Crimean War, 1853 – 1856

Origins

There had been growing religious tensions between Orthodox Christians (Russia) and Catholic Christians (France) over control of Jerusalem and Russia’s attempts to gain control of Constantinople. Also Russia was expanding south at the expense of Muslim states and the Ottoman Turks.

Preliminaries

When Russian troops began to occupy Moldavia and parts of Romania in July 1853, Turkey declared war on Russia and in November successfully attacked the Russians at Oltenitza, in southern Romania. However the Russian fleet responded, decisively defeating the Turks off Sinope in the Black Sea.

Alarmed by Russian expansion and aggression, Britain joined France in declaring war on Russia in March 1854. In the same month Russian forces crossed the Danube and invaded Bulgaria, but were repulsed by Austrians – until then an ally of Russia.

Over a two year period, French and British navies attacked Russian coastal defences at Cronstadt and Sveaborg in the Baltic Sea and Petropavlovsk in the Pacific, so the war was by no means confined to the Crimean peninsula.

Fighting in the Crimea

The British army commander, Lord Raglan, decided to deny the Russians control of the Black Sea by preventing their fleet using the Crimean harbour of Sevastopol. Allied forces landed unopposed at Kalamatia Bay in the Crimean peninsula, 30 miles to the north of the harbour and advanced towards it. The Russians attempted to hold them at the river Alma (September 1854) but were outnumbered and outfought, so withdrew to the city. Allied leaders soon realised that they needed anchorages for supply ships and therefore bypassed Sevastopol on their way south to Balaklava and Kamiesch on the coast.

The port of Sevastopol was never fully encircled by allied forces, so Russians were able to supply and reinforce it from the north. They made a number of attempts to dislodge the allies, attacking near Balaklava (October 1854) and in the hills near Sevastopol at Inkerman (November 1854). Turkish forces defeated a Russian attempt to relieve the port, at Eupatoria (February 1855) and Russian supply lines were cut by the French capture of Kerch (May 1855) on the eastern tip of the Crimea.

French and Sardinian forces defeated a final Russian effort to relieve Sevastopol at the Traktir bridge over the River Tchernaya (August 1855). On 8th September 1855 the French forced their way into the Malakoff, one of two key strong points in the defences around Sevastopol. The Russians scuttled their ships and evacuated the southern part of the city by crossing the harbour to the north shore over a floating bridge.

While this gave the allies possession of the southern side of Sevastopol Harbour, the Russians retained the northern side, so its facilities were of no value. In June 1855, in an attempt to relieve pressure on Sevastopol, Russian forces besieged Kars, a Turkish city near the border with Armenia. Kars fell to the Russians in November 1855.

Outcome

Peace terms were agreed in February 1856 at Vienna, and the Treaty of Paris was signed the following month. Russia lost her dominance in the Balkans and agreed to respect the integrity of the Ottoman Empire.

In some ways Austria was the biggest loser. Having chosen to defy the Russians in the Balkans, she lost her main ally, and over the next few years found that Britain and France were not interested in propping her up. Indeed, within three years Austria was at war with France and Piedmont (1859), resulting in the loss of her much of her Italian possessions, while the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 ended any Austrian influence in Germany.

Lessons

The campaign was characterised by poor leadership – Russian (failure to attack the Allies’ initial landing), French (their leader, Marshal Armand de Saint-Armand was seriously ill and died) and British (failure to equip and maintain their army adequately).

Despite British infantry’s use of the Minié rifle, which had given it a substantial advantage over the Russians at the Alma, Lord Raglan persisted in attacking Sevastopol’s southern defences. He ignored instructions from his political masters to launch an attack, with the French, on the weakly defended capital of Crimea, Simferopol, and to clear the Russian forces from the Crimean peninsula. The Allies thus lost the chance of ending Russian annexation of the Crimea (a result of the Russo-Turkish War 1768-1774).

For the first time, press reports of battles and living conditions of the soldiers were telegraphed home and, with photographs (another wartime first), made an increasingly angry British public aware of the scandalous lack of adequate planning and support. Far more British soldiers died of cholera and other diseases than in battle.

Lord Aberdeen was blamed for Britain’s involvement in the war and resigned as Prime Minister in January 1855, being replaced by Lord Palmerston.