The Sun.
London, England, 1854-10-13 00:00:00

LON DON', FRIDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 13, 1854.

NAVAL AND MILITARY INTELLIGENCE.

OUR SCREW' MEN-OF-WAR.
Royal Albert, 121, screw, Capt. Sir Thomas Pasley,- is
at her old moorings at Sheerness. She has completed
taking in her provisions from the victualling department,
&c., and was yesterday busy taking in her guns. She is.
beginning to show her teeth. In a few days, no doubt,
they will be' all on board ; but as they are at Chatham, and
of very heavy calibre, it necessarily takes up a longer time
than is generally imagined to get them placed. Her inter-
nal fittings are being fast completed.
The Colossus, 80, screw, Capt. Spencer Robinson, Ports-
month.—We believe that as soon as the Ajax, 56, arrives
from the Baltic, her hands will be turned over, and the
Colossus will proceed to the West Indies, to strengthen
our squadron. Under present circumstances, Jonathan is
getting saucy.
The Termagant, 24, screw, Portsmouth.—We are pleaiel
to state that an order came down from the "Board of Ad-
miralty for this ship to proceed to sea, which she did earlj,
yesterday morning, for the West Indies.
The Horatio, 22, screw, Commander Jihner, is being
caulked, &c., in her Majesty's basin at Sheerness ;no orders
for her docking we hear have been received.
The Cossack, 20, screw, Captain Fanshawe, is lying at
Black Stakes, River Medway; she is taking in her bonded
stores, &c., and on Wednesday had the powder lighter
alongside. She will now soon be off, but the definite day
for sailing is not named.
The Tartar, 20, screw steam-corvette, with otgines of
250 horse-power, sister to the Cossack, and built by Mr.
Pitcher for the Emperor of Russia, was towed up to Wool-
wich on Saturday last from Northfleet, to have her masts
put in, and she was taken into the basin on Thur.sday
for
that purpose. When her masts are put in she will be
towed to Chatham to be rigged, and made ready at that

port for sea. .
The Esk, 20, screw steam-corvette, wr.s taken out of
Woolwich deck on Wednesday, and into the basin on
Thursday. She is now ready for commission.
Tho Miranda, 17, screw, Captain Lyons, will haul out of
the fitting basin at Portsmouth, to-day. - •
The Pliceaix screw steam-sloop was taken into the basin
on Thursday, having cleared out all her stores, and com-
pletely returned her rigging to the usual depository in
Woolwich Dockyard. The .officers and crew can now leave
the yard for several hours daily, and on Monday next the
engineers and warrant-officers will be transferred, as usual,
to the Fisgard flag-ship, and the Phconix be laid up in
ordinary for the winter.

- .
place, as-the circumstances of the case are expected to be
laid before the court of inquiry which is to be held !%t
Whitehall immediately afteithe courts-Jnartial. at -Sheer-
ness are concluded.'

was then thrown back cc,mn them. We find. that the
whole garrison of Sebat ;topol were befdre us, under
Menschikoff in person. His carriage has fallen into our
hands, and iu it a letter stating-that Sebastopol could
hold out a long time agal'nst us, but that there was a
position at Alma whicL . could hold out three weeks.
NVe took it in three hews. So convinced were they 'of
Cie impossibility of our taking it that ladies were actually
there as spectators. little expecting the review they were
destined to be spectators of. We expect now to find no
resistance whatever at the Katcha river, the whole Rus-
sian force having retired Into Sebastopol. We always
turn out at 4 'o'clock in the morning, an hour before
day break.

(FROM AN ARTILLERY OFFICER.)
BALAKLAVA, SEPT. 28.
We have been marching latterly through a diffi-
cult country, and have ;been obliged to proceed with
great caution, having ha,d two very strong positions
to pass,, something of thin same nature as that on the.
Alma. The first was on the Katcha, a river running
through a valley, with . high ground rising beyond
it. The valley appeared, to be beautifully fertile, and
the Vineyards and gardens abounding in fruit of different
kinds; nearly all ripe. You .may imagine it was pleasa,nt
euvmgh to come across such places after living on salt
pork and biscuit fur several days. Oar men, however,
ate the fruit so immoderately, and without discrimina7
thin (except that the unripe was rather the most popular
with them), that they suffered from it very severely.
At the next place where we halted, on the Belbeck,
Clem were 500 left behind when -the army Marched,
,eoat.of them suffering from cholera,. Near the Belbeek
there was a chateau, belonging, I believe, to A Russian
uohkman. It was charmingly situated, with pretty
g..rdens full of fruit. Lord Raglan made it his head-
clearters fur the night, but our advanced guard had got
ioto it beforehand, and. made sad devastation in it.
S‘one of the men brought into camp a mirror, about six
f. et high, the frame of which I soon saw forming part
of ;t campfire. On Morsclay, the, 25th, we were within
:,f;on t t wo mil: sin a direct line from Sebastopol, but were

_ .
diged to make a Very circuitoas march to get round to the
I,,ck of the town. Our road lay through a thiek wood..
Tae artillery got in akivairce -of timinfatirryrrtiid When
jr•ad_ of our colutna 'debauched from the ri-ood vie
Found a body of Russians close-upon Us. They are said to
have been 15,000 strong, and their object to have been
to get into our rear, or else to form a junction with the
garrison expected from Anapa, and to brio.,* it forward
t. tl.e relief 'of SabastoPol. Anyhow, they did rot cal-
culate on meeting us there, for directly wo opened fire
upon them they made off, leaving behind a quantity of
beggige, ammunition, and flour. It was f atunate for
us that they were not aware of our real position, which
was rather a critical one -until we extricated ourselves
from the wood. They mart have thought that we were
waiting for them, instead of being surprised by them.
Oar gunners got hold of the baggage of some general
officer and his staff, for they were soon laden with em-
broidered Hussar jackets, pelisses, and garments of
various kinds. They also got a quantity of jewellery
and watc!res ; and some more lucky than the rest
got hold of the General's luncheon-basket and feasted
en wild boar washed down with champagne. We
marched that night down a hill (up which the
Russians hal marched the same day), and encamped in
a large plain. The next morning we started from this
position, passing through a narrow gorge into another
plain, backed up with high hills, beyond which we could
see the sea through one of the gorges. We had arrived
at Balaklava. Here we found a fort, which the Light
Division proceeded to attack ; and, on gaining the
heights, we came in view of a part of the fleet lying off
the shore. After a little shelling from both sides the
fort surrendered, and we are now occupying the village,
around which we are encamped. The steamers in the
Lay are lauding our siege guns as fast as they can, to
commence operations against the great place. Some
think that the resistance will nut be very desperate, and
that the garrison will only fire a few shots to save their
honour. Though not of the same way of thinking my-
self, I still hope it may so turn out, as it will save a vast
amount of bloodshed and destruction of property, of
which there has been sufficient already. Another fort-
night will probably decide the affair.

-e_-<,'

~~. ~/rte

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[PRICE SD.

21.1172; ADMIRALTY AGAIN.

( Fi.oin the Morning Chronicle.)
Having publicly exposed,, in our impression of •last
'.Wednesday, the gross unfairness of the system adopted
by the above-named department, in communicating pub.
lie despatches exclusively to one particular journal, to be
forwarded by it to' its contemporaries at its own con-
venience—and having also made strong private repre-
sentations on the matter—we had scarcely expected to
have occasion so' soon to return to the subject. But
the Admiralty authorities seem to have no sense of
shame. Only yesterday, we had another example of
She same scandalous' practice. The despatch from
Sir Charles Napier, which ,will be found in an-
other column, giving the names of some liberated
prisoners belonging to the Baltic fleet, was, like so many
preceding ones, presented by these servants of the
public to the same newspaper—probably with the condi-
tion that, so'soon as it should 'be perfectly convenient
and agreeable to the favoured organ to communicate
a printed •'copy of• the document to other journals,
they, too, should have the opportunity of giving it to
their readers. We publialt the despatch in question
—as we shall all others which may be sent to us, even
in this discreditable manner because we cannot
think it right to withhold information that concerns
either the public at large, or the friends and relatives of
our soldiers and sailors. Bat we shall not the less
continue to hold lap to the reprobation and contempt
which it merits the disgraceful conduct of a Government
department which makes public documents the instru-
ments of its own miserable spirit of jobbery and ft
vouritism. If the First Lord of tlr.e Admiralty and his
secretary choose to persist in acting on a principle which
so offensively contrasts with the just and honourable rule
adopted by the Minister of War, we suppose we have,
for the present, no remedy. But we warn those gentle-
men that, when Parliament meete, they will bear of this
-subject in the House of Gornmons, and that they will
then have to explain i,y what right they employed the
machinery of a public department in pi-tit-noting tile
private interests of a single} neTspauer crstr,blist•ta ent.

THE LATE MARSHAL' ST ARNAUD.
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