PORTER WHITWORTH: (1827-1892) British Major General of the Crimean War, served at the Siege of Sebastapol. A very fine, lengthy A.L.S., Whitworth Porter, eight pages, 8vo, Camp before Sebastapol, 7th April 1855, to his mother. Porter's closely written letter acknowledges the receipt of his mother's two letters and continues, in part, 'I had just come up tired and dead beat from twenty four hours work in our advanced trenches….My principal duty here is to be in the trenches. There are four Captains to take command of the works, each of whom stays twenty four hours down there, so that my turn comes one day in four. We have a Subaltern under us who only stays twelve hours, so that I remain through two reliefs of Subalterns. The working parties are relieved every eight hours now as our advanced works are within seven hundred yards of the main batteries of the place, and they keep up a constant fire on our working parties. You cannot imagine how harassing this work sometimes is. No man be he ever so brave can stand under fire for so long a time, inactive as far as fighting is concerned without finding it a great wear and tear to his nerves. The first hour is the worst, after that one gets more used to it. The Russians treat us to a pleasing variety in the way of projectiles, first comes the round shot of all sizes which rushes past you with a shriek something like a railway whistle badly blown. Next comes the grape which fly slower and sound like a large covey of strong birds flying very swiftly. Then comes the gun shell which sounds like the round shot, but has the pleasing trick of bursting when it reaches you, so that you have to run a double risk, first the shot itself, then the pieces. Then comes the mortar shell which though really the worst of the large projectiles I somehow dread the least. It is in the air for nearly half a minute & in the night you can see it quite plainly owing to its burning fuse. It comes along so gracefully rising to a great height making a gentle whistle every now and then like a pee wit or plover becoming louder & louder till it drops. Although you can see it all the way, it is a most difficult thing to tell where it will drop and none but the oldest hands (men of whom it is said that they have got so immune to fire that a cannon ball would hop off the pit of their stomach) can really make a good guess. What makes it worse than a gun shell is that the former flying so low retains its impetus so that if it has once passed you before it bursts all the pieces will continue to fly forward and you are safe. Whereas as the mortar shell is pitched as high as it will go into the air and then drops, the pieces have no other impetus than what the bursting charge gives them, and fly in every direction for a radius of upwards of two hundred yards & sometimes considerably more. But my greatest horror of all & the deadliest one we have is the Russian Rifle Bullet. It is not so perfect as ours but as Mercutis says "It will do well enough". This little gentleman gives you no warning but flies about all day long and courses twelve hundred yards. At a quarter of that distance it will go through two men' Porter continues to provide his personal views on the Siege, 'One thing I think I may say and that is that many and great blunders have been made in the conduct of the siege. I do not myself consider the celebrated flank march and consequent investment of the South side is clever particularly as the allied commanders have shewn by their subsequent conduct that they were not prepared to hazard an immediate assault. Now no one who has not seen the awful strength of the defences, stretching as they do, completely round this side with the tiers of batteries & entrenchments one behind the other, and frequent salient points flanking the entire line and bringing a tremendous cross fire upon every point, but must feel that an assault now will be attended with far more carnage than it would have been six months since and yet that assault must be made & within the next ten days in my humble opinion. God grant that it may be successful for on it will depend the safety of the entire army. I know that the assaulting columns are told off, and the engineer officer who is to lead them, but it is kept secret..... the weakest point in the Russian line is most undoubtedly the Malakoff tower and this they have strengthened lately by establishing themselves and constructing a most formidable battery on the Mamellon Hill so called from its round and knole like shape. I fancy this will be the point of the main assault though I make no doubt we shall assault in several places. If we seize the Mamellon we shall then push on & try to enter the tower works with the retreating Russians. Once established within the tower, we see all the rest of their lines in reverse and the South side of the town must be ours. Then comes the problem - for the North side is still a more powerful fortress than the South, & unless the fleet can help us we shall be completely under their fire and unable to retain possession of the place. Time however the disposer of events will shew & in the mean time we had better set our houses in order & prepare to do our duty as all Englishmen should'. In a signed postscript dated 9th April, Porter brings his mother up to date with events, 'This afternoon..... the whole of the Batteries of the allied army opened fire this morning at 5.20 a.m. most unfortunately all last night & today if has been blowing a most fearful storm from the South West accompanied by torrents of rain, and the trenches and batteries, the roads, & the camp are like one vast swamp. You can have no conception of the quantity of rain that has fallen during the last twenty four hours, & as it is shewing no sign whatever of abatement there is no guessing what will be the end of it. I am sorry to say I am on duty in the trenches for twenty four hours from 5 p.m. this evening so that I shall have to pass the night exposed to the full fury of it in addition to the pleasing excitement of a tremendous cannonade. We can get but very meagre information as to how we are getting on because it is a work of considerable danger for any one to leave the batteries whilst the fire is so heavy & the fog is too great for us to see anything from camp. We have however had several flying reports all of which are favourable. We blew up one Russian magazine in the gardin Batteries this morning & they say have materially crippled the enemy's fire both in the Redan and in the Malakoff Tower'. A letter of remarkable content providing a most detailed account of the Siege of Sebastapol. VG