Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-06-12 00:00:00

MR. W. RUSSELL'S PERSONAL NARRATIVE.

Mr. Russell delivered the third and concluding portion
of his Personal Narrative in the Philharmonic Hall last
night. There was, perhaps, even a more crow led and
brilliant audience than that of the previous night, and the
lecturer was greeted, as on each previous occasion, with an
enthusiastic burst of applause.

Mr. Russell proceeded to sketch in vigorous outlines, the
results of the battle of Balaklava in its more immediate
effects—the distrust which the glorious audacity of its
success inspired in each of the Russian generals, and the
surprise which so desperately won a victory struck awe
into Lord Raglan himself. As an instance of the latter
effect, he mentioned that Lord Raglan was actually
yielding to a suggestion to abandon Balaklava alto-
gether, until emphatically urged to maintain his position
by Admiral Lord Lyons, who dedared his resolution, if
driven to it, to hold Balaklava with the guns of the fleet.
The sortie of the Russians on the day after Balaklava, re-
pulsed so splendidly by the small body of men under Sir
De Lacy Evans, was the next • event of any importance.
Why the position held by Sir De Lacy Evans was not
strengthened more quickly, the lecturer expressed himself
unable to explain. When the Russians converted the hill,
known as Gordon's Hill, once perfectly bare, into the sub-
sequently
famous Mamelon, the key of Sebastop .1, regret
was felt in our army that, even with their diminished
forces, and at any risk, an effort had not been made to
secure so formidable a position. Within the space of one
fortnight, the genius of Todtleben had surrounded
one side of Sebastopol with a continuous line
of fort, trench, and battery. Inside that line
of trenches the city could be seen a fair show of dazzling
white streets, spires, domes, barracks and fortifications.
All this time the army of Liprandi was still teen upon the
plains of Balaklava. The Lecturer gave an effective and
in some parts humerous description of the manner in which
the besieging army gradually became accustomed to the
continual sound of cannon and the whistling of red hot
balls past them from the beleaguered city. Then the wea-
ther began to grow cold around the besiegers on the plains,
aed the approach of winter came gradually to be felt.
It was the night before the memorable and remarkable
battle of Inkermann that the break in the weather her•
aided the approach of that enemy against which
even British valour could not contend—the Crimean win-
ter. On that night the rain began to fall in torrents, and
was accompanied by intense cold. The morning broke
wet, cold, and fogey—so dense that the sentries could not
see ten paces in advance. It was such a morning as a
desperate enemy would avail of to make a desperate sortie.
The Russians were prepared for the opportunity; and
though in our camp there was a presentiment of their
intention, and though Lord Raglan knew two or three days
before that they had received large reinforcements, still no
attempt was made to strengthen our position towards
Inkermann, the dangers of which were frequently pressed
on his lordship by Sir de Lacy Evans. Like all his battle-
pieces, Mr. Russell's description of the desperate day of
Inkermann was spirit stirring in the extreme. He
described, in graphic terms, the alarm of the camp when,
at grey dawn, the thunders of the Russian cannon an-
nounced that they had established a poisition on the
plateau on which we lay ; the confusion among our troops
at first ; the ready and desperate valour th -y then dis•
played ; and the final struggle, when, after seven
hours of the most unparalleled fighting, 7,500 wearied,
over- worked British soldiers ignominiously beat a force of
40,000 desperate Russians. For though late in the day
4,000 French troops, with the " light of battle in their
faces," came up to our assistance, the fight was almost
over, and the enemy had received a lesson in tha loss of
20,000 of his best men, which paralysed his efforts during
the rest of the year, and male him fear to the last mo•
ment to encounter British soldiers even with the largest
odds on his side. Mr. Russell well described the fight,
when summing up his glowing narrative of the event he
called it "Our Thermopolis." On that fearful day, in a
battle fought without order, and won by the most desperate
hand to hand fighting recorded even of British soldiers,
we lost seven generals, 143 officerz, and 2,685 men, but
20,000 Russians lay dead on the field; an appalling evi-
dence how desperate the contest had been, how fearful
had been our danger, and how great has been our glory.
The dreary details of the siege formed a painful feature in
the narrative, and as Mr. Russell told of the sufferings of our
troops,of the fearful storm which burst over their unprotected
heads, and sunk in the harbour of Balaklava seven of our
finest transports, an I gave to a watery gr .ve 1,000 souls—
his listeners were se ougly moved, the more so because it
was so clearly shown that most of those evils, which form
the dark side of the war, could have
been avoided by forethought and management.
Mr. Russell drew a painfully vivid picture of the failure
of our assault upon the Redan, and commented in em-
phatic terms upon the management which for the first
time rendered the 18th of June a day not glorious to
British a^ms. Having described the taking of the
Itlalakhoff by the French, he passed on to the closing
scenes of the great campaign—the opening of the me-.
morable bombardment, characterised as the feu cl' enfer,
which would before long have rendered eebastopol
untenable even without the final assault, and the
deliberate retreat of the Russians, firing their magazines
behind them, across the bridge to the north side of
Sebastopol. Perhaps one of the most remarkable descrip.
tions throughout the lecture, was that in which Mr. Russell
illustrated that retreat, and the position in which the armies
of the allies stood, gazing upon it as spectators with
scarcely an effort to break its order or to harass its de-
parting lines. In a few words, he dwelt upon the horrors
which met the eyes of the conquering armies entering the
city, and the scenes surpassing even that of the field after
the battle of Balaklava, which Ruestan oft:leers had de-
scribed to him as having characterised Sebastopol during
the last days of its defence when the dead bodies buried
iu heaps in the streets were frequently blown into the air
by the falling shells, and overwhelmed the living. For
ten enenthi after he remained upon that soil, until the
last of the allied forces had quitted it, and he found by a
final visit to the scene of the Alma, that the Russians still
respected our dead. In a brilliagt peroration he exhorted
Englishmen ever to cherish their memory, and then
declared that his story was at an end.
An enthusiastic burst of applause, again and again
renewed, followed Mr. Russell as he quitted the plat-
form.

r

FRI DAY', --JUNE

PRESENTATION OF AN ADDRESS TO
MR. RUSSELL.

A deputation from the members of the Liverpool Press
Association, waited upon Mr. Russell last night, for the
purpose of presenting him with an address expressive of
their admiration of his talents and public services ; and
their appreciation of the honor he has reflected upon the
profession to which he and they belong. The deputation
was received by Mr. Russell, in the green-room of the
Philharmonic Hall, immediately after :he conclusion of
his lecture :

Mr. B. J. Meany, the president, addressing Mr. Russell,
said :—I have been deputed by the members of the Liver-
pool Press Association, to present to you an address, which
but faintly indeed expresses the warmth of their feeling in
your regard. As Journalists, we cannot bat feel pride in
the world-wide fame, which you as a journalist have carved
out for yourself ; and while I am honoured by the com-
mand of my associates in Liverpool to speak to you on
their behalf, I feel, in fulfilling it, the additional gratifica-
tion, that I address an old and dear friend. I will not
detain you by farther prefatory remarks. The address is
an impulsive testimony to your worth, borne by those who
have watched your career with interest; and in the pre-
sentation of it, I feel that we best consult your wishes and
inclinations by abstaining from all formality,
Mr. Meany then presented the following :