"In this struggle between a handful of Russian soldiers and a determined and enterprising enemy, ten and even twenty times their superiors in number, the high deeds of the garrisons of the Veliaminof and Michael redoubts, and the defence of forts Navaguinsky and Abinsky, merit particular attention. The first of these redoubts was taken by the mountaineers on the 29th of last February. At daybreak, taking advantage of the localities, and concealed by the morning mist, their bands, more than 7000 strong, approached the entrenchments unperceived, and rushed impetuously to the assault. Repeatedly overthrown, they returned each time furiously to the charge, and after a long conflict finally remained masters of the rampart. The garrison, rejecting all proposals to surrender, continued with invincible courage a combat thenceforth without hope, preferring to find in it a glorious death; and all fell with the exception of some invalid soldiers, who were made prisoners by the mountaineers. The latter, in token of respect for the defenders of the redoubt, took home with them some of them whom there still appeared a chance of saving. The garrison of the Veliaminof redoubt consisted of 400 men of all ranks. The loss of the mountaineers amounted, in killed alone, to 900 men.
"On the morning of the 22nd of March, the mountaineers, to the number of more than 11,000 men, attacked the Michael redoubt, the garrison of which counted but 480 men under arms. Its brave commander, Second-captain Lico, of the battalion No. 5 of the Cossacks of the frontier line of the Black Sea, having learned the intentions of the enemy, had made preparations for vigorously resisting his attempts. Seeing the impossibility of receiving timely succour, he had nails prepared to spike his cannons, in case the rampart should be carried, and had a reduit constructed in the interior of the redoubt, with planks, tubs, and other suitable materials. Then collecting his whole garrison, officers and soldiers, he proposed to them to blow up the powder magazine, if they did not succeed in repulsing the enemy. The proposal was received with an enthusiasm which the subsequent conduct of the garrison proved to be genuine. The mountaineers were received with a most destructive fire by the artillery of the fort, and could not make themselves masters of the rampart until after an hour and half of fighting, in which they suffered considerable loss. The heroic efforts of the garrison having forced them back into the ditch, they took to flight; but the mountain horsemen, who had remained on the watch at a certain distance, fell with their sabres on the fugitives; and the latter, seeing inevitable death on either hand, returned to the assault, drove the garrison from the rampart, and forced it to retire into the reduit, after it had set fire to all the stores and provisions of every kind that were in the redoubt. Sharp-shooting went on for half an hour; the firing then ceased, and the mountaineers were beginning to congratulate themselves on their victory, when the powder magazine blew up.[62] The garrison perished in accomplishing this act, memorable in military annals; but with it perished all the mountaineers who were in the redoubt. The details of the defence of the Veliaminof and Michael redoubts have been divulged by the mountaineers themselves, and by some soldiers who have escaped from slavery among them. The services of the heroes who died thus on the field of honour, have been honoured by his majesty the emperor, in the persons of their families; whose livelihood has been insured, and whose children will be brought up at the expense of the state. These redoubts are now once more occupied by the detachment of troops operating on the eastern coasts of the Black Sea.
"The Navaguinsky fort has often been subjected to the attacks of the mountaineers; but they have always been repulsed with the same valour and steadiness. In one of these attacks, the mountaineers, availing themselves of the darkness of night, and the noise of a tempest, approached the fort without being perceived by the sentinels, surrounded it on all sides, sprang suddenly to the assault with ladders and hooks, made themselves masters of part of the rampart, and got into the fort. Captain Podgoursky, its brave commandant, and Lieutenant Jacovlev, then advanced against them with a part of the garrison. Both were killed on the spot, but their death in no degree checked the ardour of the soldiers, who fell upon the enemy with the bayonet, and drove them into the ditch. The fight was maintained with the same enthusiasm on all the other points of the fortifications, and the invalids themselves voluntarily turned out from the hospital and took part in it. At daybreak, after three hours hard fighting, the fort was cleared of the enemy, who left in it a considerable number of killed and wounded.