Ballads of Brave Deeds :: :: University of Virginia Library

Those who have read Sir Evelyn's Wood's volume, “The Crimea in 1854 and 1894,” will remember his account of an able-seaman, Michael Hardy, of H.M.S. “Leander,” and the record of this Irishman's bravery.

On the morning fixed for the assault of the Redan, the 18th of June, the anniversary of the battle of Waterloo, young Evelyn Wood, who was ill, writes:—

“Thinking I would secure, at all events, one physically strong man at my side, I observed to Hardy, who was holding me on to my saddle, ‘When we go out, I shall stick to Captain Peel, mind you stick to me.’ Hardy replied somewhat evasively; ‘Yes, I'll stick to him, if he goes well to the front.’ This indomitable blue-jacket fully carried out his somewhat insubordinately expressed intention of not permitting anyone to surpass him in the assault.”

That evening, young Wood, who had been wounded, whilst lying in the operating tent, enquired anxiously for his friend Michael Hardy, of whom he could learn nothing then; but he continues:—“At the flag of truce next day, his body was found under an embrasure of the Redan, the only man as far as I know, who crossed the ‘Abatis’ and Ditch that day.”—

(Cf. “The Crimea in 1854 and 1894,” chap. xv., p. 246. Chap. xix., p. 318.)

Starless and dark! cold mist upon the ground!
No first faint glimmer on Careenage Bay!
We heard the surly Russian pace his round,
As cramped beside our ladders still we lay.

Then Mamelon thundered, Malakoff made boom,
We knew the gallant Frenchmen faced the foe;
With light of hell the cannon's cry of doom
Rolled thro'our hearts a sound of coming woe.

But from the Eight-gun Battery sudden broke
The swift flag-signal; each man like a ghost
Stole from the trench, and never a voice that spoke,
And every foot pressed forward to his post.

Thick on the ground, with noise of tropic hail,
The foemen's bullets swept the way before,
Death's murd'rous battle-hand ne'er wielded flail
With deadlier might upon a deathlier floor.

Ladders and men shot-shattered, on they passed
From gloom to gloom, swift falling, man by man;
Shall any reach the “Abatis” at last
Or dare the Ditch that guards the grim Redan.

Yes, tho' the Russians from their earthen tower
Mock at our melting lines and cry, “Come on!”
One heart through fiery sleet and furious shower
Has heard the louder cry, “Well done! Well done!”

Alone he crossed the fence; “Retire! Retire!”
The bugle rang;—he heeded not the call,
For Michael Hardy with his soul afire,
Will die or scale the flaming Russian wall.

Thro' treacherous grasses pitted with the storm
Of nine months' battle, on and up he pressed,
The Russian gunners sware they saw a form
Of one not man, if man, by fiend possessed.

Down to the deep-hewn Ditch he leapt apace,
He saw a hundred rifles overhead,
Clenched fist and shook it in the fortress face,
Put hand to climb, reeled backward, and was dead.

“Well to the front!” let proud “Leander” say;
“Well to the front!” All wounds in front and well;
They found the leader of the desperate way
Close to the fierce embrasure where he fell.

We may forget the sorrow of that height,
The storm-swept trenches filled with blood and mire,
The hope forlorn, the wild unequal fight,
The bitter bugle-note that bade retire.

Forget this other Eighteenth day of June,
When Russia mocked us from her high Redan
And swept us out of being; but ah! not soon
Will Britain's heart forget her bravest man.