The Sun.
London, England, 1854-12-25 00:00:00

STATE OF TB

(From the Times.)
What remains of more than 50,000 men, the best
blood of this country, which now represents, 3,000 miles
from home, the glory, the influence, the courage, and
the ability of our race ? The England of European his-
tory is now in the Crimea. We have defied the largest
army in the world, and, if we have not backed our chal-
lenge with quite sufficient strength or promptitude, we
have at least made an effort beyond all former example.
At this moment it would be rash even to conjecture the
fate of those hardy survivors of the 54,000 men. Do
they still maintain the unequal fight—chilled, drenched,
famished, utterly neglected ? -Has a slight aggravation
of their many ills--a drop of the thermometer some de-
grees below zero, or a few inches of rain, extinguished
them altogether,- or left scarce enough for a safe retreat ?
Or may we dare to hope that desperation itself has
urged the brighter alternative, of a dash at the city,
with a somewhat less cost of life than would attend an-
other month of inaction ? After the dreary, and ever
still drearier, history of this siege, we cannot hope as
much. Yet, if that has not been done, what is the other
alternative It is, that the army is now in a worse
condition than ever it was. We say this deliberately.
The reinforcements and supplies that have been sent
out would up to this, December 23, only keep the
army numerically at the inadequate force at which
it landed, setting the certain drain by death
and sickness against the reinforcements, and the
consumption of food and material agairst the
supplies. But, if that army is numerically no
larger, it is physically and morally much worse.
It is true we have been making immense efforts lately,
but no one can say how much everything has been re-
tarded, even at home, by the pressure and by the
elements. With the westerly gales of the last few days,
nothins, but the most powerful steamers can get down
the Channel or out of the port of Liverpool, nod many
sailing vessels and screw steamers of moderate capacity
are weather-bound. Not a rail, not a "navvy, and
but a few "huts," have yet left these shores. Immense
quantities of warm clothing, of potted meats, and Christ-
mas dinners, and we know not what besides, are still in
our harbours. With such weather as we have had, one
cannot but have great fears for the many heavily-laden
vessels that are out at sea. At all events, if the army
should want supplies at this moment, we are unable to
send them. All this is bad enough ; but, dark as the
picture may be at this end of the passage, it is worse at
the other, because more hopeless.
There is no use disguising the matter. We are not
speaking from our own correspondence only. We are
not saying what we think alone; We say, on the evi-
dence of every letter that has been received in this
country, and we echo the opinion of almost every
experienced soldier or well-informed gentleman,
when we say that the noblest army England ever
sent from these shores has been sacrificed to the
grossest mismanagement. Incompetency,. lethargy,
aristocratic hauteur, official indifference, favour,
routine, perverseness, and stupidity reign, revel, and
riot in the camp before Sebastopol, in the harbour of
Balaklava, in the hospitals of Scutari, and how much
nearer home we do not venture to say. We say it
with extreme reluctance—no one sees or hears anything
of the Commander-in-Chief. Officers who landed on
the 14th of September, and have been incessantly en-
gaged in all the operations of the siege, are not even ac-
quainted with the face of their commander. It has
always been imagined that the Duke of Wellington's
personal appearance was a familiar thing to every sol-
dier in his army. He is related to have said no man
was fit to command an army who could not ride well a
cross-country. People talk of his eagle eye, his ener-
getic voice, his calm manner, as if he were personally
known throughout his army. Is all this a myth,
or has war so changed that a campaign or even a
battle can now be transacted in an office by means
of aides-de.camp and orderlies F If the staff itself
made up for the invisibility of the commander, we
should not complain of a military fiction bearing a strong
resemblance to the privacy and inviolability of the
Crown. But, unfortunately, the staff is said to consist
of young gentlemen whose honour and courage nobody
can doubt, but who are devoid of experience, without
much sympathy for the distresses of such inferior beings
as regimental officers and privates, and disposed to treat
the gravest affairs with a dangerous nonchalance. Unfor-
tunately, too, all the results agree too nearly with the
fact of an invisible commander. Had the eye of a
general fallen on the confusion in the harbour of Bala-
klava, on the impassable state of the road from that
place to the camp, on the miserable condition of the
camp, on the state of the trenches, on the unprotected
state of the right flank before the Battle of Inkerman,
and before that, on the circumstances under which the
fatal charge of Balaklava took place, we can hardly
suppose but that so able a man as Lord Raglan un-
doubtedly is would have prevented such errors and
neglects. We only echo the feelings of every letter from
the seat of war. In the officer and the private alike we
find a quiet, resigned, unimpassioned conviction that
the whole affair is bungled in the most hopeless and
horrible manner. Everybody perceives it in his own
state, in the fate of his comrachs, in the condition of the
camp, and in the progress of tie siege. Young gentle.
men, bred in every luxury, and with an ample store
of every military comfort, were still at the last
date wearing day and night nothing but the threadbare
clothes and worn-out boots in which they landed on the
14th of September. They had no means of getting up
the things lett behind in the transports. What becomes
of everything sent to- Balaklava nobody knows, but wh.le
they are rotting, thousands are perishing for want of
them. Everybody can paint outsomething that should be
lone, but there is nobody to order it to be done ; and
50,000 men, or what now remains of then), are drifting
with their eyes open, but h and-bound, spell-bound, towards'
destruction. Do any of the letters, or any of the regi-
mental officers returned from the war, give a different
account ? On the contrary, does it not come within
everybody's knowledge, es it does in ours, that the let-
ters handed about in private circles, and not published,
lest, they should prejudice the writer in the eyes of his
superiors, give a far more gloomy account than any let-
ters that we have ventured to publish ?
The burden is forced upon us, and we must spak out.
Good nature is a pleasant thing iii its way, but, if Eng-
land is ever to be ruined, it will be by unseasonable good
nature, by unlimited condonance, connivance, indulgence,
and all the softer forms of virtue. England has not be-
come what it is by good nature, nor is good nature the
one sole element of our social and commercial system
The period for good nature is over in the Crimea, and
sterner qualities must now be invoked into action, unless
we would throw away the last chance that remains for
redeeming the character of this country, now in fearful
jeopardy. Send out some man with competent ad-
ministrative powers to the necessary basis of our ope-
rations Constantinople. Give him the command,
of the hospitals, that present so scandalous a con-
trast to the French hospitals ; the command of the
post-office, and of transports waiting for orders ; and
give him also the ordering of such supplies for the army
as can be procured in that neighbourhood, and which the
French have not obtained before us. Nobody has yet
had command of this important station who was fit for
anything else than to be the figure-head of his own ship.
There is Sir Charles Trevelyan, for example, who pos-
sesses the administrative power of 50 old admirals.
Why not send him as High Commissioner to the Bo .
phorus ? Send somebody to Balaklava with a head on
his shoulders and a competent staff, so competent, both
in numbers and ability, that the whole work will not
immediately change hands on the death or removal of
one man • and let everything sent for the army, the offi-
cers or the privates, be addressed to this officer, who
shall be answerable for its delivery. Must we stop here ?
Shall we be true to the statements we venture to make
above, if we imply that Constantinople and Balaklava
are the only places wanting reform ? No, we shall not ;
so we will proceed. If Lord Raglan is the man he is
thought to be—and nobody doubts his high courage,
his perfect coolness, and his great ability in his former
employments,—he wants better instruments. He
wants better coadjutors and staff,—men who will
supply that übiquity of which the chief is incapable,
tell him everything, convey the wants of the army,
take orders, and see that they are executed.
Send out men who will save the army not from
the Russians, though they are formidable enough,
but from despair, which is weighing down the
spirits of every one, and an utter distrust in the
arrangement of the expedition. It will be of little use
to send out reinforcements by thousands unless we take
steps for their better management. As it is they march
to their graves, and begin to perish by scores from the
hour they land. Misrule receives them on the beach,
and wearies them, worries them, drenches them,
shivers, them, and so destroys them, till a few spectral
figures are all that remain. The soldiers of the Pen'n-
sula, when they saw the Duke of Wellington after an
absence, used to exclaim that his face did them more
good than the arrival of ten regiments. Such a head,
or coadjutors equivalent to it, is what we want for the

Crimea.

.. -
Chief. And we know that letters actually rectiied
from the Crimea have expressed impatience and irrits.. .;
tion because the army has not ere now been led on'to, ;:
storm Sebastopol. But the critics, though anlinet-ed by.
the sane amiable spirit which inspires the unemployed' - -
leaders of an opposition to carp and cavil at every net •
of more fortunate rivals in office, and disparage their -
abilities, have been at least modest and gentlemanly in
their language. And it can be said in extenuation of
the murmurers in the camp, that raw soldiers, expe-
riencing for the first time the trying severity of a winter
campaign, and incapacitated both by position and lack
of experience, to estimate the full strength of the ob•
stacles opposed to them, may chafe at delay, and pro.
test that they would prefer death as the result of a
brief fierce struggle to the risk of lingering disease-and
an inglorious end. But the General who is responsible
for the issues of the war—to whom is entrusted
the assertion of England's honour—dare not listen
to such rash and headstrong counsellors. True,
the ranks of our army in the Crimea were
at one time thinned to a hazardous extent true, the
necesity of bringing up fresh siege artillery and
additional stores of ammunition bas caused delay—true,
the roads in the Chersonesus have been for a time al-
most impassable on account of the deep mud—true,
disasters have been occasioned by storms in the Black
Sea ; but what would be the fee ings of remorse and
self-condemnation of the Commander-in-Chief, were be,
in a fit of despondency,
under these accumulated diffi-
culties, to itrifice 5,000 of Lis bravest soldiers (the very
lowest estimate of the loss of life a storm of Sebastopol
would occasion, by those who have urged him to
set all on the hazard of a die), and to be taught in the
course of a few days by the arrival of Mr. Peto's navvies
with their rails, and of fresh supplies of men, ammuni-
tion, and artillery, that be had been causelessly prodical
of the best blood of England ? There are times when
it is the duty of a
general to cheer on his men to the
onslaught ; there are also times when it is his duty to
check and curb their headlong ardour though they
strain like greyhounds in the slip. This is the most
difficult and thankless task that can devolve upon a
Commander-in-Chief. The murmuring of those who see
nothing but what is passing in their immediate vicinity
is a venial fault ; but for those who, standing remote
from the scene of action, can overlook the whole •
tions at home, in the Crimea, and on the seas between
—who, from t o
f onromt beinga comparatively
e struggle, are in a
wh
judgment—to echo and exaggerate these complaints, is
condition
injustice to the leaders of our army and treason to the
national cause.
We do not complain of the publicity that has been
given to complaints from the camp. But for that publi-
city we do not believe that such strenuous efforts would
have been made to repair errors, and improve the defec-
tive organisation of some important departnients of our
army. But we are entitled to demand that the home
public—and, above all, those who aspire to heleaders
and mouthpieces of the home public—should make-these
revelations the means of effecting needful reforms,-not a
mere excuse for inflated declamation and malignant per-

sonalities.
The difficulties with which Lord Raglan- has lad
to contend ought to be taken into account. He.has
an inefficient commissariat, the natural consequence
of the department having only recently been trans-
ferred from the inappropriate control of the Trea-
sury to an extemporised War Department. He has
a medical staff and subordinate officers, all whose
means and appliances have been systematically cur-
tailed for years, in consequence of crude and mis-
taken notions among men in office of what constitutes
real ;'economy. He has an army brave and well disci-
plined, but not seasoned to those hardships and priva-
tions which in time of war try the constitution of the

soldier. Are we to infer that Lord Raglan is not aware
of these deficiencies, and is not anxiously seeking a re-
medy, because he does not run hither and thither through
camp,fithdeinghis
griefs a
cacklingna annoyances to every likeahenabout t
man fr
olayani
abets ni
That he has been exerting himself to remedy the disad-
vantages accruing from the inability of our young' Sol-
diers to endure with impunity protracted exposure to
wind and weather has been made evident in the oourse
of the debates on the Foreigners Enlistment Bill. It is
he who has urgently drawn the attention of Ministers to
the speed with which ouryouthful soldiers are transferred
from the camp to the hospital, and the necessity of en-
rolling seasoned veterans under our banners, whose em-
ployment may give time to habituate our English-levies
to the influence of climate and exposure. Is it likely
that while urging this point he can overlook the ne-
cessity of providing proper shelter for his army, im-
proved organisation of the transport and commissariat
service, and augmented means of medical assist-
once ? Is it a fault that instead of wasting time in
comforting assurances to those who have repre-
sented what was amiss, be has been corresponding
with Ministers with a view to amend it ! The charac-
teristic taciturnity of the Duke of Wellington exposed
him,during the earlier years of the Peninsular campaigns,
to numerous imputations of the same kind as are now
poured forth against Lord Rag!an ; the Duke's pub-
lished despatches prove that while assailed by these
calumnies ho was straining every nerve to procure sup-
plies for his soldiers. That example ought to teach
modesty to our fireside critics, now censuring Lord
Raglan, who has too much business on hand to have
leisure to tell the whole world what he is doing and

planning.
A day will come when history shall deliberately sera•
tinise and expose all errors that have been committed in
the course of the war, and appOrtion to every man con-
cerned his share of tl►e blame. Nay, at a much earlier
day it will be the duty of the Legislature to institute
such inquiries. But the duty of the present hour is
action, not inquiry. Enough it we can at this moment
repair delays and oversights by bringing to bear upon
all who take part in the management of the war sxch
a pressure of public opinion as will compel them to
exert themselves to the utmost. Common justice, com-
mon decency, common regard for the national interest,
demand that no matt shall be condemned unheard, or
upon fragmentary, partial, anonymous delations.