Chapter XXXII: Well Done Heavies!

No sooner had the Russians been repulsed than Captain Wintle turned to rejoin his regiment, Jack following.

They had reached the site of the light cavalry camp, some of the tents being already taken down, while others remained standing, when Captain Wintle, actuated by a sudden impulse, said, ‘Dismount, corporal, and run to my tent--that one yonder. Inside is a bottle of brandy. I’ll fill my canteen with it.’

Jack went inside the tent indicated, found the bottle, poured some into his officer’s water-bottle, and, as he was bidden, poured the rest into his own. He then mounted again and both were making their way to where the Light Brigade still stood dismounted, when just behind them, picking their way among the remains of the camp, they saw the heavy Dragoons advancing.

Gray-headed old General Scarlett, followed by his aide-de-camp Lieutenant Elliot, led the Inniskillings, who were advancing by ‘threes.’

‘Hallo, Wintle,’ cried out General Scarlett,’where did you spring from?’

‘I’ve just returned from Kadikoi, General,’ replied Captain Wintle, saluting.

‘I’m just off there to support the Highlanders.’

‘They don’t want any support, General;’ and in a few words Captain Wintle related their gallant action.

‘Well done!’ exclaimed the General.

Lieutenant Elliot had been riding beside the General as he talked, and Jack was just behind. They were marching parallel with the Causeway Heights and about eight hundred yards from the summit, when Jack happened to glance up, and in a moment noticed the top fringed with lance-points.

He immediately called out the fact, and Lieutenant Elliot, who had seen much service, said, ‘The trumpeter’s right, and, moreover, those troops are fronting towards the south valley and will take us in flank as we pass them.’

General Scarlett, who had seen no war-service, had the greatest confidence in his aide-de-camp who had, and he said instantly, ‘Elliot, ought we not to charge them?’

To which the gallant aide-de-camp replied, Certainly, General.’

‘Left wheel into line,’ cried the old General, and the Inniskillings immediately obeyed the order.

Behind the squadron of Inniskillings were two of the Scots Greys, and these formed up on the left of the column. The 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards and the Royals were following, making, with the other squadron of the Inniskillings, eight squadrons in all; but Scarlett had with him at the moment but three, the gallant ‘Three Hundred.’

Hardly had the General announced his determination of charging the enemy than they came over the ridge and began to descend the slope, an enormous mass, nearly forty squadrons of Lancers, Hussars, Dragoons, and Cossacks, all, with the exception of one Hussar corps in pale-blue, clad in dark-gray overcoats, which seemed to be the distinguishing badge of Russian troops.

Seeing the handful of red-coated Dragoons below them, they started forward at a smart canter. Greys and Inniskillings, however, were going on calmly with dressing their line, the officers facing their men and seeing that the line was dressed with nicety. Captain Wintle had remained near General Scarlett, and Jack remained with his officer.

The advancing Russians--seeing the calmness with which the British cavalry prepared for the attack, apparently ignoring the fact that the enemy was in sight--as though fearing an ambush, slackened their pace to a trot, then to a walk, then halted altogether.

‘Will you lead the charge, or will you direct, sir?’ asked Lieutenant Elliot of his chief, saluting with his sword.

‘I shall lead, by all means,’ said the gallant old General. ‘Lord Lucan is on the ground and in supreme command; as its brigadier I will lead my brigade.’

The Inniskillings were eager to be off, and several men seemed inclined to start; but the General waved them back, saying, ‘Back, men; the Greys are not ready.’

When the line was dressed to his satisfaction, the General, ignoring the intermediate steps of trot, canter, and gallop, said simply to his trumpeter, ‘Sound the charge;’ and as the notes rang out the squadrons started forward.

Captain Wintle rode behind the General, and Jack followed him, keeping almost in a line with General Scarlett’s trumpeter and orderly. The General himself, mounted on an immense bay horse, was fully fifty yards in front. No matter what happened, he was determined to be first among the enemy.

These, with a precision that showed they were highly trained troops, had thrown out two huge wings on either flank as though, when the Dragoons had passed, to close in on them and cut off their retreat. From the start the distance was only about four hundred yards; but at first the pace was slow, owing to the litter of the camp over which they moved.

The Russian cavalry had a depth of fully twenty files and a frontage thrice that of the handful of heavy Dragoons, every man of whom knew that it was absolutely impossible to hurl such a mass back by mere shock; all they could hope to do was to carve their way in and to ply their swords until they fell. This was all they asked.

As the Inniskillings neared the enemy they gave a wild cheer; but the Greys came more silently, though their faces were lit up with the stern joy of war. An officer sat in front of the Russian squadrons, and General Scarlett, passing him on his left, hewed his way into the serried masses behind. The General’s aide-de-camp rode straight at the Russian officer, and, parrying a cut made at him, drove his sword up to the hilt in the Russian’s body. For a moment he could not withdraw it, and clinging to the hilt he turned the wounded Russian round and literally tore him from his saddle. He then disappeared into the mass, as did the orderly and trumpeter, and Jack found himself face to face with the foe.

A trumpeter, probably obeying some order, was sounding a call, and had turned his head towards his comrades while doing so. As Dainty raced by him Jack raised his sword to cut this trumpeter from his saddle; but seeing the man was unable to protect himself he stayed his hand, and dashed at the Hussars behind. The two Russians who faced him forced their horses to right and left, and left Jack a space, into which he urged his horse. He made a tremendous cut at the Hussar on his right as he did so, and the man reeled in his saddle. The other man, though, made a point which Jack parried; and, his horse still going forward between the files, he found himself surrounded by enemies. For a few seconds that half-dozen intrepid cavalrymen were alone amidst thousands of Russians; then came a wild yell, a crashing shock, and the first line of Inniskillings and Greys had reached the foe.

Jack was forced farther in, being absolutely surrounded by blue jackets and gray greatcoats. Blows were rained at him; but by keeping up a rapid circling of his own blade above his head he managed to ward them off. Another crash behind told that the second rank had charged in, and the forward movement of that handful of red-coats became accelerated.

The Russians did not directly face their enemies, but always gave way to right and left, as much as they could, before them; then they closed in on the flanks and behind, and tried to cut the Englishmen from their saddles. But the heavy Dragoons were men of fine physique, larger, heavier, and better mounted than the Russians, and their blows told with terrible effect.

Fierce denunciations and epithets of disdain were hurled at the foe by Irishman and Scot as they hacked and hewed; but the Russians, with lips curled back from their clenched teeth, made only a sort of gurgling roar or a low kind of hissing noise. The turf beneath the horses’ hoofs was thick and spongy and deadened the sound of the trampling of thousands of hoofs; but the ceaseless clash of sabres, the frequent firing of pistols, the incessant jingle of cavalry accoutrements made such a volume of sound as must have been heard by the headquarter staff up on the heights above.

Jack had hewed his way half-through the dense mass, and had got in amongst some Dragoons, on whose thick gray coats a sword-blade fell quite harmless. The men wore tall red felt shakos with a brass eagle in front, and several of them closed round Jack with the intention of slaying him. One fellow made two blows in rapid succession, and while Jack was parrying these another made a thrust at his head. Fortunately, his aim was too high, and though he pierced the top of Jack’s lance-cap he missed his head. That man fell back with his sword-hand almost severed by Jack’s sword.

The other three, however, uttering their curious zizzing sound through their clenched teeth, renewed the attack, and a blow fell on Jack’s left shoulder which almost knocked him from the saddle. Fortunately for him the aim had not been true, and the flat rather than the edge of the Russian’s blade struck him. As it was he reeled, and next moment must have been struck from his saddle, to have been trampled to death by hundreds of horses; but a sergeant of the Greys cut his way to him, and with three tremendous successive strokes cut down the Russians attacking him.

The pressure thus relaxed, Jack paused a moment to take breath and look round him. It looked like a vast sea of gray coats and Russian faces. Here and there a tall bearskin or burnished helmet could be seen, and an occasional gleam of a scarlet tunic; but in that throng of Russians they appeared buried. A mighty swaying, heaving motion had become imparted to the mass, and it was no longer possible to direct one’s way.

But at that moment a tremendous cheer was heard from behind, and the 5th Dragoon Guards came crashing in. A moment later another cheer, a good, hearty English one, and the Royals rolled up one of the wheeling wings. Then the 4th Dragoon Guards in grand style charged in on the Russian right flank, and the three fresh regiments carved a gory way to the aid of their comrades of the Greys and Inniskillings.

The Russians were pierced and riven, the swaying motion set in upwards, and the enormous mass, incredible as it seemed, began to fall back before the fiery impetuosity of the British Dragoons.

Jack, mixed up with men of different regiments, cut his way out of the left flank of the Russians.

The adjutant of the Greys, a mighty man with a mighty voice, was calling upon his men, ‘Rally, the Greys! Rally, rally! Rally on _me_!’

Another officer, minus his bearskin, his face streaming with blood, though he seemed unaware of it, joined the adjutant, and the men began to rally on the Russian flank.

A trumpeter of the Greys was near Jack, when an officer, whose burnished helmet was cloven down to his head, laid a hand on Jack’s shoulder, crying, ‘Trumpeter, sound the rally!’

Jack and the Scots Grey sounded again and again. Men of different regiments rallied, formed, and at a word from an officer of the Royals, with a cheer charged once more upon the enemy. Taken now in flank, pressed hard from in front, smitten on all sides by the mighty scarlet-clad Dragoons, the Russians broke, the movement uphill got more pronounced, they turned their horses’ heads, and soon the thousands were galloping up the hill whence but ten minutes before they had come down in all the majesty of overwhelming numbers.

Royals, Greys, and Inniskillings would have pursued; but the officers knew that once upon the crest of the Causeway Heights they would become exposed to a galling fire of musketry and artillery.

‘Rally, rally, rally!’ shouted officers and sergeants; ‘Rally, rally!’ went the bugles, and the scarlet coats were got in hand, while a British field-battery and a battery of position opened fire on the defeated Russians and hastened their retirement.

As the Dragoons reformed a thundering roar of cheering went up from the throats of all those comrades who had beheld their gallant deed.

An aide-de-camp came down from Lord Raglan to Scarlett, bearing the hastily scribbled words, ‘Well done!’

Sir Colin Campbell galloped up, and doffing his cocked hat, turned to the Scots Greys.

‘Greys, gallant Greys,’ he said, ‘I am sixty-one years old, and if I were young again I should be proud to serve in your ranks.’

Such praise from such a man raised the enthusiasm of his countrymen, and they gave him a cheer that brought the colour to his cheeks.

Jack was cheering as loudly as any one when he felt himself tapped on the shoulder, and, turning, saw Captain Wintle, his reeking sword in his hand, regarding him sternly.

‘What the dickens are you doing here?’ he exclaimed.

‘I followed you, sir,’ said Jack naïvely.

‘Then follow me back to our brigade, or Lord Cardigan will have something to say to both you and me;’ and setting spurs to their horses the two Lancers galloped across the heights to where the Light Brigade sat, some five hundred yards away.