Soldiers in the Mist Read online

  GARRY DOUGLAS KILWORTH was raised in South Yemen, the son of an RAF sergeant and has a BA (Hons) in English from King’s College London in which his special subject was American Literature. Later he served 15 years in the RAF himself. More recently he was with the British Army in Hong Kong (1988–91), where he wrote for The South China Morning Post. He now divides his time between Suffolk and Spain, writing full time. He has won many awards for both his children’s and adult’s novels.

  Other titles available in the ‘Fancy Jack’ Crossman series:

  The Devil’s Own

  Valley of Death

  Soldiers in the Mist

  The Winter Soldiers

  (available in hardback)

  Forthcoming

  Attack on the Redan

  (available in hardback, June 2003)

  Constable & Robinson Ltd

  55-56 Russell Square

  London WC1B 4HP

  www.constablerobinson.com

  First published by HarperCollins 1999

  This paperback edition published by Robinson,

  an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd, 2011

  Copyright © Gary Douglas Kilworth, 2011

  The right of Gary Douglas Kilworth to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in

  Publication Data is available from the British Library

  ISBN 978-1-78033-257-4

  eISBN 978-1-78033-505-6

  Printed and bound in the EU

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  This one is for an old soldier:

  my stepfather, Edward Shaw

  Author’s Note

  I wish to acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the following works, authors and publishers:

  The Russian Army of the Crimean War 1854–56, Robert H. G. Thomas and Richard Scollins, Osprey Military.

  The British Army on Campaign: 2 The Crimea 1854–56, Michael Barthorp and Pierre Turner, Osprey Military.

  Uniforms and Weapons of the Crimean War, Robert Wilkinson-Latham, B. T. Batsford Ltd.

  Battles of the Crimean War, W. Baring Pemberton, B. T. Batsford Ltd. (A wonderful volume!)

  The Crimean Campaign with the Connaught Rangers 1854–56, Lieutenant-Colonel N. Steevens, Griffith and Farren.

  Rifle Green in the Crimea, George Caldwell and Robert Cooper, Bugle Horn Publications.

  The Crimean War, Denis Judd, Granada Publishing Ltd.

  1854–1856 Crimea (The War with Russia from Contemporary Photographs), Lawrence James, Hayes Kennedy Ltd.

  Heroes of the Crimea, Michael Barthorp, Blandford.

  The Thin Red Line, John Selby, Hamish Hamilton Ltd.

  George Lawson – Surgeon in the Crimea, edited letters explained by Victor Bonham-Carter, Constable and Co. Ltd.

  The Invasion of the Crimea (Vol VI), A. W. Kinglake, William Blackwood and Sons.

  The Reason Why, Cecil Woodham-Smith, Constable and Co. Ltd.

  Thanks go yet again to David Cliff of the Crimean War Research Society, Major John Spiers (Retired) and David Greenwood.

  List of Characters

  The following are the names of real people additional to those used in Books 1 and 2 of this series:

  Private Patrick McGuire

  Mrs Nell Butler, regiment wife

  General Soimonoff

  General Pauloff

  General Liprandi

  General Dannenberg

  Lieutenant Riley

  Captain Crosse

  Major Maxwell

  Colonel Rose

  Colonel Jeffreys

  Colonel Mauleverer

  Henry Clifford

  General Bourbaki

  Captain Astley

  Lieutenant Acton

  Captain Haines

  General Strangways

  Colonel Gordon

  Colonel Somerset

  Colonel Ayde

  Contents

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  2

  3

  4

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  6

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  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

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  16

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  36

  1

  ‘There is a traitor in our midst,’ said Major Lovelace, ‘and we must remove him with all expediency.’

  Sergeant Crossman and the major were sitting on gunpowder barrels just inside the lower room of a hovel. These were quarters shared by Crossman and his four men. The major also stayed there from time to time, when he was not out on one of his spying missions. These expeditions were called ‘fox hunts’ by General Buller, who was responsible for their formation.

  The hovel itself was situated in Kadikoi village, just north of Balaclava harbour, the scene of the gallant stand by the 93rd Sutherland Highlanders against the Russian cavalry just a few days previously.

  On a recent mission Crossman had captured a quantity of silver coins – Maria Theresa dollars – from a Russian caravan. The booty was to be shared between all those involved. It would make each of them considerably richer. Prize money was held in abeyance until the end of the campaign however, or men would be buying themselves out of the army right, left and centre. Crossman and the others would have to wait for their cash.

  Major Lovelace suspected that the money had been destined for the pockets of a traitor to the allied cause.

  ‘You seem convinced of that fact, sir?’

  Lovelace nodded. The major was a slim blond man in his early thirties. An officer on General Buller’s staff, he was one of the modern-thinking new men emerging in a post-Wellingtonian army run by old men. Although he had purchased a captaincy in the Royal Horse Artillery, he had nothing against those who rose from the ranks or received field promotions. He had recently been promoted by Lord Raglan at General Buller’s request.

  Major Lovelace believed in espionage and sabotage as acceptable methods of conducting a war. Lord Raglan and many of the older staff officers did not. Lord Raglan was under the impression that Lovelace had done something on the battlefield to impress Buller, but in fact he had earned his promotion by what Lord Raglan would describe as ‘skulking and sneaking’.

  Sergeant Crossman had been recruited by Lovelace, not altogether voluntarily, into this new branch of special duties which crossed through ranks and regiments and was in many ways a leveller of class. He too was now a spy and saboteur with a Russian price on his head. The job did not come to him as naturally as it came to his superior officer, however. Certain rather unsavoury acts were carried out reluctantly by the young Scot.

  On the other hand, although Crossman had not witnessed Lovelace in action, there was something in the cold blue eyes of the English officer which told the sergeant that, in the major’s thinking, expediency overruled scruples. Crossman had no doubt that Major Lovelace was a student of Machiavelli and believed that the end always justified the
means. Major Lovelace’s next remark confirmed this view.

  ‘Utterly convinced of it. We must seek him out and eliminate him.’

  ‘Bring him to trial you mean, sir?’ said Crossman, with more hope than conviction.

  ‘Good Lord, no, man. We must assassinate the beggar before he does any more harm. He’s been passing the Russians information on the disposition of our battalions and the positions of our guns. We must kill him.’

  Sergeant Crossman puffed on the long curved Turkish chibouque which was his constant companion. Taking the stem from between his lips he said quietly, ‘That sounds like murder to me, sir. What if we get the wrong man?’

  Major Lovelace sighed and unbuttoned his tunic.

  ‘We must make sure we get the right man. Work like this requires precision. Think how it would look to those back home if the culprit were British! His regiment, his parents and his friends, his comrades – they would all die of shame. Think of what the war correspondent William Russell would make of it – headlines across the front of The Times.’

  ‘And if the traitor’s not British?’

  ‘Then it hardly matters, does it?’

  Crossman frowned. He was not sure he liked that answer. He was not one of those who believed in the superiority of the British as a race. Lovelace however saw the frown and interpreted it correctly.

  ‘I think you misunderstand me, sergeant. I meant if he’s not British – say he’s French or Turkish, or some mercenary from another nation entirely – we should have the dickens of a job to bring him to trial. My feeling is that he would slide out of it somehow and end up laughing at us on the shores of some unreachable country. No, we must shoot him dead and be done with it.’

  ‘And,’ asked Crossman with a sinking feeling, ‘who is to do this unpalatable deed?’

  Lovelace smiled humourlessly with those cold blue eyes.

  ‘Why, you of course, sergeant.’

  The pipe came out of the mouth.

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Would I be telling you all this if it were not you? This must remain strictly between the two of us. No other person in the world must know of it.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear that part,’ said Crossman. ‘If it’s to be done I would prefer it to remain a secret to everyone else but myself. Even two of us is one too many.’

  ‘Your wish will be granted in full. I do not know who the traitor is. A Greek informant out of Sebastopol tells us only that he will be in a certain place at a certain time. It is all he knew of the matter himself. He will arrive at Mackenzies Farm at around six a.m. tomorrow morning. You will be there to put a bullet in his heart. On your return you will not need to tell me his name – all I wish to hear is that the mission has been a success. This is not one of the fox hunts I would have chosen for you, Sergeant Crossman, but there is no alternative.’

  ‘Why me?’

  ‘Because I have to be elsewhere and I trust no one else but you to carry this out successfully.’

  Crossman puffed on the dregs of his tobacco, muttering, ‘I suppose I should take that as a compliment.’

  ‘Yes and no,’ said the major, smiling. ‘One of the aspects of this business I am certain of is that you are not the traitor – and that makes you entirely eligible to be the assassin.’

  At that moment the door opened and Major Lovelace looked up sharply. The noise of the guns along the siege line around Sebastopol could be heard quite plainly through the open doorway. Those Russian batteries replying to the bombardment were slightly fainter, but the eerie sound of ‘Whistling Dicks’ – large Russian shells which made a peculiar whirring noise – could be heard above all. The two sides had been pounding at one another since the British had repelled an attack a few days previously on the ruins of Inkerman to the north of the city.

  Into the room stepped a lieutenant from the Rifle Brigade. Crossman recognised Dalton-James, a member of the old school, and not a modern-thinking soldier like Lovelace. He believed sergeants, whether they came from good families or not, should be seen and not heard. Dalton-James had not been on any fox hunts. He worked more in the role of coordinator of missions for General Buller

  Lieutenant Dalton-James looked shocked as he approached the pair of them. Crossman guessed it was because Lovelace was casually sipping at a glass of rum, his tunic unbuttoned and his hat on the table beside him. Crossman himself was in a similar state of undress, puffing away on his chibouque. The major and the sergeant looked like drinking chums enjoying a chitchat in an inn.

  ‘Sir?’ said Dalton-James, coming stiffly to attention before the major. ‘You sent for me?’

  ‘Ah, yes, lieutenant. The sergeant here will be going out on a fox hunt. He will be going alone. See that he is provided with enough rations for two days in the field.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ replied the lieutenant.

  Clearly Dalton-James did not like to be called forth to supply a mere sergeant with his field rations. Immaculate in his Rifle Greens, the lieutenant looked as if he were going to a ball. A ship had recently arrived at Balaclava carrying a trunk of new uniforms solely for him.

  Crossman, in comparison, was dressed in rags.

  The majority of British soldiers walking around the Crimean landscape were attired similarly to Crossman. After almost a year in the only uniform they possessed they looked like scarecrows. They slept in trenches half-filled with water, they waded through rivers, through thorny brakes, down into dust bowls and up over rocky escarpments – all in the same uniform. Their tents, ancient and threadbare even before being unpacked, were also in tatters. It was a raggedy army which besieged the city of Sebastopol, an army of red-eyed, weary men, attacked by sickness and undernourished.

  It was rumoured that there were uniforms, and blankets, and other such riches, thick with mould and rotting in the boats and warehouses of Balaclava harbour. This sorely-needed equipment never reached the men: no one dared take the responsibility for issuing them. The Commissariat ‘Purveyors’ awaited certificates from England, granting permission to open crates and issue clothing. Such certificates took an age to arrive, after being signed by several government departments, and even when approved were often lost in transit. Soldiers died of exposure not because there were no warm clothes, but because of red tape. Families and the general public in Britain were appalled by the stories coming back from the front and there had been much castigation of the Commissariat in the press.

  Winter was coming on, and though a few had managed to take coats and boots from Russian corpses, most were still in desperate need of kit. Crossman had purchased an issue sheepskin coat from French soldiers who were better provisioned. This hid his threadbare coatee which had weathered from its original red into a faded purple hue. He had sheepskin leggings, held in place by leather thongs crisscrossed up his calves. On his head he wore a fur hat, taken from a dead Russian.

  Once Crossman had been provisioned, he set off to the northwest, to find the Mackenzie place. The farm, once owned by a Scottish expatriate, was situated not far from the Inkerman ruins, just above the Old City Heights. It was a good ten miles from Kadikoi village over dangerous country. The sergeant travelled light: his Tranter revolver with its two triggers – one for cocking the weapon and the other for firing – and his German hunting knife. Not for him the normal 58 lb weight of equipment carried by a British soldier, most of which that soldier had to purchase himself out of his own pay.

  The farm was outside the limits of the siege. In fact, Crossman reflected as he walked, it could hardly be called a siege. Supplies and fresh men were still getting through to the troops and citizens of Sebastopol. The Russians, though soundly beaten at the Alma and held at Balaclava now had the initiative.

  Retaining some of the redoubts in the hills, the Russians blocked the Woronzoff Road, thus denying the British a proper supply route from Balaclava to the siege line, and confining them to a small difficult track over the Sapouné Ridge. They also held the coast along the Heights of Inkerman, north of Sebastopol, t
hus allowing a safe passage in and out of the city. Reinforcements and supplies were transported over the Sea of Azov to the towns of Yenikale and Kerch on the east of the Crimea, and from there overland westwards to Sebastopol.

  It appeared to Crossman that men were fighting bravely and dying for no gain. Lord Raglan seemed to be a most ineffectual commander-in-chief, though there were one or two competent generals below him. Raglan was a mere presence on the battlefield, but little else. The one time he had made a decisive order, it had resulted in the destruction of the Light Brigade.

  It had been an early dawn of mist and rain when Crossman set out from Kadikoi, passing hovels and tents where British wives took in washing. It was a good time to travel. One could see one’s path, yet the shadows of the twilight chased each other across the landscape and disguised movement. One man flitting between rocks and through bushes might avoid detection.

  As the morning wore on however, the mists cleared and the rain ceased. It became brighter and more dangerous to travel. Crossman climbed a ridge, found himself a rock hang and decided to get some rest. He had recently been quite ill and was not yet thoroughly fit.

  On waking, Sergeant Crossman scratched at his throat, feeling something irritating him in that spot. He thought it was an insect, until he opened his eyes and looked up the shining length of a sabre. Thence along an arm which culminated in the smiling face of a young Russian lieutenant. The point of the lieutenant’s sword was pricking the hollow below Crossman’s Adam’s apple.

  ‘Good day to you,’ said the Russian in his own language.

  Crossman, who spoke both German and French, and understood a little Russian, nodded without opening his mouth. He glanced to the right and left and saw he was surrounded by Russian soldiers. Unlike their officer they were not smiling. They simply stared, a semicircle of long bayonets at the ready. Their round faces revealed no curiosity. They looked as if they belonged behind a plough, much like the lads who served under British officers.

  Crossman now spoke. ‘Good day, lieutenant – I was just having a nap.’