The Sun.
London, England, 1855-05-29 00:00:00

THE BL4 OF AZOFF.

The following letter is extracted front a morning con-
temporary :
Sir,—The interest excited es to Russian supplies to
the Crimea by way of Azoff, and the evidence before the
Sebastopol Committee of official "ignorance of that
route," may justify a notice of its actual use a century
and more ago, when it contributed essentially to the
Russian conquests of the Crimea. •
At that time the Black Sea was in the possession of
the Turks, the Tartars and Turks bald the Perekop
route, and Turkish vessels were in the Sea of Azoff, yet
Russia conquered the Crimea from the then most daring
and warlike people in Europe.
Field Marshal Count de Lacy (an Irish warrior), in his
autobiography, in the possession of his kinsman, Cornet
Pierse, records, 1736, "The 3d of August I marched,
cold trmahly to the orders I had from his Majesty, from
Azoff to Perekop, with 5,000 infantry, 500 Dragoons.
600 Cossacks, and 2,000 Calmucks. I passed by Murtza
Danza, Sapiana, the river Salisch. Asalambek, south
side the river Mehus, where I found the Cossacks coming
from Perekop with the news that Munich, wanting pro-
vision and forage, and the greater part of his troops sick
for want of regular supplies of bread and water, bad rt.
tired from Perekop towards Russia. Munich passed.the
whole of the campaign in 1736 in taking and restoring
the Crimea (Perekop ?), and in losing half of his army,
which on first entering it amounted to 54,000 men, the
amount of the killed did not exceed 2,000. He left me
to winter in the Ukarine, in command of both armies,
while he went to St. Petersburg."
From Prince Ds Ligne's Memoirs of Marshal Lacy (as
quoted in Mrs. Nash's "Crimea") we extract, "In the
next year (1737) it was necessary the campaign should
be opened with eclat, an expedition to the Crimes being
quite the fashion at court, this famous man (Lacy) was
therefore fixed on to take the sole command. . . . His
intrepid march, his passage across the arm of the sea
near Arabat, partly on cork bridges, partly by fording,
partly by swimming, are well known and will never be
forgotten. He was charged with the operations in the
Crimea—the enemy in possession of all the surrounding
points of strength, and seas—yet he penetrated it with-
out losing a man ; and it ought to be recorded how. He
had remarked that the excessive heats; dried up a part of
ths Sea of Azoff, and that with the wind in the west the
waves are so effectively driven back, that if advantage
he taken of the instant, a passage may be effected dry
footed." He did so with 10,000 men ; he turned Pere-
kop, which he took "in reverse ;" blew up the impreg-
nable fortifications ;" levelled those famous li oes, defeat-
ed the Tartars in a pitched battle ; he took himself to
winter quarters in the Ukraine, as was will, This
was his second conquest of the Crimea, without passing
by Perekop.
_

General-Manstein's memoirs too, record that "Lacy,
to the astonishment of all Europe, penetrated the Crimes,
where victory always attended him by which gallant'
exploit be saved an army which must have been sacrificed
in attacking the impenetrable lines of Perekop, on the
north side."

It is not for one whose relations 'Served Russia for a
century and a half, and have been denied service in their
own country, to comment ou facts ,—I am, &c.,
London, Monday. DE. LACY PRIRIE.