The Press.
London, England, 1854-08-12 00:00:00

SEBASTOPOL.

To the enemy who approaches Sebastopol from the
sea that fortress presents a must formidable aspect.
The bay on which it stands opens a short distance
above Cape Khersonesus, the south-west ex
tremity of the Crimea, and consists of a deep road-
stead, narrow at its entrance, and penetrating for a
league in a direction from west to east between cliffs
of white chalk varying from forty to eighty feet in
height. The town is situated on the south shore of
the bay. Within this long roadstead, which of itself
constitutes a vast and magnificent harbour, four
ports, perfectly sheltered from all winds, open them-
selves successively. Nearest the embouchure is the
quarantine port, then the arsenal or artillery port,
afterwards the visitor reaches the grand port, while
the port for outfitting and repairing ships lies far-
thest in of all. The inlets which form these ports
have between them jutting peninsulas covered with
casemate(' forth presenting many-tiered batteries,
whose fires cross at every point along the whole
extent of the bay. Each port is also flanked by
similar batteries, while a submarine chain protects
the entrance to the great or military port. The
harbour is altogether justly reckoned among the
finest in Europe.
A list of the forts at Sebastopol, on an enumera-
tion of the various batteries which make up the
ensemble of its bristling defences, would be monoto-
nous and barely intelligible. We must content our-
selves accordingly with such general and topographic
description as may best give an idea of the fortress
which has so long constituted the great stronghold
of Russian power upon the Black Sea. There are
twelve forts upon both sides of the bay, six being on
the shore where the town lies, and six more facing
them from the northern coast. These forts are
built for the most part in pairs vis-à-vis to one
another. They carry from 1,300 to 1,400 guns, in-
cluding several mortar batteries, and are furnished
at many points with furnaces for heating shot.
The six pairs of forts offer so many lines of fire
which an advancing fleet would have successively to
surmount, exposed in every instance to the shot at
pint-blank range from three or four hundred cannon,
b ;sides the fire from more distant batteries, the
shells from the mortar batteries, or red-hot shot.
The stone of which these forts are built is said to
be friable, and it is also asserted that the casemates
would rapidly become filled with smoke from the
fire of their own guns. But still much time would
be required to extinguish the resistance of the first
two forts, and after that there are ten more to be
dealt with. There are, moreover, several elevated
fort; which command the bay from a height of 120
feet, and can throw a plunging fire upon ships whose
guns could hardly, if at all, be elevated to the angle
requisite to return the salute with any effect. Then
the entrance, which, as we have said, is very narrow,
is flanked by two enormous fortresses carrying each
three tiers of guns. Around the military port also
are ranged a series of defensive fortifications which
the highest professional authorities rank with those
of Gibraltar or Malta. All the works of the port
and harbour are constructed upon the most gigantic
scale. They have cost the Russian Government
t venty millions sterling.
From this detail we cannot wonder that both the
English and French admirals recognised the impos-
sibility of assailing Sebastopol successfully from the
sea. By land, however, the attack presents much
less formidable difficulties. The town of Sebastopol
is built upon an amphitheatre of rising ground com-
manding the bay, and on a foundation of chalk, whose
hot and sterile strata extend into the interior as far
ai the eye can reach. The streets of the town are
steep and difficult of access. One street, which runs
parallel to the port upon an elevated terrace, is at
oace the only level thoroughfare of the place, and
cliitains the principal edifices, public and private,
which it can boast. The population amounts to
41..000 souls, of whom three fourths are soldiers,
sulors, or otherwise employed upon the public estab
lishments of the forts or arsenal. Above the town
ii a suburb containing some decenthouses, but much
exposed to the fierce winds from the steppes, which
bring down absolute tornadoes of sand. As a resi-

THE PRESS.

deuce the town of Sebastopol is detestable. In addi-
tion to all other inconveniences, the inhabitants are
terribly a ; icted by the Egyptian ophthalmia, caused
by the prodigious quantity of dust raised by every gale
from the chalk soil laid bare by the levelling opera
Lions when the fortifications were constructed. Thirty
thousand soldiers and sailors are stated to have fallen
victims to Z.his disease since the fortress has been
occupied by the Russians.
Before 1852 Sebastopol was hardly fortified at all
on the land side, and was commanded from a near
distance by the hills with which it was enviroued.
Recently, however, these hills have themselves been
fortified, or levelled, the materials being employed
in filling up every crevice which might facilitate the
approach of a besieging force. Upon the ground
thus prepared an enceinte continue has been traced,
commencing with s bastion behind the quarantine
port, and traversing round to the very brink of the
grand port. This enceinte has at least three quarters
of a league of circuit. Such a work must cost much
time and money. It is not a work to be improvised.
It requires vast constructions of solid masonry ; nor
will a simple rampart suffice : there must be out-
works—that is to say, demi-lunes and lunettes—all
built of massive stone, and of the most solid charac-
ter. On this work it is said that every disposable
soldier or marine in the place—to the number of
40,000—has been, and is, incessantly employed, and,
as these are forced to labour according to the Rua•
sian system, which lavishes men by thousands either
upon work or upon war, it is far from impossible
that these fortifications may already have attained
a formidable progress towards completion when the
allied armies present themselves before them. But,
notwithstanding all the fortifications and all the
levellings executed or executing, Sebastopol will still
be commanded by heights which no engineering
skill can either reduce or isolate, and where a be-
sieging army will find their intrenchments almost
naturally marked out. It is true that from these
heights the harbour is invisible, the declivity being
so great that even the mast-heads of the vessels
lying in the different ports are not perceptible ; but,
when the siege-works are sufficiently pushed towards
the right, which is a mere matter of time, the great
military port will then lie open to the fire from the
trenches, and may be enfiladed in its whole length.
This will always be the weak point in the defence of
Sebastopol from a land attack ; at all events, until
the Russians have had time and opportunity to com-
plete she fortifications of the enceinte in all their
extent and solidity.
It is an axiom in the science of war that every
place can be taken if besieged with au cient force
and according to the rules of the military art. But
for the siege of Sebastopol nothing less than an en-
tire army will be requisite, for the Russians will
certainly have one on the spot for the defence of
their great arsenal. The preliminary operation must
consist of the disembarkation of the troops and siege
apparatus on the shores of the Crimea. Such a de-
barkation upon an enemy's coast is one of the
grandest and most difficult achievements of war.
We must expect to find every available point crowned
with fortifications and garrisoned by troops. Will
the attempt be made upon the southern coast; at
the monastery of St. George ; the convenient harbour
of Balaklova; the fine beach of Yalta; or on one of
the bays of the Khersonesus • There are four of
these bays, of which the most remote is only three
leagues from Sebastopol. They are called Streletska,
Pestschanaia (or Sandy Bay), Kamiesk, and Kasach.
By disembarking, and immediately constructing an
entrenched camp at either of these points, the attack-
ing force would have the great advantage of securing a
lodgment very near the scene of action, and whence the
transport of materiel for the siege would be safe and
speedy. That the attack will be made sooner or
later appears certain. The Russian garrison of the
place are looking for it day by day.