Russian riflemen, after the last defeat on the right, had retired behind the banks of the Tchernaya. A battalion of Piedmontese, preceded by a company of bersaglieri, advanced in beautiful order as if on parade, and soon drove these riflemen from their position. It even advanced some way, but it was not intended to force the heights. The French brought up a new division (Dulac's). The English and French cavalry were in readiness on the ground of the Light Cavalry charge, to receive the enemy if they should debouch on the plain. But General Morris would not risk the cavalry on the plain, intersected as it was by the branches of the river, and defended, as it was still, by the Russian - guns on the height; so only two squadrons of Chasseurs d'Afrique followed the retreating enemy.
The guns which the Russians had brought up to cover their retreat suffered so much by the fire, which from our side was increased by Captain Mowbray's battery from the open ground between the Sardinian and the French positions, that they made off. As the guns retired, a brilliant line of cavalry appeared from behind the rising ground. I could distinguish five regiments — three in line and two other regiments in second line. They advanced at a gallop, and wheeling round, allowed twelve guns to pass, which again opened fire, but at half-past nine or ten o'clock black lines moving off, through clouds of the dust on the Mackenzie Road, were the only traces which remained of the so long threatened attack of the Russians.
Although not quite so obstinate and sanguinary as the Battle of Inkerman, this affair resembled it in many points. The Russians gave up manoeuvring, and confided entirely in the valour of their troops. The difference was in the manner of fighting. At Inkerman the Russians fell under file firing; on the Tchernaya it was the artillery which did the greatest execution. On the banks of the aqueduct particularly, the sight was appalling; the Russians, when scaling the embankment of the aqueduct, were taken in flank by the Sardinian batteries, and the dead and wounded rolled down the embankment, sometimes more than twenty feet in height.
According to the account of the prisoners, and judging from the straps on the shoulders of the wounded and dead, three divisions were engaged in the actual attack, — the 5th of the 2nd corps d'armee (of General Paniutin), then lately arrived from Poland, under the command of General Wrangel; the 12th division of the 4th corps oVarmee (Osten Sacken's), formerly under the command of General Liprandi, afterwards under General Martinolep; and the 17th division of the 6th corps d'armee (Liprandi's), under Major- General Wassielkosky. Before the attack began, General Gortschakoff, who commanded in person, read a letter from the Emperor before them, in which he expressed a hope that they would prove as valorous as last year when they took the heights of Balaklava; and then there was a large distribution of brandy. Besides the three divisions which attacked, the 7th occupied Tchorgoun and the heights, but was not engaged except in the small outpost affair of the Sardinians.
The French had three divisions engaged — the Division Faucheux to the right, the Division d'Herbillon. in the centre, and the Division (Camou) on the left of the bridge; their loss was about 1,000 in killed and wounded. The Sardinians had only one division engaged (the Division Trotti), and lost but a few hundred men; they had to regret the loss of a distinguished general officer, the Brigadier- General Count de Montevecchio, who died of his wounds; but they gained great confidence from the day, and were proud of holding their own so well under the eyes of their allies.