WHY LUCAN’S EYES DECEIVED HIM
The communication breakdown between Lord Raglan and his cavalry commander is perhaps explained by the topography of the Balaklava battlefield, says Saul David
It is hard to comprehend how the Light Brigade could have been misdirected until you stand on the spots where the main actors were situated when they made their fatal decisions. The site on the edge of the Sapouné Ridge, from where Raglan and his staff are said to have observed the battle of Balaklava, is today marked by a viewing platform. When I visited it, I was struck by the panoramic view it afforded of the battlefield.
Directly below the platform is a large plain covered with vineyards and other crops – just as it was in 1854 – and bisected by a tarmac road that snakes from right to left. This is the famous Woronzow Road that, for much of its length, runs along the range of hills known to the British during the Crimean War as the Causeway Heights.
From Raglan’s vantage point, the Heights appear to be little more than a slight rise in the ground and are dwarfed by the hills that fringe the plain to the north and east. Does this explain why Raglan felt justified in issuing those two orders to Lucan and the cavalry: first to advance and take any opportunity to “recover the Heights”; and then to “advance rapidly to the front – follow the enemy and try to prevent the enemy from carrying away the guns [from the Heights]”?
He was not – as some commentators have suggested – ordering cavalry to attack fixed positions up a steep hillside; but instead wanted Lucan to move the cavalry forward on both sides of a relatively gentle slope, and possibly even along it, to hasten the Russian withdrawal and encourage them to abandon the British guns.
Just as revealing was my visit to the approximate location where Lucan had received Raglan’s orders, on a slight knoll of ground between the two valleys. From there Lucan’s view of the captured redoubts would have been obscured by rising ground. So when Nolan gestured vaguely (“There, my lord, is your enemy! There are your guns!”), it is easy to understand why Lucan mistook the Russian battery for Raglan’s true target.