Charge of the Light Brigade
Encyclopedia
The Charge of the Light Brigade was a charge
of British cavalry
led by Lord Cardigan
against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava
on 25 October 1854 in the Crimean War
. The charge was the result of a miscommunication in such a way that the brigade attempted a much more difficult objective than intended by the overall commander Lord Raglan
. Blame for the miscommunication has remained controversial, as the original order itself was vague. The charge produced no decisive gains and resulted in very high casualties, and is best remembered as the subject of the poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade
" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, whose lines emphasize the valour of the cavalry in carrying out their orders, even "tho' the soldier knew / Some one had blunder'd".
The charge was made by the Light Brigade of the British cavalry, consisting of the 4th
and 13th Light Dragoons
, 17th Lancers
, and the 8th and 11th Hussars
, under the command of Major General
the Earl of Cardigan
. Together with the Heavy Brigade comprising the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards
, the 5th Dragoon Guards
, the 6th Inniskilling Dragoons
and the Scots Greys
, commanded by Major General James Yorke Scarlett
, himself a past Commanding Officer of the 5th Dragoon Guards, the two units were the main British cavalry force at the battle. Overall command of the cavalry resided with Lieutenant General
the Earl of Lucan. Cardigan and Lucan were brothers-in-law who disliked each other intensely.
Lucan received an order from the army commander Lord Raglan stating that "Lord Raglan wishes the Cavalry to advance rapidly to the front, follow the enemy, and try to prevent the enemy carrying away the guns. Troop Horse Artillery may accompany. French Cavalry is on your left. Immediate." Raglan in fact wished the cavalry to prevent the Russians taking away the naval guns from the redoubt
s that they had captured on the reverse side of the Causeway Heights, the hill forming the south side of the valley. Raglan could see what was happening from his high vantage-point on the west of the valley, but Lucan and the cavalry were unaware of what was going on owing to the lie of the land where they were drawn up.
The order was drafted by Brigadier Richard Airey and was carried by Captain Louis Edward Nolan
, who carried the further oral instruction that the cavalry was to attack immediately. When Lucan asked what guns were referred to, Nolan is said to have indicated, by a wide sweep of his arm, not the Causeway redoubts but the mass of Russian guns in a redoubt
at the end of the valley, around a mile away. His reasons for the misdirection are unclear, as he was killed in the ensuing battle.
In response to the order, Lucan instructed Cardigan to lead 673 (some sources state 661; another 607) cavalrymen straight into the valley between the Fedyukhin Heights and the Causeway Heights, famously dubbed the "Valley of Death" by the poet Tennyson
. The opposing Russian forces were commanded by Pavel Liprandi and included approximately 20 battalion
s of infantry supported by over fifty artillery
pieces. These forces were deployed on both sides and at the opposite end of the valley. Lucan himself was to follow with the Heavy Brigade.
The Light Brigade set off down the valley with Cardigan out in front leading the charge. Almost at once Nolan was seen to rush across the front, passing in front of Cardigan. It may be that he then realised the charge was aimed at the wrong target and was attempting to stop or turn the brigade, but he was killed by an artillery shell and the cavalry continued on its course. Despite withering fire from three sides that devastated their force on the ride, the Light Brigade was able to engage the Russian forces at the end of the valley and force them back from the redoubt, but it suffered heavy casualties and was soon forced to retire. The surviving Russian artillerymen returned to their guns and opened fire once again, with grape
and canister
, indiscriminately at the mêlée of friend and foe before them. Lucan failed to provide any support for Cardigan, and it was speculated that he was motivated by an enmity for his brother-in-law that had lasted some 30 years and had been intensified during the campaign up to that point. The troops of the Heavy Brigade entered the mouth of the valley but did not advance further. Lucan's subsequent explanation was that he saw no point in having a second brigade mown down and that he was best positioned where he was to render assistance to Light Brigade survivors returning from the charge. The French light cavalry, the Chasseurs d'Afrique
, was more effective in that it cleared the Fedyukhin Heights of the two half batteries of guns, two infantry battalions and Cossack
s to ensure the Light Brigade would not be hit by fire from that flank and later provided cover for the remaining elements of the Light Brigade as they withdrew.
War correspondent William Russell
, who witnessed the battle, declared "our Light Brigade was annihilated by their own rashness, and by the brutality of a ferocious enemy".
Cardigan survived the battle. Although stories circulated afterwards that he was not actually present, he led the charge from the front and, never looking back, did not see what was happening to the troops behind him. He reached the Russian guns, took part in the fight, and then returned alone up the valley without bothering to rally or even find out what had happened to the survivors. He afterwards said all he could think about was his rage against Captain Nolan, who he thought had tried to take over the leadership of the charge from him. After riding back up the valley, he considered he had done all that he could and then, with considerable sang-froid, left the field and went on board his yacht in Balaclava harbour, where he ate a champagne dinner. He subsequently described the engagement in a speech delivered at the Mansion House
in London that was afterwards quoted in length in the House of Commons
:
The brigade was not completely destroyed, but did suffer terribly, with 118 men killed, 127 wounded and about 60 taken prisoner. After regrouping, only 195 men were still with horses. The futility of the action and its reckless bravery prompted the French Marshal Pierre Bosquet
to state "C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre." ("It is magnificent, but it is not war.") He continued, in a rarely quoted phrase: "C'est de la folie" — "it is madness." The Russian commanders are said to have initially believed that the British soldiers must have been drunk. Somerset Calthorpe, ADC to Lord Raglan, wrote a letter to a friend three days after the charge. He detailed casualty numbers, but he did not make distinction between those killed and those taken prisoner:
Slow communications meant that news of the disaster did not reach the British public until three weeks after the action. The British commanders' dispatches from the front were published in an extraordinary edition of the London Gazette
of 12 November 1854. Raglan blamed Lucan for the charge, claiming that "from some misconception of the order to advance, the Lieutenant-General (Lucan) considered that he was bound to attack at all hazards, and he accordingly ordered Major-General the Earl of Cardigan to move forward with the Light Brigade." Lucan was furious at being made a scapegoat: Raglan claimed he should have exercised his discretion, but throughout the campaign up to that date Lucan considered Raglan had allowed him no independence at all and required that his orders be followed to the letter. Cardigan, who had merely obeyed orders, blamed Lucan for giving those orders. He returned home a hero and was promoted to Inspector General of the Cavalry.
Lucan attempted to publish a letter refuting point by point Raglan's London Gazette dispatch, but his criticism of his superior was not tolerated and in March 1855, Lucan was recalled to England. The Charge of the Light Brigade became a subject of considerable controversy and public dispute on his return. He strongly rejected Raglan's version of events, calling it "an imputation reflecting seriously on my professional character". In an exchange of public correspondence printed in the pages of The Times
, Lucan blamed Raglan and his deceased aide-de-camp Captain Nolan, who had been the actual deliverer of the disputed order. Lucan subsequently defended himself with a speech in the House of Lords
on 19 March.
Lucan evidently escaped blame for the charge, as he was made a member of the Order of the Bath
in July of that same year. Although he never again saw active duty, he reached the rank of General in 1865 and was made a Field Marshal
in the year before his death.
The charge of the Light Brigade continues to be studied by modern military historians and students as an example of what can go wrong when accurate military intelligence
is lacking and orders are unclear. Sir Winston Churchill
, who was a keen military historian and a former cavalryman, insisted on taking time out during the Yalta Conference
in 1945 to see the battlefield for himself.
According to Norman Dixon, 19th century accounts of the charge tended to focus on the bravery and glory of the cavalrymen, much more than the military blunders involved, with the perverse effect that it "did much to strengthen those very forms of tradition which put such an incapacitating stranglehold on military endeavor for the next eighty or so years," i.e., until World War I
.
The fate of the surviving members of the Charge was investigated by Edward James Boys
, a military historian, who documented their lives from leaving the army to their deaths. His records are described as being the most definitive project of its kind ever undertaken. Edwin Hughes
, who died 14 May 1927, aged 96, was the last survivor of the charge.
In October 1875 survivors of the Charge met at the Alexandra Palace
in London to celebrate the 21st Anniversary of the Charge. The celebrations were fully reported in the Illustrated London News
of 30 October 1875, which included the recollections of several of the survivors, including those of Edward Richard Woodham
, the Chairman of the Committee that organised the celebration. Tennyson was invited but could not attend. Lucan, the senior commander surviving, was not present but attended a separate celebration, held later in the day, with other senior officers at the fashionable Willis's Rooms, St James's Square.
August 2nd, 1890 trumpeter Landfrey, from the 17th Lancers, who sounded the bugle charge at Balaclava made a recording on an Edison
cylinder that can be heard here, using a bugle which had been used at Waterloo
in 1815.
In 2004, on the 150th anniversary of the Charge, a commemoration of the event was held at Balaklava. As part of the anniversary, a monument dedicated to the 25,000 British participants of the conflict was unveiled by HRH Prince Michael of Kent
.
, wrote evocatively about the battle in his poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade
". Tennyson's poem, published on 9 December 1854 in The Examiner, praises the Brigade ("When can their glory fade? O the wild charge they made!") while trenchantly mourning the appalling futility of the charge ("Not tho' the soldier knew, someone had blunder'd... Charging an army, while all the world wonder'd"). Tennyson wrote the poem inside only a few minutes after reading an account of the battle in The Times, according to his grandson Sir Charles Tennyson. It immediately became hugely popular, even reaching the troops in the Crimea, where it was distributed in pamphlet form. Forty years later Kipling
wrote "The Last of the Light Brigade
", commemorating a visit by the last twenty survivors to Tennyson (then in his eightieth year) to reproach him gently for not writing a sequel about the way in which England was treating its old soldiers. Some sources treat the poem as an account of a real event, but other commentators class the destitute old soldiers as imagined, with the visit invented by Kipling to draw attention to the poverty in which the real survivors were living, in the same way that he evoked Tommy Atkins
in "The Absent Minded Beggar".
stars Errol Flynn
and is completely historically inaccurate, turning the motive into a grudge match against an Indian ruler allied with the Russians. The 1968 version
, featuring David Hemmings
(as Nolan) and Trevor Howard
(as Cardigan), was much more factually accurate. It was produced during a time of public frustration over the Vietnam War
.
The novel Flashman at the Charge
has Harry Flashman participating (much against his will) in the Charge.
The charge is the subject of British heavy metal
band Iron Maiden
's song "The Trooper
" on their Piece of Mind
album.
It was also the inspiration for the Pearls Before Swine
album Balaklava
, which begins with a sample of the 1890 recording of trumpeter Landfrey.
Charge (warfare)
A charge is a maneuver in battle in which soldiers advance towards their enemy at their best speed in an attempt to engage in close combat. The charge is the dominant shock attack and has been the key tactic and decisive moment of most battles in history...
of British cavalry
Cavalry
Cavalry or horsemen were soldiers or warriors who fought mounted on horseback. Cavalry were historically the third oldest and the most mobile of the combat arms...
led by Lord Cardigan
James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan
Lieutenant General James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, KCB , was an officer in the British Army who commanded the Light Brigade during the Crimean War...
against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava
Battle of Balaclava
The Battle of Balaclava, fought on 25 October 1854 during the Crimean War, was part of the Anglo-French-Turkish campaign to capture the port and fortress of Sevastopol, Russia's principal naval base on the Black Sea...
on 25 October 1854 in the Crimean War
Crimean War
The Crimean War was a conflict fought between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the French Empire, the British Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The war was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining...
. The charge was the result of a miscommunication in such a way that the brigade attempted a much more difficult objective than intended by the overall commander Lord Raglan
FitzRoy Somerset, 1st Baron Raglan
Field Marshal FitzRoy James Henry Somerset, 1st Baron Raglan, GCB, PC , known before 1852 as Lord FitzRoy Somerset, was a British soldier.-Early life:...
. Blame for the miscommunication has remained controversial, as the original order itself was vague. The charge produced no decisive gains and resulted in very high casualties, and is best remembered as the subject of the poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade
The Charge of the Light Brigade (poem)
"The Charge of the Light Brigade" is an 1854 narrative poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson about the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War...
" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, whose lines emphasize the valour of the cavalry in carrying out their orders, even "tho' the soldier knew / Some one had blunder'd".
Events
4th Queen's Own Hussars
The 4th Queen's Own Hussars was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1685. It saw service for three centuries, before being amalgamated into The Queen's Royal Irish Hussars in 1958....
and 13th Light Dragoons
13th Light Dragoons
The 13th Hussars was a cavalry regiment of the British Army whose battle honours include Waterloo and The Charge of the Light Brigade. 1n 1922, the regiment was amalgamated with the 18th Royal Hussars, to form the 13th/18th Hussars.-Regimental history:British light dragoons were first raised in...
, 17th Lancers
17th Lancers
The 17th Lancers was a cavalry regiment of the British Army, notable for its participation in the Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War...
, and the 8th and 11th Hussars
11th Hussars
The 11th Hussars was a cavalry regiment of the British Army.-History:The regiment was founded in 1715 as Colonel Philip Honeywood's Regiment of Dragoons and was known by the name of its Colonel until 1751 when it became the 11th Regiment of Dragoons...
, under the command of Major General
Major General
Major general or major-general is a military rank used in many countries. It is derived from the older rank of sergeant major general. A major general is a high-ranking officer, normally subordinate to the rank of lieutenant general and senior to the ranks of brigadier and brigadier general...
the Earl of Cardigan
James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan
Lieutenant General James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, KCB , was an officer in the British Army who commanded the Light Brigade during the Crimean War...
. Together with the Heavy Brigade comprising the 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards
4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards
The 4th Royal Irish Dragoon Guards was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1685. It saw service for three centuries, before being amalgamated into the 4th/7th Dragoon Guards in 1922....
, the 5th Dragoon Guards
5th Dragoon Guards
The 5th Dragoon Guards was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1685. It saw service for three centuries, before being amalgamated into the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards in 1922....
, the 6th Inniskilling Dragoons
6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons
The 6th Dragoons was a cavalry regiment in the British Army, first raised in 1689. It saw service for three centuries, before being amalgamated into the 5th/6th Dragoons in 1922.The 'Skins' are one of the four ancestor regiments of the Royal Dragoon...
and the Scots Greys
Scots Greys
The Royal Scots Greys was a cavalry regiment of the British Army from 1707 until 1971, when they amalgamated with the 3rd Carabiniers to form The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards ....
, commanded by Major General James Yorke Scarlett
James Yorke Scarlett
General Sir James Yorke Scarlett, GCB was a British general and hero of the Crimean War.-Early life:The son of the 1st Baron Abinger, and educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge, Scarlett entered the army as a cornet in 1818 and in 1830 became a major in the 5th Dragoon Guards...
, himself a past Commanding Officer of the 5th Dragoon Guards, the two units were the main British cavalry force at the battle. Overall command of the cavalry resided with Lieutenant General
Lieutenant General
Lieutenant General is a military rank used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages where the title of Lieutenant General was held by the second in command on the battlefield, who was normally subordinate to a Captain General....
the Earl of Lucan. Cardigan and Lucan were brothers-in-law who disliked each other intensely.
Lucan received an order from the army commander Lord Raglan stating that "Lord Raglan wishes the Cavalry to advance rapidly to the front, follow the enemy, and try to prevent the enemy carrying away the guns. Troop Horse Artillery may accompany. French Cavalry is on your left. Immediate." Raglan in fact wished the cavalry to prevent the Russians taking away the naval guns from the redoubt
Redoubt
A redoubt is a fort or fort system usually consisting of an enclosed defensive emplacement outside a larger fort, usually relying on earthworks, though others are constructed of stone or brick. It is meant to protect soldiers outside the main defensive line and can be a permanent structure or a...
s that they had captured on the reverse side of the Causeway Heights, the hill forming the south side of the valley. Raglan could see what was happening from his high vantage-point on the west of the valley, but Lucan and the cavalry were unaware of what was going on owing to the lie of the land where they were drawn up.
The order was drafted by Brigadier Richard Airey and was carried by Captain Louis Edward Nolan
Louis Edward Nolan
Louis Edward Nolan , was a British Army officer of the Victorian era, an authority on cavalry tactics best known for his controversial role in launching the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade during the Battle of Balaclava...
, who carried the further oral instruction that the cavalry was to attack immediately. When Lucan asked what guns were referred to, Nolan is said to have indicated, by a wide sweep of his arm, not the Causeway redoubts but the mass of Russian guns in a redoubt
Redoubt
A redoubt is a fort or fort system usually consisting of an enclosed defensive emplacement outside a larger fort, usually relying on earthworks, though others are constructed of stone or brick. It is meant to protect soldiers outside the main defensive line and can be a permanent structure or a...
at the end of the valley, around a mile away. His reasons for the misdirection are unclear, as he was killed in the ensuing battle.
In response to the order, Lucan instructed Cardigan to lead 673 (some sources state 661; another 607) cavalrymen straight into the valley between the Fedyukhin Heights and the Causeway Heights, famously dubbed the "Valley of Death" by the poet Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, FRS was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular poets in the English language....
. The opposing Russian forces were commanded by Pavel Liprandi and included approximately 20 battalion
Battalion
A battalion is a military unit of around 300–1,200 soldiers usually consisting of between two and seven companies and typically commanded by either a Lieutenant Colonel or a Colonel...
s of infantry supported by over fifty artillery
Artillery
Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons...
pieces. These forces were deployed on both sides and at the opposite end of the valley. Lucan himself was to follow with the Heavy Brigade.
Grapeshot
In artillery, a grapeshot is a type of shot that is not a one solid element, but a mass of small metal balls or slugs packed tightly into a canvas bag. It was used both in land and naval warfare. When assembled, the balls resembled a cluster of grapes, hence the name...
and canister
Canister shot
Canister shot is a kind of anti-personnel ammunition used in cannons. It was similar to the naval grapeshot, but fired smaller and more numerous balls, which did not have to punch through the wooden hull of a ship...
, indiscriminately at the mêlée of friend and foe before them. Lucan failed to provide any support for Cardigan, and it was speculated that he was motivated by an enmity for his brother-in-law that had lasted some 30 years and had been intensified during the campaign up to that point. The troops of the Heavy Brigade entered the mouth of the valley but did not advance further. Lucan's subsequent explanation was that he saw no point in having a second brigade mown down and that he was best positioned where he was to render assistance to Light Brigade survivors returning from the charge. The French light cavalry, the Chasseurs d'Afrique
Chasseurs d'Afrique
The Chasseurs d'Afrique were a light cavalry corps in the French Armée d'Afrique . First raised in the 1830s from regular French cavalry posted to Algeria, they numbered five regiments by World War II...
, was more effective in that it cleared the Fedyukhin Heights of the two half batteries of guns, two infantry battalions and Cossack
Cossack
Cossacks are a group of predominantly East Slavic people who originally were members of democratic, semi-military communities in what is today Ukraine and Southern Russia inhabiting sparsely populated areas and islands in the lower Dnieper and Don basins and who played an important role in the...
s to ensure the Light Brigade would not be hit by fire from that flank and later provided cover for the remaining elements of the Light Brigade as they withdrew.
War correspondent William Russell
William Howard Russell
William Howard Russell was an Irish reporter with The Times, and is considered to have been one of the first modern war correspondents, after he spent 22 months covering the Crimean War including the Charge of the Light Brigade.-Career:As a young reporter, Russell reported on a brief military...
, who witnessed the battle, declared "our Light Brigade was annihilated by their own rashness, and by the brutality of a ferocious enemy".
Cardigan survived the battle. Although stories circulated afterwards that he was not actually present, he led the charge from the front and, never looking back, did not see what was happening to the troops behind him. He reached the Russian guns, took part in the fight, and then returned alone up the valley without bothering to rally or even find out what had happened to the survivors. He afterwards said all he could think about was his rage against Captain Nolan, who he thought had tried to take over the leadership of the charge from him. After riding back up the valley, he considered he had done all that he could and then, with considerable sang-froid, left the field and went on board his yacht in Balaclava harbour, where he ate a champagne dinner. He subsequently described the engagement in a speech delivered at the Mansion House
Mansion House, London
Mansion House is the official residence of the Lord Mayor of the City of London in London, England. It is used for some of the City of London's official functions, including an annual dinner, hosted by the Lord Mayor, at which the Chancellor of the Exchequer customarily gives a speech – his...
in London that was afterwards quoted in length in the House of Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
:
Aftermath
Pierre Bosquet
Pierre François Joseph Bosquet was a French Army general. He served during the conquest of Algeria and the Crimean War; returning from Crimea he was made Marshal of France and senator.-Biography:...
to state "C'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre." ("It is magnificent, but it is not war.") He continued, in a rarely quoted phrase: "C'est de la folie" — "it is madness." The Russian commanders are said to have initially believed that the British soldiers must have been drunk. Somerset Calthorpe, ADC to Lord Raglan, wrote a letter to a friend three days after the charge. He detailed casualty numbers, but he did not make distinction between those killed and those taken prisoner:
The reputation of the British cavalry was significantly enhanced as a result of the charge, though the same cannot be said for their commanders.
"Killed and missing. Wounded. 9 Officers 12 14 Serjeants [ sic SicSic—generally inside square brackets, [sic], and occasionally parentheses, —when added just after a quote or reprinted text, indicates the passage appears exactly as in the original source...
]9 4 Trumpeters 3 129 Rank and file 98
156 Total 122 278 casualties;
— besides 335 horses killed in action, or obliged afterwards to be destroyed from wounds. It has since been ascertained that the Russians made a good many prisoners; the exact number is not yet known."
Slow communications meant that news of the disaster did not reach the British public until three weeks after the action. The British commanders' dispatches from the front were published in an extraordinary edition of the London Gazette
London Gazette
The London Gazette is one of the official journals of record of the British government, and the most important among such official journals in the United Kingdom, in which certain statutory notices are required to be published...
of 12 November 1854. Raglan blamed Lucan for the charge, claiming that "from some misconception of the order to advance, the Lieutenant-General (Lucan) considered that he was bound to attack at all hazards, and he accordingly ordered Major-General the Earl of Cardigan to move forward with the Light Brigade." Lucan was furious at being made a scapegoat: Raglan claimed he should have exercised his discretion, but throughout the campaign up to that date Lucan considered Raglan had allowed him no independence at all and required that his orders be followed to the letter. Cardigan, who had merely obeyed orders, blamed Lucan for giving those orders. He returned home a hero and was promoted to Inspector General of the Cavalry.
Lucan attempted to publish a letter refuting point by point Raglan's London Gazette dispatch, but his criticism of his superior was not tolerated and in March 1855, Lucan was recalled to England. The Charge of the Light Brigade became a subject of considerable controversy and public dispute on his return. He strongly rejected Raglan's version of events, calling it "an imputation reflecting seriously on my professional character". In an exchange of public correspondence printed in the pages of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, Lucan blamed Raglan and his deceased aide-de-camp Captain Nolan, who had been the actual deliverer of the disputed order. Lucan subsequently defended himself with a speech in the House of Lords
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
on 19 March.
Lucan evidently escaped blame for the charge, as he was made a member of the Order of the Bath
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
in July of that same year. Although he never again saw active duty, he reached the rank of General in 1865 and was made a Field Marshal
Field Marshal
Field Marshal is a military rank. Traditionally, it is the highest military rank in an army.-Etymology:The origin of the rank of field marshal dates to the early Middle Ages, originally meaning the keeper of the king's horses , from the time of the early Frankish kings.-Usage and hierarchical...
in the year before his death.
The charge of the Light Brigade continues to be studied by modern military historians and students as an example of what can go wrong when accurate military intelligence
Military intelligence
Military intelligence is a military discipline that exploits a number of information collection and analysis approaches to provide guidance and direction to commanders in support of their decisions....
is lacking and orders are unclear. Sir Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
, who was a keen military historian and a former cavalryman, insisted on taking time out during the Yalta Conference
Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference, sometimes called the Crimea Conference and codenamed the Argonaut Conference, held February 4–11, 1945, was the wartime meeting of the heads of government of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union, represented by President Franklin D...
in 1945 to see the battlefield for himself.
According to Norman Dixon, 19th century accounts of the charge tended to focus on the bravery and glory of the cavalrymen, much more than the military blunders involved, with the perverse effect that it "did much to strengthen those very forms of tradition which put such an incapacitating stranglehold on military endeavor for the next eighty or so years," i.e., until World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
The fate of the surviving members of the Charge was investigated by Edward James Boys
Edward James Boys
Edward James Boys was a leading authority on the men of the cavalry regiments of the British Army who took part in the famous Charge of the Light Brigade of 1854 during the Crimean War of 1854-56 between the UK and Russia....
, a military historian, who documented their lives from leaving the army to their deaths. His records are described as being the most definitive project of its kind ever undertaken. Edwin Hughes
Edwin Hughes
Troop Sergeant Major Edwin Hughes, known as 'Balaclava Ned', was the last survivor of the famous Charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War of 1854–56. He was born in Wrexham, Wales on 12 December 1830, and died in Blackpool on 18 May 1927, aged 96...
, who died 14 May 1927, aged 96, was the last survivor of the charge.
In October 1875 survivors of the Charge met at the Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace is a building in North London, England. It stands in Alexandra Park, in an area between Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green...
in London to celebrate the 21st Anniversary of the Charge. The celebrations were fully reported in the Illustrated London News
Illustrated London News
The Illustrated London News was the world's first illustrated weekly newspaper; the first issue appeared on Saturday 14 May 1842. It was published weekly until 1971 and then increasingly less frequently until publication ceased in 2003.-History:...
of 30 October 1875, which included the recollections of several of the survivors, including those of Edward Richard Woodham
Edward Richard Woodham
Edward Richard Woodham was one of the survivors of the Charge of the Light Brigade on October 25, 1854 during the Crimean War....
, the Chairman of the Committee that organised the celebration. Tennyson was invited but could not attend. Lucan, the senior commander surviving, was not present but attended a separate celebration, held later in the day, with other senior officers at the fashionable Willis's Rooms, St James's Square.
August 2nd, 1890 trumpeter Landfrey, from the 17th Lancers, who sounded the bugle charge at Balaclava made a recording on an Edison
Thomas Edison
Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...
cylinder that can be heard here, using a bugle which had been used at Waterloo
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
in 1815.
In 2004, on the 150th anniversary of the Charge, a commemoration of the event was held at Balaklava. As part of the anniversary, a monument dedicated to the 25,000 British participants of the conflict was unveiled by HRH Prince Michael of Kent
Prince Michael of Kent
Prince Michael of Kent is a grandson of King George V and Queen Mary, making him a cousin of Queen Elizabeth II. He is also the first cousin once removed of Prince Phillip. Prince Michael occasionally carries out royal duties representing the Queen at some functions in Commonwealth realms outside...
.
Poems
Alfred, Lord Tennyson, the then Poet LaureatePoet Laureate
A poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and is often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events...
, wrote evocatively about the battle in his poem "The Charge of the Light Brigade
The Charge of the Light Brigade (poem)
"The Charge of the Light Brigade" is an 1854 narrative poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson about the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War...
". Tennyson's poem, published on 9 December 1854 in The Examiner, praises the Brigade ("When can their glory fade? O the wild charge they made!") while trenchantly mourning the appalling futility of the charge ("Not tho' the soldier knew, someone had blunder'd... Charging an army, while all the world wonder'd"). Tennyson wrote the poem inside only a few minutes after reading an account of the battle in The Times, according to his grandson Sir Charles Tennyson. It immediately became hugely popular, even reaching the troops in the Crimea, where it was distributed in pamphlet form. Forty years later Kipling
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
wrote "The Last of the Light Brigade
The Last of the Light Brigade
"The Last of the Light Brigade" is a poem written in 1890 by Rudyard Kipling echoing – forty years after the event – Alfred Tennyson's famous poem The Charge of the Light Brigade...
", commemorating a visit by the last twenty survivors to Tennyson (then in his eightieth year) to reproach him gently for not writing a sequel about the way in which England was treating its old soldiers. Some sources treat the poem as an account of a real event, but other commentators class the destitute old soldiers as imagined, with the visit invented by Kipling to draw attention to the poverty in which the real survivors were living, in the same way that he evoked Tommy Atkins
Tommy Atkins
Tommy Atkins is a term for a common soldier in the British Army that was already well established in the 19th century, but is particularly associated with World War I. It can be used as a term of reference, or as a form of address. German soldiers would call out to "Tommy" across no man's land if...
in "The Absent Minded Beggar".
Media representations
Two war movies were made, both titled The Charge of the Light Brigade. The 1936 versionThe Charge of the Light Brigade (1936 film)
The Charge of the Light Brigade is a 1936 historical film made by Warner Bros. It was directed by Michael Curtiz and produced by Samuel Bischoff, with Hal B. Wallis as executive producer, from a screenplay by Michael Jacoby and Rowland Leigh, from a story by Michael Jacoby based on the poem The...
stars Errol Flynn
Errol Flynn
Errol Leslie Flynn was an Australian-born actor. He was known for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films, being a legend and his flamboyant lifestyle.-Early life:...
and is completely historically inaccurate, turning the motive into a grudge match against an Indian ruler allied with the Russians. The 1968 version
The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968 film)
The Charge of the Light Brigade is a 1968 British war film made by Woodfall Film Productions and distributed by United Artists . It was directed by Tony Richardson and produced by Neil Hartley....
, featuring David Hemmings
David Hemmings
David Edward Leslie Hemmings was an English film, theatre and television actor as well as a film and television director and producer....
(as Nolan) and Trevor Howard
Trevor Howard
Trevor Howard , born Trevor Wallace Howard-Smith, was an English film, stage and television actor.-Early life:...
(as Cardigan), was much more factually accurate. It was produced during a time of public frustration over the Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
.
The novel Flashman at the Charge
Flashman at the Charge
Flashman at the Charge is a 1973 novel by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the fourth of the Flashman novels. Playboy magazine serialized Flashman at the Charge in 1973 in their April, May and June issues...
has Harry Flashman participating (much against his will) in the Charge.
The charge is the subject of British heavy metal
Heavy metal music
Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
band Iron Maiden
Iron Maiden
Iron Maiden are an English heavy metal band from Leyton in east London, formed in 1975 by bassist and primary songwriter Steve Harris. Since their inception, the band's discography has grown to include a total of thirty-six albums: fifteen studio albums; eleven live albums; four EPs; and six...
's song "The Trooper
The Trooper
"The Trooper" is a song written by Iron Maiden bass player Steve Harris. It is Iron Maiden's ninth single, and the second from their 1983 album Piece of Mind. The single was released on 20 June 1983...
" on their Piece of Mind
Piece of Mind
Piece of Mind is the fourth studio album by British heavy metal band Iron Maiden. It was originally released in 1983 on EMI, and on Capitol in the US; it was reissued later on Sanctuary/Columbia Records...
album.
It was also the inspiration for the Pearls Before Swine
Pearls Before Swine (band)
Pearls Before Swine was an American psychedelic folk band formed by Tom Rapp in 1965 in Eau Gallie, now part of Melbourne, Florida. They released six albums between 1967 and 1971, before Rapp launched a solo career.-Early years, 1965-68:...
album Balaklava
Balaklava (album)
Balaklava was the second album recorded and released by psychedelic folk group Pearls Before Swine, in 1968.For the album, original group members Tom Rapp, Wayne Harley and Lane Lederer were joined by Jim Bohannon, who replaced Roger Crissinger. Like the group’s previous LP on ESP-Disk, "One...
, which begins with a sample of the 1890 recording of trumpeter Landfrey.
See also
- Battle of SomosierraBattle of SomosierraThe Battle of Somosierra occurred November 30, 1808 in the Peninsular War, when a French army under Napoleon I forced a passage through the Sierra de Guadarrama shielding Madrid....
, involving another near-suicidal cavalry charge - Pickett's ChargePickett's ChargePickett's Charge was an infantry assault ordered by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee against Maj. Gen. George G. Meade's Union positions on Cemetery Ridge on July 3, 1863, the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War. Its futility was predicted by the charge's commander,...
, a famously disastrous infantry advance against strong defensive positions during the Battle of GettysburgBattle of GettysburgThe Battle of Gettysburg , was fought July 1–3, 1863, in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle with the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War, it is often described as the war's turning point. Union Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade's Army of the Potomac...
in the American Civil WarAmerican Civil WarThe American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
Further reading
- The Reason Why, Story of the Fatal Charge of the Light Brigade, Cecil Woodham-SmithCecil Woodham-SmithCecil Blanche Woodham-Smith was a British historian and biographer. She wrote four popular history books, each dealing with a different aspect of the Victorian era.-Early life:...
, Penguin Books, ISBN 0-14-139031-X, first published in 1953 by McGraw-Hill. - Hell Riders: The True Story of the Charge of the Light Brigade, Terry BrightonTerry BrightonTerry Brighton is a British military historian and author.- Biography :Terry Brighton studied philosophy at Lancaster University and theology at Birmingham University before being ordained an Anglican priest...
, Henry Holt and Co, ISBN 0-8050-7722-7, published November 2, 2004. - Forgotten Heroes: The Charge of the Light Brigade, Roy Dutton, InfoDial Ltd, ISBN 0-9556-5540-4, published October 25, 2007.
- The Charge of the Light Brigade Contemporary eyewitness account from journalist William Howard RussellWilliam Howard RussellWilliam Howard Russell was an Irish reporter with The Times, and is considered to have been one of the first modern war correspondents, after he spent 22 months covering the Crimean War including the Charge of the Light Brigade.-Career:As a young reporter, Russell reported on a brief military...
. - Illustrated London News 30 October 1875, reporting the celebration at Alexandra Palace of the survivors of the Charge and some of their recollections including those of Edward Richard WoodhamEdward Richard WoodhamEdward Richard Woodham was one of the survivors of the Charge of the Light Brigade on October 25, 1854 during the Crimean War....
the Chairman of the Committee that organised the celebration - The Charge. The Real Reason Why the Light Brigade was Lost, Mark Adkin, Leo Cooper, London 1996, ISBN 0-85052-469-5, (also: Pimlico, London 2004, ISBN 1-84413-734-1).
External links
- Infodial.co.uk, List of names of troopers who took part in the Charge
- Nationalarchives.gov.uk, The National Archives: Charge of the Light Brigade
- Eserver.org, The Charge of the Light Brigade by Lord Alfred Tennyson
- Virginia.eud, A copy of the poem hand-written by Tennyson
- BBC.co.uk, illustrated history of the Charge of the Light Brigade
- Loc.gov, Roger Fenton photographs
- Kipling.org.uk, The Last of the Light Brigade by Rudyard KiplingRudyard KiplingJoseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
- Plus.com, Casualty list
- NPR.org, Retelling the Tale of the Light Brigade
- Findagrave.com, The monument to the charge in Ukraine
- www.archive.org Trumpeter Martin Landfrey (or Lanfried) plays the charge he sounded at the Charge of the Light Brigade. He uses a bugle which was previously used by Wellington's forces at the Battle of WaterlooBattle of WaterlooThe Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
in 1815. Edison cylinder recording, August 2, 1890, London. - Julienco.com, Illustrated London News Article dated October 30, 1875 about the 21st Anniversary Reunion dinner at Alexandra PalaceAlexandra PalaceAlexandra Palace is a building in North London, England. It stands in Alexandra Park, in an area between Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green...
on October 25, 1875.