The Sun.
London, England, 1856-01-15 00:00:00

FURTHER DESTRUCTION OF DOCKS AT

SEBASTOPOL.

(Front the Daily News Correspondent.)
CAMP BEFORE SEBASTOPOL, Jan. 1.
It had been the intention of our engineers to blow in
a portion of the English half of the docks last Saturday,
but owing to the prevalence of water all could not be
got ready for that purpose before yesterday afternoon.
At head-quarters at 10 o'clock in the morning it was
nut certainly known whether we should be able to fire
more than three charges in the left side of the basin ; and
although the French had arranged to blow up their east
dock, the entrance pier of their west dock, and their half
of the left side of the basin which joined us, still I know
that the Quartermaster-General of the army was not
aware of the French intention, nor was he of our: till late
in the afternoon. For this extreme secrecy I can see no
reason. To show how few officers were present actually
to see the docks, I will just give you their name,. At
the first explosion (French and English), besides seve-
ral French engineers, I noticed Sir W. Codrington and
his two aides-de-camp ; Lieut.-Colonel L. Curzon and
Captain Ponsonby ; Sir Hugh Ross, our commissioner
at French head-quarters ; Lieut.-Colonel Turner, com-
mandant of the liarabelnaia ; the Town Majors ; Capt.
Cooch, 62d ; and Major Dewar, 49th ; Mr. Deen, R N.;
two surgeons 62d Regiment ; the officers of the White-
buildings guard ; and of our engineers there were pre-
sent—Colonel Gordon, Major Cooke, Captain Schaw,
Major Ewart, Lieuts. Brine and Donnelly, and Lieut.
Colonels Lloyd and Bourchier, together with the four
engineers veto have been employed on the demolition-,
viz., Major Nicholson and Limits. Cumberland, Gordon,
and Graham. At the second explosion, four hours
later, which the French engineers appeared to take
great interest in, there were present, in addition to the
foregoing, General Froissard, of the French Engineers;
the French Commandant of the Karabelnaia, Col. Percy
Herbert, and Lieut.-Colonel Lefroy, R.A. It was at
six minutes to one that the drum was beaten by the
French sapper for the 39 French and four English
engineers to light their port-fires. At 5, minutes, the
drum beat two taps for all to be ready, and at 4.1
minutes to ono the drum beat one more tap to fire ; in
q minutes afterwards the charges in the side and
bottom of the French east dock exploded almost simul-
taneously. Shortly afterwards the large charges in
the piers of the entrance and behind the steps leading
down to the deck blew up. These three charges shook
the ground all round terribly, and propelled large stones
perpendicularly up in the air to the height of at least
900 feet. In 91 minutes the English charges exploded,
causing a very neat demolition of half the side wale of
the basin ; but the powder was, I think, run a little too
fine. After the smoke had cleared away, it was evident
that four of the French charges and one of the English
had not gone off, the four French charges being two in
the entrance pier to their west dock, which was not
Mown in by them on the 21st, and two in the side wall
of the basin, adjoining our charges. The demolition of
the French east dock—or " Steamer Dock," as it is
called, for it contains the remains of the paddle steamer,
which was brought from Sinope and set fire to by the
Russians on the 9th September—was complete. They
appear to have used too much powder, and the right
fbodeate being blown in against the left floodgate has
the effect of making the destruction of the left entrance
pier look less complete than that of the rest of the dock.
The quantity of powder expended in blowing up this
dock alone was 10,00011e5., with 83 charges in all.
The 12 side charges were each 5001bs. Behind the
steps leading down to the bottom of the deck there were
1 charge of I,ooolbs. and two of SOOlbs. cf powder each.
The remaining charges, I mean those under the docks
and the floodgate, averaged about 1101bs. each. After
the Russians had fired a few badly-aimed shells, and
the French and English engineers had examined the
debris, the former again fired the four charges that had
not gone off. After the lapse of a few minutes these ex-
plodej, and thus the west and east docks of the French
half, together with the left side of the large basin, even
to the gates, were completely destroyed. Sir W. Cod-
rington new asked Col. Lloyd how long he thought it
would be before our engineers would be ready to blow
up the bottom of their dock. The answer was, "As ,
soon as Mr. Deen, who has charge of the voltaic bat-
teries, is ready." Mr. Deen, on being asked, stated he
could not be ready for two hours ; and at this time it was
about two. Our three docks, on account of being about
four feet lower thae the two French docks and entrance,
have half a foot of water in each of them. As a result
of this great difficulties have had to be contended with ;
and, owing to the severity of the weather, the sappers
have suffered terribly, both by night and by day. At
about five the wires and cables appeared to be getting
fixed. The bunk where Mr. Deen had his ten vol.
taic batteries, and from which he fired the mines,
was on the other side of the dockyard high white
wall, and up a steep bid. In the bottom of tee
dock were ten charges, each of 1621b5. These
were connected by electric wires to the two cables,
making five wires for each cable, and these two
cables, with an electric inside, ran up the hill
through holes in the wall to Mr. Deen's bunk.
Ju:t before the explosion, the force of the electricity
was tested at the end of the cables, which were about
100 yards long. At 20 minutes past 5 o'clock, just Ist--
fore dark, Private Sulley, tinsmith by trade, of the 10th
company of Sappers, was ordered by Major Nicholson
to connect the ten wires to the two cables. In another
two minutes all had cleared away. The m'ment the
word "all r;glit" was passed up to Mr. Dees eight of
the ten charges blew up, which were qtnte sufficient
completely to destroy the bottom of this &cis. The
latter was 191 feet long on the stone skids at bottom,
40 feet wide, and 29 feet deep. At top it is 238 feet
long and 95 feet 4 inches wide. The revetment at top
was 6 feet 8 inches broad. Our centre dock, which in all
probability will have its bottom blown up to-morrow
evening, is 236 feet long, and the west dock is 233 feet.
There is every reason to expect that in another fortnight
the whole of the Sebastopol docks wi:l he totally worth-
less for any purpose whatever. The French appeared
to be much pleased at our engineers being so successful
under water. They will have nearly as great an
obstacle to contend with in their centre entrance. As
for the Russians, they took no notice either of the
first or second explosions, not even jumping up on
their parapets. The French and English have been
each taking down one of the large floodgates complete,
to send home as trophies ; either halt of a gate con-
tains 12 iron hollow ribs, each weighing about 21 tons.
The French took down their two halves bodily, and now
that these are at bottom of the dock, they have been
obliged- to take the ribs off and drag them across the
basin at- an immense cost of labour. We, on the con-
trary, by Means of 140 artillerymen, under the charge of
Major Andrews, R.A., and two lieutenants, the whole
under the superintendence of Lieutenant-Colonel Bent,
ILE-, have been lifting the ribs up by pulleys, one by
one, as the halves of the gates stand. Two ribs have
by accident been broken, for they are very brittle, so
that a half of another gate will have to supply them: A
naval officer of the Furious, steamer, with two sailors
and three rappers, has been also employed on this duty,
which is by no means so easy as it may appear.

DARING BURGLARY AT MANCRESTER.—Yesterday
morning information was given at the station of the D
division of police, Manchester, that the house of Mr.
John Doughty, commercial traveller, Horsley-street,
Hulme (just without the city boundary) had been entereu
about two o'clock in the morning by burglars. Mr.
Doughty wasfrom home, and Mrs. Doughty stated that she
was awoke by some person seizing her by the throat as she
lay in bed and demanding where she kept her money.
The servant girl came running into the room, soon after.
wards, with her hands tied behind her and her
mouth Bagged. Mrs. Doughty escaped from the person
who had hold of her after a struggle, and the burglars
made off, but not before they had secured Cl. 9s. (3d. in
money from one of her dress pockets. She had a watch
and some jewellery in the room, which escaped observa-
tion. Superintendent Taylor, of the D division of police,
examined the premises yesterday morning, and from cir-
cumstances which trine to his knowledge in the course
of his investigation, he was induced to apprehend the
servant girl on suspicion of being an accomplice in the
robbery. The rope with which the girl's hands had been
tied had been taken from the kitchen, and the gag was
fastened in her mouth with two pieces of worsted braid
that had been in the house about a fortnight. The set-
vant, Ann Coulter, had been in the house about thret
months. Since she was apprehended, two pocket hand-
kerchiefs have been discovered at her mother's which are
the property her Mistress.

LATEST NEWS.

THE PEACE PROPOSALS.

The Nord publishes the I,llowing telegraphic

despatches :

BERLIN, SUNDAY.

The reply to the proposals of which Count
Valentine Esterhazy was the bearer, addressed
from St. Petersburg to Vienna, accepts, in prin-

ciple, those proposals.
The Imperial Cabinet of Russia does not intro-

duco therein any modifications of significance. It
refuses the territorial cession demanded in Bes-

sarabia ; it consents to the exchange of the ter-

ritories zespectively occupied by the belligerents.
M. de Seebach left Berlin yesterday evening

en route for Paris.

BERLIN, SUNDAY EVENING.

Count Buol has rejected the counter proposals
of the Imperial Cabinet of Russia without dis-

cusslon.

At the same time that he mada Prince Gorts-

chakoff aware of a probable speedy rupture of
diplomatic relations between the Courts of Russia

and of Austria, Count Buol notified to the Cabi-
nets of Paris and London that Austria would not
take the field (d'emtrerait pas en ligne) this year.

FRANCE.
PARIS, MONDAY EVENING.

The Times correspondent (second edition), says :
—lndependently of the treaty of the 2d of Decem-
ber between England, France, and Austria, there
exists, it appears, a convention, memorandum, or
by whatever appellation diplomatic Purists term it,
between the same Powers, to this effect—First, if
within 20 days Russia does not accept the proposi-
tions of Austria, this Power will break off diplomatic
relations with her. This condition will, as my letter
of yesterday mentioned, have been executed by this.
Secondly, relations being broken off, Austria, Eng-
land, and France will forthwith deliberate and con-
cert measures to force Russia to accept peace on the
conditions already agreed on between them, and will
intimate the same to the other States of Europe 2,
inviting them to co-operate. And, thirdly, a noti-
fication will be made to Prussia, declaring that she
shall not' be admitted to future negotiations of
peace, except on condition that she will accept the
propositions already adopted by the three Powers,
that she will formally announce the same to Russia,
and in the event of Russia still refusing will break
off all diplomatic relations with her, and recall her
Ambassador. I cannot inform you what measures
will be taken with respect to Prussia in case she re-
fuse to accept these conditions; but it is certain that
her position will be of the most critical kind.
Some time since France and England demanded
of Denmark to allow their fleets a station, and
means of procuring provisions in two of her ports.
Denmark positively refused. A note will be trans-
mitted—indeed, I am told it is this day transmitted
to the Danish Government on the subject, and in
terms not merely energetic but menacing—with
what effect remains to be seen.

The Council of War held a sitting this day, and
another will take place on Thursday. Two com-
missions, one from the navy, the other from the
army, are named to draw up a report. Admiral
Lyons and General Canrobert are members of one
and Admiral Dundas and General Niel of the other.
The discussion was at first of a general kind, and I
am told included the question of withdrawing the
army from the Crimea, keeping possession of Eupa-
toria, Kamiesch, Balaklava, and one or two other
points. The question of a campaign in the interior
of the southern provinces is said to have been
touched on, and the possibility of ascending the
rivers, but this was opposed by the Admirals. It ap-
pears it would take nearly six months to remove the
materiel. I allude to this subject with some
diffidence, as from the very nature of the delibe-
rations secrecy must be observed, and implicit
confidence can hardly be placed in the reports
out of doors. The absence of Mehemed Bey,
the Turkish Ambassador in Paris, from the
Council, excites a good deal of surprise, and is
not, so far as I know, satisfactorily accounted for.
One would suppose that, as the protection of Tur-
key is in question, her Ambassador has a claim to
a seat in the Council. It cannot be said that his
exclusion from deliberations which so highly inte-
rests his country and his Sovereign is attributable
to his not being a military man, seeing that there
are members of the Council who are also civilians.
At all events Turkey is our ally, and represants in
military force at least ten times more than Sar-
dinia. As we can hardly suppose that an offence is
meant against the Sultan, there must be some cause
for the omission with which I am unacquainted.
The Emperor and the Empress yesterday received
a great number of foreigners of distinction.
The Emperor yesterday received Baron Hubner,
Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary
of the Emperor of Austria, who presented to his
Majesty the reply of the Germanic Diet to the
letters of recall of the Marquis do Tallenay, Envoy
Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the
Emperor at Frankfort.

" Tho Emperor," says a Rouen journal, " having
been lately informed that a number of veterans of
the old army were living in the Seine-Inferieure in
very reduced circumstances, had inquiries insti-
tuted concering them, and has lately accorded to 39
of them pensions extending from 80fr. to 100 fr.
a-year. . _ .

BOURSE, Jan. 14.—The following are the last
quotations :

Cash. ft. e. End of '”ontl
41 per Cents 9l —f. -c.
per Cents 62 75 62 65
New Loan 63 55

Bank Shares 3120 Roman
Credit llobilisir 1235 Austrian
Belgian Fives 94 Spanish Threes...
Piadinouteso Bl Home Debt

RAILWAYS—rob CASH.

tr. c. e
tie4ans
vort h e r n
i.,yous
Ilediterranean ..... 1125 Grand Central 550 --
Lyons Geneva 655 Teste
Cette