DURING the progress of the Kinburn Expedition, General Orders announced the promotion of Colonel Windham to the rank of Major-General "for distinguished services in the field," and his appointment to the command of the Fourth Division, with which he served as Assistant-Quartermaster-General until he was named to the command of that Brigade of the Second Division, at the head of which he fought on the 8th September.
Lord William Paulet assumed the command of the 2nd Brigade of the Fourth Division, and occupied General Bentinck's old quarters on Cathcart's Hill.
The camp before Sebastopol, into which Russian projectiles not unfrequently obtruded, was nevertheless tranquil and laborious, as some new settlement in Australian bush or America's backwoods. The Russians continued to pound away at intervals at the ruins of the town they had been forced to abandon. They did little harm to us, and might as well have saved the ammunition, which they often condescended to expend even on a single soldier, wandering among the broken walls or across the plain. Our old friend Bilboquet, long silent, now opened his mouth, and sent shot at the works by Traktir Bridge, or at anything he saw moving in the valley below his muzzles. The English army, convinced that it was to winter in camp, set seriously to work to guard against the effects of weather from which it suffered so grievously, and to make itself as comfortable as possible. Hutting and road-making were the occupations of the hour, and rapid progress was made in both. Strong wooden huts sprang up on every side, and here and there a solid stone dwelling was in course of construction.{421}
It was a striking contrast between the sufferings of the former winter — exposure, want of clothing, and famine — with the prospect of plenty and comfort, and it was pleasant to observe the cheerfulness and the activity that prevailed. Drainage was not neglected, and, indeed, it was a question whether it was not almost overdone. Some of the ditches, dug along each side of the roads, and around the stores, hospital huts, and other establishments, were of formidable width and depth, and of a dark night proved dangerous to wanderers through the camp, especially if they had been taking "just one more glass" in the quarters of some hospitable friend. But the rain frequently descended in torrents, the water swept down the slopes in sheets and floods, and deep drainage was essential.
Mr. Doyne, the superintendent of the Army Works Corps, proceeded vigorously with his labours. Mr. Doyne divided the road into miles, and at every mile was placed a station-hut and a lamp, with a corporal and two men to act as police. We heard nothing but the clatter of the spade and the thud of the pick, varied by frequent explosions of small mines, with which builders and road-makers got rid of the rock that impeded their work. Besides working at the roads, parties were busy at various small jobs, clearing wells, c. But the want of proper system and organization, which was so often deplorably shown during this war, was again visible. With different arrangements, half the men, perhaps a quarter of them, could have done the work of the whole 10,000 employed on the roads, and probably have done it better, because they would have been less crowded. Thus, for instance, a regiment of the Third Division, at the farthest extremity of the camp, marched down to work at Balaklava, returning at night, daily performing a distance of nearly fifteen miles. Of course, this was just so much power taken out of the men, and the army was full of boys whose strength was not equal to a good day's work. It could not, in fact, be got out of them, even though they had not to walk long distances.
There were frequent alarms, but many were of opinion — some of them persons whose opinion had weight — that our Muscovite friends had not the remotest idea of attacking us, and that Lord Panmure's information to a contrary effect, derived from Berlin, proceeded, in fact, from St. Petersburg, or, at any rate, from friends of our enemies, who desired to prevent us taking advantage of what little fine weather remained to undertake fresh expeditions against them.