Terry Brighton - Hell Riders: The Truth About the Charge of the Light Brigade

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First published 2004

Copyright Terry Brighton, 2004

Cover image: The Charge of the Light Brigade by Richard Caton Woodville. Courtesy of The Queens Royal Lancers Regimental Museum
Cover design: EstuaryEnglish

The moral right of the author has been asserted

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-141-91398-8

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The Last Charge: The 21st Lancers and the Battle of Omdurman

To R.E. and E.L.

In a moment they were gone:
Like a sudden spark
Struck vainly in the night,
Then returns the dark
With no more hope of light.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Maud

Assistant Surgeon Henry Wilkin, 11th Hussars. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Balaklava harbour. Photograph by James Robertson, 1855

Balaklava harbour seen from the end of the wharf. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Balaklava seen from the cavalry camp at Kadikoi. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Looking out across the Balaklava plain from the cavalry camp at Kadikoi. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Field kitchen of the 8th Hussars. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Camp of the 4th Dragoon Guards. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Captain Henry Duberly (8th Hussars) and his wife, Fanny. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Officers and men of the 8th Hussars. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

General Lord Raglan, commander-in-chief of the British Army in the Crimea. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Lieutenant General Lord Lucan, commanding the Cavalry Division

Major General Lord Cardigan, commanding the Light Brigade

Captain Louis Nolan, 15th Hussars, who carried the order from Lord Raglan to Lord Lucan. Drawing by an unknown artist

His Highness Prince Menshikov, commander-in-chief of the Russian Army in the Crimea

Lieutenant General Liprandi, in command of the Russian attack on Balaklava on 25 October 1854

Colonel Prince Obolensky, commanding the Don Cossack battery charged by the Light Brigade

The Thin Red Line. Photogravure after Richard Gibb published by Archibald Ramsden, London, 1883

The Charge of the Heavy Brigade. Oil painting by Godfrey Douglas Giles, 1897

Lord Raglans order to the cavalry

The bugle blown by Trumpeter Billy Brittain to sound the charge of the Light Brigade, and the bugle blown by Trumpet Major Henry Joy to sound the advance of the Heavy Brigade

The Death of Captain Nolan. Oil painting by Thomas Barker, 1855

The Charge. Oil painting by C. E. Stewart

The mle behind the guns. Illustrated London News, 18 November 1854

The Roll Call. Lithograph after Richard Caton Woodville, 1890

The Charge of the Light Brigade. Tennysons first draft of his poem

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

William Russell, war correspondent of The Times. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

The Valley of Death. Photograph by Roger Fenton, 1855

Four survivors of the charge photographed in August 1855 after their return to the cavalry depot at Brighton

Private Benjamin Soley, who rode in the charge with the 17th Lancers

Letter describing the charge written by Private Soley

Survivors of the charge with Butcher, one of the few horses to live through both the charge and the winter that followed and to return home

Survivors of the charge photographed with Buffalo Bill (Colonel William Cody) at Earls Court, London, in 1903

The author and publishers are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce illustrations: 1, 310, 289, Fenton Collection, Library of Congress, Washington, DC; 2, 1113, 17, 20, 235, 303, 35, The Queens Royal Lancers Museum, Belvoir Castle; 1416, Sevastopoltsy, St Petersburg; 1819, National Army Museum, London; 21, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin; 22, Cavalry and Guards Club, London; 267, Tennyson Research Centre, Lincoln; 34, Wrexham County Archives.

A number of organizations and individuals have helped in the preparation of this book. I would like to thank the staff of the Reading Room at the National Army Museum, without whom most research into the Victorian soldier would prove impossible, the Ministry of Defence Information and Library Service and the Public Record Office (now the National Archive) at Kew. The present regimental museums of the original Light Brigade regiments have given their assistance and support: The Kings Royal Hussars, the Light Dragoons, The Queens Royal Hussars and The Queens Royal Lancers. I am especially indebted to the several members of the Crimean War Research Society whose advice and comments have been both informed and helpful. My wife Janet spent many hours working on the roll of officers and men who charged at Balaklava.

Special thanks must go to those who read the final manuscript in full and offered their expert advice: Michael Hargreave Mawson, whose encyclopedic knowledge of the Crimean War is unrivalled, and my colleague at The Queens Royal Lancers Museum, Captain Mick Holtby, who once again placed his specialist knowledge of the cavalry at my disposal. Thanks also go to my agent Luigi Bonomi for making the right decision while I was without a phone in Greece, and to Eleo Gordon at Penguin for her belief and guidance (and for surviving the cannonball).

All of the above have helped to make this a better book than it could otherwise have been, though the opinions expressed and any faults that remain are my own. Finally, it does not seem out of place to acknowledge as my co-authors the twenty or so survivors of the charge who wrote first-hand accounts of their hell ride at Balaklava. No words of mine could conjure up the reality of the charge as surely as theirs, and it is to them that I owe the greatest debt.