Washington sentinel. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1853-1855, 1854-12-27
THE FIELD AFTER THE BATTLE OF
INKERMAN-BURIA OF THE DEAD.

THE AFTER THE BATTLE OF'
INKERMAN-BURIAL OF THE DEAD.
A correspondent Of the London Times gives
the following notwithstanding account of some
of the after-scenes Of the battle Of Inkerman
Gin every bush-on every yard of blood
stained ground--lay q dead or dying Russian.
The well-known bearskins of our guards, the
red coats of our infantry, and the bright blue
of the French Chasseurs, revealing each
silent horror in the glades, and marking the
spot where stark and stiff a corpse lay con-
torted on the grass, pointed out the scenes OF
the bloodiest contests. The dead were happy
the dull, cold eye--the tranquil brow-the gent
ly-opening lips, which had given escape to the
parting spirit as it fed from its bleeding shell,
| showed how peacefully a man may die in bat
tie, pierced by the rife ball. The British and
| the French, many of whom had been murdered
by the Russians as they lay wounded, wore
| terrible frowns on their faces, with which the
| agonies of death had clad them. Some in their
last throes had torn up the earth in their hands,
and held the grass between their fingers up
| towards heaven. All the men who exhibited
such signs of pain had been bayoneted. The
| dead men who lay with an eternal smile on
| their lips had been shot. But the wounded.
| For two days they had lain where the hand
| and the ball had felled them. There were very
few, it is true, but all our searching had not
discovered the secrets of that blood stained
1 hill side, and it was towards noon to-day ere
| the Inst of onr soldiers had been found in his
| lair and carried to the hospital. But the Rus
slams, grooming and palpitating as they lay
around, were far more numerous. Some of
these were placed together in heaps, that they
might be more readily removed. Others
glared on you from the bushes with the ferocity
| of wild beasts as they Rugged their wounds.
Some implored, in an unknown tongue, but in
accents not to be mistaken, water or succor !;
holding out their mutilated or shattered limbs,
or pointing to the track Of the lacerating ball.
4 The sulleS, angry scowl of some Of these men
was fearful. Fanaticism and immortal hate
spake through their angry eye-balls, and he
| who gazed upon them in pity and compassion,
could at least (unwillingly) understand why
these men, in their savage passion, kill the
wounded, and fire on the conqueror who, in his
generous humanity had aided them as he
passed. twas areiefto see that their armswere
broken-that their cartridges were lying open
in heaps on the ground. Litterbearers, French
and English, clothed the hill side, now.toiling
| painfully up with heavy burden for the grave,
| or with some subject for the doctors care; now
| hunting through the bushes for the dead or
dying. Our men have acquired a shocking
| facility in their diagnosis A body is before
you; there is shout Come here boys /; / see
a Russianp Tor "a Frenchman, or zone Of our
| fellows.') One of the party comes forward,
raises the eyelid if it be closed, peers into the
eye, shrugs his shoulders, says quietly He's
dead, he'll wait and moves back to the litter /;
others pull the feet, and arrive at equally cor
rect conclusions by that process. The dead are
generally stripped of all but their coats. The
camp followers and blackguards from Balak-
lava, and seamen from the ships anxious for
trophies, carry off all they can take from the
field. At particular spots you see party of
men busy at work. Groups Of them are digging
away all along the hillside, at the distance Of
forty or fifty yards apart. Go over and you
find them around a yawning trench, thirty feet
in length bytwenty feet in breadth and six feet in
depth at the bottom of which, in every con-
ceivable attitude, lie packed together with ex-
ceeding art some thirty or forty corpses. The
gravediggers stand chatting on the mounds
| by the sides, waiting for the arrival Of some
bearers to complete the number of the dead.
They speculate on the appearance of the body
which is being borne towards them "lts Cor
poral -, Of the --tb, l think" says one.
"Nol its my rear rank man, can see his red
| hair plain enough" and so on. They discuss
| the merits or dement's Of dead sergeants or
comrades. "Well, he was a hard man; many's
the time was drilled through him, but it's all
over nowl' or "Poor Mickl he had fifteen
years services better fellow never stepped"
This scene is going on all about the hillside.
Frenchmen, with htters, are also busy looking
out for their dead and wounded, and in sharing
the sad labors of the day. At last the number
in the trench is completed. The bodies lie as
closely as they can be packed. Some Of them
have appraised arms, in the attitude Of taking
aim; their legs stick up through the mould as
it is thrown upon them; others are bent and
twisted into shapes like fantoccini. Inch after
Inch the earth rises upon them, and they are
left "alone in their glory" No, not alone, for
the hopes, and fears, and affections Of hundreds
of human hearts lie buried with them.
0xE O'CLOCK, P. M.-For about one mile
and half in length by half mile in depth,
the hillside offers such sights as these. Up.
| wards of two thousand Russians have been