas the destructive con-
sequences would have terminated P