Ivan-the-Soldier and Tommy Atkins
At the beginning of the Crimean War the Russian soldier rightfully considered himself invincible - the glorious deeds of the previous hundred and fifty years served as proof of that deep belief. Having crushed the might of the terrible Swedes, the brave Turks, the proud Poles and the unbending Prussians, Russia’s soldiers finally swept into Europe in order to cross swords with the Gallic giant. The colossus of Bonaparte was first overturned by the Russian bayonet in 1812, and collapsed shortly afterwards, with the consequences of its fall being felt for generations. In the following decades, however, the Russian soldier remained largely in the Napoleonic epoch, and Russia, rested on her victorious laurels, slept for over a quarter of a century until to her horror she was awoken by cannons at her southern border.
The reasons for the defeat of Russia in the Crimean War are far from being a secret. Backwardness and stagnation reigned in all branches of society in the enormous empire, aggravated by the personality of the Tsar himself - Emperor Nikolai I, better known among the soldiers as Nikolai Palkin (Palka meaning a stick in Russian) for his excessive love of corporal punishment. This lover of uniform and parades administered the state much like his father, Pavel I, who on a dark March night had been strangled by his own guards using a general’s scarf. The son evaded the fate of his father, but this affected the fate of Russia in the most grievous way.
As has already been said, the Russian army had failed to make progress in tactical and strategic thinking, or indeed in any other area, since 1815. This extended to the uniform of the common soldier, but in this respect Russia was little different to many other countries. The uniform and equipment of the Tsarist soldier certainly contained all the features of deliberate conservatism, but no more so than the soldier of a much more advanced country like Great Britain. We will compare the appearance of the infantry of both powers, especially as in the future we will release several sets of British infantry. The major part of the uniform had not changed its cut in either country since Borodino and Waterloo. In 1828 the Russian coat had changed from double-breasted to single-breasted, and the tails of the British coat had lengthened, with sergeants no longer having lace decoration on their uniforms after 1836. The British infantry shako, after passing through several transformations, returned to the strictly cylindrical form it had held at the beginning of the century., with a leather rear peak for many regiments. As for Russia, she had the honour of being the first to introduce the famous ‘Pickelhaube’, although strictly speaking it was not a Pickelhaube but ‘the helmet of Yaroslav Mudry’, the great prince of Kiev. This imposing helmet was developed by a court artist with the personal participation of Tsar Nikolai Pavlovich, and was based on the cuirassier helmet of 1811, the intention being to symbolize historical continuity. It was made of black leather, and had a habit of shrivelling in the rain, so in the field the soldiers preferred to wear the forage cap without a peak (the ‘beskozyrka’). Trousers in both armies were not as tight as in the Napoleonic period and were decorated with thin red stripes. In the British army the colour changed from greyish-blue to a darker shade, but the difference was not striking. By the Crimean campaign, gaiters had been abolished in both armies. The short coat of the British infantry remained a constant from the days of Wellington, and the long overcoats with the standing collar of the Russian army were also similar to those of the Napoleonic Wars, but in warm weather they were kept in a special cylinder on the haversack rather then worn round the body as in 1812. Generally speaking, the climate meant the overcoat was given careful consideration by the authorities, and was one of the main items of military clothing. According to regulations it was very loose (so that in winter it would be possible to wear a sheepskin coat beneath it), on the sides it was gathered in many folds, its exceptionally long skirts were tucked up inside when on the march or, more rarely, they were pinned back to the belt in the French manner. The long sleeves were turned up inside, forming a sort of cuff. Wide bleached belts – a daily concern for every soldier – and calf-skin haversacks had remained unchanged for over a quarter of a century in both armies. The new fashion of wearing trousers outside the boots was less than practical when on the march, and the Russian soldier chose to ignore this regulation when on campaign, along with many other absurd rules more suited to the parade ground, by tucking his trousers inside his boots. By contrast, the evidence of preserved photographs suggests that the British soldier kept his outside his boots. To be brief then, the outfit of the soldier of a backward empire was no worse or better than that of the soldier of an advanced empire.
However the picture is very different regarding the tactics of the two opposing sides. The British command, noted for its conservatism, used linear tactics in the Crimea. Such tactics, which dated back as far as the first half of the XVII century, were first practised by the Swedes, and wholly relied upon the application of massed fire power. This doctrine was to rule the battlefields of Europe up to the French revolution, but against the new French offensive tactics it was to prove out of date. The battalion, regimental and divisional columns of Napoleon were preceded by skirmishers and inevitably broke through the thin enemy lines. By the first decade of the XIX century all European armies had completely rejected the linear formations – all that is apart from the British. Their thin red lines stood firm throughout the Napoleonic wars, cascading a hail of lead onto the grenadiers of the Old Guard with their ‘Brown Bess’. And now, with the introduction of the Enfield threaded gun model 1853, this archaic tactic found new life. The Russian soldier was another matter. Brought up with General Suvorov’s creed that “a bullet is foolish, but the bayonet is correct”, he was accustomed to feeling the shoulder of a comrade in battle formation as he had mastered the energetic aggressive tactics of Bonaparte. His flint, or at best percussion, smooth-bore musket had a range of about 300 paces – the same as it did at Borodino in 1812 or even Poltava in 1709, and it was very liable to misfire as well as being difficult to aim. Therefore the Russians came to rely on the bayonet, and the cold steel sting never let them down. The Russian-style bayonet impact was terrible – there was no recovering from it. The Swedes of Charles XII fought holding the musket with the fixed bayonet in the left hand and a sword in the right, thus only utilising the bayonet for stabbing. The French tried to thrust with the bayonet, forward and then back. But the Russian soldier was taught to deliver the bayonet into the stomach of the enemy and then raise the butt, which caused the guts to be forced out , leaving no hope for the surgeons. This technique was not developed by any military theorist – from time immemorial the peasants had used pitchforks both to collect hay and to fight in this manner. No one would envy an enemy who met a Russian soldier in hand-to-hand combat. For the previous 150 years he had excelled in close combat, disregarding the disastrous enemy fire to get to grips with his enemy. In the words of Frederick the Great, "To overcome the Russian, two bullets are necessary. One - in order to kill him, another - in order to bring him down." Alas by the middle of the XIX century Britain had become the workshop of the world, and the ammunition pouches of ‘Tommy Atkins’ contained not just two, but as many bullets as necessary, and they flew considerably further, quicker and more frequently than the bullets of Frederick’s fusiliers.
It is appropriate to mention a phenomenon that was new at this time. The British, whose rifled muskets boasted a range four times that of the Russians, first shot down the Russian officers who marched on the flanks of the attacking columns, which caused the column, horrifying in its inexorable power, to stop. No, the Russians did not run from the battlefield, but they pressed forward, attempting to reduce the fateful distance between themselves and the enemy. The confused soldiers, deprived of their commanders, often simply stood on the spot, making it possible to shoot at them with impunity. Was that strange mixture of sluggishness and renunciation the result of the strangling bureaucratic structure in the Russian army of that time - it’s not for us to judge. Here in essence we have described the nature of the entire Crimean campaign. On the Alma, at Balaclava and Inkerman, the story was the same: the conical Minuet bullet proved to be both ‘clever’ and quick whereas the bayonet, crowned by a century and a half of glory, rarely even reached the guts of the enemy. Technical superiority alone decided the outcome of the war since without exception the command and organisation of all the opposing forces left much to be desired. We will describe this in more detail in subsequent articles, but for now we will touch on a tricky question…
It’s easy to imagine that the Russian soldier was the unhappiest person in the world: a serf since birth, he passed smoothly from the rod of the landowner to the stick of the NCO. Illiterate and superstitious, he was deprived of both self esteem and even an elementary feeling of honour. He received 2 rubles 40 kopecks per year and was permanently robbed by the quartermasters. He searched to solace in vodka and sad songs (by way of comparison, the Russian soldier of Peter the Great received about 4 rubles a year, at a time when a ruble would buy more, but the government of Nicholas I increased deductions from the soldier’s pay). This view on the moral spirit of the Russian troops was very popular in Europe prior to the invasion of the Crimea. The unprecedented heroism of the serf-soldier was explained by some mysterious phenomenon of the Russian soul. We do not attempt to interpret this ‘phenomenon’, merely to recount a number of facts which, in our opinion, prove that the circumstances of a Russian peasant, clothed in uniform, was not so intolerable. To begin with, the situation of Russian peasants, for all its disadvantages, never reached the terrifying level of, for example, that of the peasantry in pre-Napoleon Poland, where the ‘pan’ (master) had the power of life and death over his ‘kholop’ (serf). Since the days of Ivan the Terrible the supreme power in the country had regarded the peasantry as a resource, first and foremost, for use by the state as a whole, and not for individual representatives of the ruling class. The Tsar temporarily delegated his supreme powers over the people to landowners in exchange for their military and civil service, and could punish those who abused those powers heavily. The ideas of the Enlightenment, which flowed into the country from the West around the middle of the XVIII century, had by now had a hundred years to take durable root (Nicholas I in the court salons would say “Ah, serfdom is a terrible thing”, but would then add “but it’s not up to me to abolish it”). Surprisingly the ideas of the Enlightenment came along with the patriarchal relationship, some of which are still to be found in Russia to this day. This fact is particularly important and therefore we bring it to the attention of our readers. Basically the internal life of the empire was cemented with patriarchal community and collectivism, and these affected all levels of society from the very top to the very bottom. People addressed their lord as ‘Father-Tsar’ rather than ‘your Majesty’. The Russian soldier, until recently a peasant, saw in both the NCO and the company commander an elder brother or father figure who had to be obeyed “as if God himself had ordered it”. The officers spoke with their subordinates in a good-natured, unceremonious tone, although they did not hesitate to administer a beating to the lazier or undisciplined of their ‘sons’. A new recruit in the army referred to a grey-haired NCO as ‘Uncle’ – something that was unconceivable in the British army! Therefore the fierce military regulations of the army of Nicholas I were to a large extent softened by these patriarchal relationships and natural kindness. One should not, of course, exaggerate these factors, but were it not for them military service in Russia under Nicholas I would have been absolutely intolerable.
Now we will refute some other misconceptions about the burdens of service to the Tsar. It is a well-known fact that when the regular army was initially formed the soldiers served for life. By the end of the XVIII century service was limited to 25 years (see also our article about ’Early Russian Infantry’). Tsar Nicholas I introduced a 15 year period of service, after which the soldiers were discharged. Such men were no longer serfs and were not considered as peasants – in their leave documents there was a special note: “The beard to be shaved; no wandering” (beards were only permitted for peasants and clergy, while moustaches were the exclusive prerogative of the military class). The overwhelming majority of old soldiers disliked their discharge. After the Tsar’s relatively generous meat rations it was not an attractive proposition to work for a few kopeks in an uninteresting job. At this point it is appropriate to touch upon another widely held belief about high levels of corruption and theft amongst quartermasters. Certainly, as elsewhere, they frequently stole the supplies in their care. An annoyed emperor Nicholas I, when asked how he thought his subjects occupied themselves, responded “stealing”. However the embezzlement of quartermasters was considerably restricted by the famous “Artel” (association, comradeship, cooperation) system. Since the time of Peter the Great, a vigorous persecutor of pilferers and bribe-takers, money for food had been handed over to the men directly, passing the officers by. The company selected from within its ranks 2 or 3 trusted men who did all the necessary purchasing of food and were completely accountable for their expenditure to their comrades, thus making theft much more difficult. The army was generously fed. During a campaign soldiers consumed between 800g and 1200g of rye bread a day, 400g to 800g of mutton or beef (before the XX century pork was not popular in Russia) and 120g to 150g of buckwheat or oats. On top of that, morning and evening saw an issue of a ‘wine portion’ – very strong domestic vodka, in sufficient doses to knock out one of Bonaparte’s guardsmen without firing a shot.
Patriarchal relations in the tsarist army were further strengthened by the principle of local association. This was wisely introduced by Peter the Great, who in 1708 decreed that regiments should be raised with recruits from the same area. Once he arrived at the barracks, a novice found himself amongst compatriots who were always ready to help with words or deeds. We have painted the internal world of the Russian army in great detail so that the reader who is unfamiliar with this era can better understand the fortitude of the thousands of nameless heroes who bore the brunt of the attacks on Sevastopol and maintained their good name in the memory of their comrades.
The picture would not be complete if we failed to describe the life of troops from other countries, since the life of any soldier is not easy, wherever they are. It is only by comparison that we can give a real impression of the relative advantages and disadvantages of any system. We will try and make such a comparison with the army of the most advanced country in the middle of the XIX century – that of Great Britain. In contrast to the Russian soldiers, the ‘children of Queen Victoria’ were free both at birth and throughout their lives. However the limitations of this freedom were noted by those that were born outside the borders of Albion, and in the first instance by those from Britain’s closest ally in the alliance. Victor Hugo wrote that the Englishman is free only as a citizen – he is still ordered about as a servant, and as a soldier he is beaten with a stick. In fact the birch was frequently used in the British army, where the harsh regulations for not softened by the same informal relations we have already described. Individualism was actively discouraged, and the need for an aristocratic background when selecting officers only strengthened the differences between officers and men. Officers and gentlemen generally considered it beneath their dignity to address the privates, and they even preferred passing orders via sergeants. The other ranks were treated as people of the lowest order, as if they were devoid of basic human emotions. A curious detail: in the Russian army corporal punishment was abolished in 1863, and some punishments such as sitting on a trestle with loads attached to both feet were largely unknown in it. For the inquisitive reader we leave an open question: in what year did the British army abolish humiliating corporal punishments?
In general, to foreign observers the internal life of the British nation seemed a long way from the ideal. Napoleon, the greatest revolutionary in world history, shortly before his death said: “I’m dying far from the Motherland, killed by the British oligarchy. English people won’t take their time to avenge me”. It’s worth mentioning that this man, in the first place, directly called British parliamentarism of that time an oligarchy, and, in the second place, the role of avenger for himself was given not to the French, but the English people, since he was convinced that this people wouldn’t tolerate such an order for too long. We won’t go into the details of the bribery of the deputies of both chambers, the Chartist movement, the Irish question and others. We will just note that the practice of selling officers’ commissions existed in Britain until 1872. For comparison: General Shein had appointed several of his friends as Colonels in exchange for money, but was publicly was beaten by Peter I himself. Thanks be to God that the very concept of the sale of officer’s commissions was never known in Russia.
So what sort of people were those junior off-springs of the aristocracy, who purchased the right to lead people to glory and death at auction? They were officers and gentlemen, passionate at the Derby, refined in the parlours, cold-blooded under fire – they compensated for the lack of a military education by practical experience in the field. This was hardly the best method, costing the lives of many soldiers as well as those of their officers, but such was the reality at that time. Stiff and infinitely distant from the privates, they were men of honour to the core, and they knew how to gain unconditional respect for themselves and for the cause for which all of them served - from the field marshal to the most humble transport driver.
The privates are of particular interest to us. "The scum of the earth" - as Wellington called them, provoking a storm of angry responses down the years. We won’t join them, but just will try to examine this question as far as possible without emotion. The fact is that, with all its flaws, British society was always considered civil. Possessing a powerful navy that protected the insular kingdom, the British had grown accustomed to having a relatively small land army, which was formed quite late on in comparison to the continental powers. The principle of voluntary recruitment was taken as the basis for manning this army. Throughout the entire XVIII century this principle was practiced everywhere (with the notable exceptions of Sweden, Russia and with considerable reservations Prussia). All over the continent the soldiers’ ranks were filled with people who, for whatever reason, could not settle themselves in civilian life - paupers, giddy heads, even complete criminals. So in the XVIII century the moral spirit of the British army was neither better nor worse than the moral spirit of the majority of Europe’s other armies. To be more accurate, there was no moral spirit whatsoever. The shilling, gin, tobacco and the rod – those were the pillars on which rested the discipline of the armies. Upon the introduction of universal military duty and the creation of national conscripted armies in the first decade of the following century, the soldiers of continental Europe came from other, higher-quality human material. Britain, however, for reasons which would take a long time to explain, did not introduce this principle. As in the previous century, its army was professional. As in days past, the soldiers were predominantly recruited from two categories of the population - landless farmers and the urban unemployed. Both of those categories were in great supply. The agrarian revolution of the previous 300 years, which had lead to enclosure and the redistribution of land, threw hundreds of thousands of people on to the streets, full of spite and disappointment. Their feelings of patriotism were blunted. What could they protect, if they had nothing? In order to hold them in the bridle, it was necessary to resort to the heavy punishments which had already been discarded on the continent. But it was not so much the lash that made a first-class soldier from an English pauper. Having signed a contract, John Bull removed a weary jacket and put on the red uniform, becoming Tommy Atkins, a man of duty and honour. An example was set by the officers and gentlemen, fearlessly advancing under fire, stretching a hand to the defeated enemy. "Disgrace!" - shouted Englishmen at Waterloo, when they saw two Germans bayonet a French cuirassier trapped by a fallen horse. Yes, with all its shady sides, the army returned a man to society, and indicated a place in life for him.
As regards to finance, the British army was second to none in the world. Corruption was minimised, and civilian commissioners managed the entire supply system. Therefore Tommy Atkins always had enough beer and meat and was well dressed. We must make a reservation here, in that during the initial stages of the Crimean War the British supply service proved less than ideal, but this was caused by complete ignorance of the local climactic conditions rather than wilful misconduct.
In later articles we will have a chance to recount further the mishaps of the British in the Crimea, but now it is time to switch to a description of the new collection. The theme of the Crimean War in 1/72 scale is very poorly represented. Older collectors will surely recall the Russian infantry/artillery and Lord Cardigan’s 11th Hussars made by ESCI, but the Russian set was mixed infantry and artillery, while the Hussars were no more than British Light Dragoons for the Napoleonic Wars. We intend to radically fill this gap. Our new set of Russian infantry consists of 44 figures, all in different poses, which represent all stages of a battle. The first group that we would like to focus on are the soldiers on the march. They are supposed to produce the impression of the column marching into the battle – the front ranks are moving from the walk to a run, while the rest are following behind. Understandably, the soldiers are not moving in neat parade-like formation and some bear non-regulation weapons which they have acquired. The second group of figures represents a fire-fight – after being extended into a line, the Russians are standing and firing or loading their muskets. Should a scene of salvo fire be desired, all the reloading figures can be placed in the second row, but if they are firing at will then the figures can all be put in one row or dispersed. The third group of figures is engaged in hand-to-hand combat. Some of the soldiers are advancing with fixed bayonets while the rest have already made contact with the enemy and are fighting with bayonets, musket-butts and broadswords. This third group can be mixed with Zouaves from our French Light Infantry set, which is released at the same time as the Russian infantry. Several figures supplement the whole scene: an injured soldier, dragging his musket on the ground, and another private with crooked helmet tearing at his shirt– a typical Russian gesture of fury and desperation. Here we can reveal a small secret to our readers: as a starting point we picked the battle of Balaklava, noted for, first of all, the tragic attack of the British cavalry and the final assault on the Malakhov Kurgan, where in a furious hand-to-hand fight the Zouaves distinguished themselves. However to make it possible to recreate earlier battles of the war we have added Russian soldiers in helmets which fell out of use later in the war.
By the end of the year the following sets of this series will be released in 2 lots:
- "Russian Line Infantry" - 44 figures, 44 poses made in green colour that will be consistent for all Russian sets.
- "French Line Infantry" - 44 figures, 44 poses. Colour - dark-blue.
- "Terek Mounted Cossacks" - 12 figures, 12 poses. Colour - green.
- "British Heavy Dragoons" - 12 figures, 12 poses. Colour - red terracotta.
- "Cossack Infantry and Sailors" - 46 figures, 46 poses. Colour - green.
- "Highlanders" - 44 figures, 44 poses, colour - red terracotta.
At the end of February 2005 a further batch will be released:
- "Scots Greys" - 12 figures, 12 poses, colour - red terracotta.
- "Russian Hussars" - 12 figures, 12 poses, colour - green.
- "Russian Naval Artillery" – 2 cannons with crews, colour - green.
- "Zouaves" - 44 figures, 44 poses, colour - dark-blue.