Flashman Papers 3-Book Collection 3: Flashman at the Charge, Flashman in the Great Game, Flashman and the Angel of the Lord. George Fraser MacDonald
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order. There were great hideous ranks of the brutes, with Cossacks dead ahead, not twenty yards off – I had only a fleeting glimpse of amazed, bearded faces, there wasn’t a hope of stopping, and then with a blasphemous yell of despair I plunged into them, horse, sabre and all.
“Picture, if you can bear it, reader” – as that idiot journalist put it – “the agony of Lord George Paget and his gallant remnant, in that moment. They had fought like heroes in the battery, Lord George himself had plucked the noble Flashman from bloody hand-to-hand conflict, they had rallied and ridden on through the battery, Lord George had given the halt, preparatory to wheeling about and charging back into the battery and the valley beyond, where ultimate safety lay – picture then, their anguish, when that great heart, too full to think of safety, or of aught but the cruel destruction of so many of his comrades, chose instead to launch himself alone against the embattled ranks of Muscovy! Sabre aloft, proud defiance on his lips, he chose the course that honour pointed, and rode like some champion of old to find death on the sabres of his enemies.”
Well, I’ve always said, if you get the Press on your side you’re half way there. I’ve never bothered to correct that glowing tribute, until now; it seems almost a shame to do it at last. I don’t remember which journal it appeared in – Bell’s Sporting Life, for all I know – but I don’t doubt it caused many a manly tear to start, and many a fair bosom to heave when they read it. In the meantime, I was doing a bit in the manly tear and bosom-heaving line myself, with my horse foundering under me, my sabre flying from my hand, and my sorely-tried carcase sprawling on the turf while all those peasant horsemen shied back, growling and gaping, and then closed in again, staring down at me in that dull, astonished way that Russians have. I just lay there, gasping like a salmon on the bank, waiting for the lance-points to come skewering down on me, and babbling weakly:
“Kamerad! Ami! Sarte! Amigo! Oh God, what’s the Russian for ‘friend’?”
Being a prisoner of war has its advantages, or used to. If you were a British officer, taken by a civilized foe, you could expect to be rather better treated than your adversary would treat his own people; he would use you as a guest, entertain you, be friendly, and not bother overmuch about confining you. He might ask your parole not to try to escape, but not usually – since you would be exchanged for one of his own people at the first opportunity there wasn’t much point in running off.
Mind you, I think we British fared rather better than most. They respected us, and knew we didn’t make war in a beastly fashion, like these Balkan fellows, so they treated us accordingly. But a Russian taken by the Poles, or an Austrian by the Eyetyes, or even a Confederate by the Yankees – well, he might not come off quite so comfortably. I’m told it’s all changing now, and that war’s no longer a gentleman’s game (as though it ever was), and that among the “new professionals” a prisoner’s a prisoner so damned well cage him up. I don’t know: we treated each other decently, and weren’t one jot more incompetent than this Sandhurst-and-Shop crowd. Look at that young pup Kitchener – what that fellow needs is a woman or two.
At all events, no one has ever treated me better, by and large, than the Russians did, although I don’t think it was kindness, but ignorance. From the moment I measured my length among those Cossacks, I found myself being regarded with something like awe. It wasn’t just the Light Brigade fiasco, which had impressed them tremendously, but a genuine uncertainty where the English were concerned – they seemed to look on us as though we were men from the moon, or made of dynamite and so liable to go off if scratched. The truth is, they’re such a dull, wary lot of peasants – the ordinary folk and soldiers, that is – that they go in fear of anything strange until someone tells ’em what to do about it. In those days, of course, most of them were slaves – except for the Cossacks - and behaved as such.
I’ll have more to say about this, but for the moment it’s enough to note that the Cossacks kept away from me, glowering, until one of their officers jumped down, helped me to my feet, and accepted my surrender. I doubt if he understood a word I said, for I was too shocked and confused to be coherent, even if I’d spoken Russian, which I didn’t much, at that time. He led me through the crowd, and once I had realized that they weren’t going to do me violence, and that I was safely out of that hellish maelstrom, I set myself to collect my wits and consider what should be done.
They stuck me in a tent, with two massive Cossacks at the entrance – Black Sea Cossacks, as I learned later, with those stringy long-haired caps, and scarlet lances – and there I sat, listening to the growing chatter outside, and every now and then an officer would stick his face in, and regard me, and then withdraw. I was still feeling fearfully sick and giddy, and my right ear seemed to have gone deaf with the cannonading, but as I leaned against the pole, shuddering, one thought kept crowding gloriously into my mind: I was alive, and in one piece. I’d survived, God knew how, the shattering of the Light Brigade, to say nothing of the earlier actions of the day – it seemed like a year since I’d stood with Campbell’s Highlanders, though it was a bare five hours ago. You’ve come through again, my boy, I kept thinking; you’re going to live. That being the case, head up, look alive and keep your eyes open.
Presently in came a little dapper chap in a fine white uniform, black boots, and a helmet with a crowned eagle. “Lanskey,” says he, in good French – which most educated Russians spoke, by the way – “Major, Cuirassiers of the Guard. Whom have I the pleasure of addressing?”
“Flashman,” says I, “Colonel, 17th Lancers.”
“Enchanted,” says he, bowing. “May I request that you accompany me to General Liprandi, who is most anxious to make the acquaintance of such a distinguished and gallant officer?”
Well, he couldn’t have said fairer; I bucked up at once, and he led me out, through a curious throng of officers and staff hangers-on, into a great tent where about a dozen senior officers were waiting, with a genial-looking, dark-whiskered fellow in a splendid sable coat, whom I took to be Liprandi, seated behind a table. They stopped talking at once; a dozen pairs of eager eyes fixed on me as Lanskey presented me, and I stood up tall, ragged and muck-smeared though I was, and just stared over Liprandi’s head, clicking my heels.
He came round the table, right up to me, and said, also in excellent French: “Your pardon, colonel. Permit me.” And to my astonishment he stuck his nose up close to my lips, sniffing.
“What the devil?” cries I, stepping back.
“A thousand pardons, sir,” says he. “It is true, gentlemen,” turning to his staff. “Not a suspicion of liquor.” And they all began to buzz again, staring at me.
“You are perfectly sober,” says Liprandi. “And so, as I have ascertained, are your troopers who have been taken prisoner. I confess, I am astonished.20 Will you perhaps enlighten us, colonel, what was the explanation of that … that extraordinary action by your light cavalry an hour ago? Believe me,” he went on, “I seek no military intelligence from you – no advantage of information. But it is beyond precedent – beyond understanding. Why, in God’s name, did you do it?”
Now, I didn’t know, at that time, precisely what we had done. I guessed we must have lost three-quarters of the Light Brigade, by a hideous mistake, but I couldn’t know that I’d just taken part in the most famous cavalry action ever fought, one that was to sound round the world, and that even eye-witnesses could scarcely believe. The Russians were amazed; it seemed to them we must have been drunk, or drugged, or mad – they weren’t to guess that it had been a ghastly accident. And I wasn’t going to enlighten them. So I said:
“Ah, well, you know, it was just to teach you fellows to keep your distance.”
At this they exclaimed, and shook their heads and swore, and Liprandi looked bewildered, and kept muttering: “Five hundred sabres! To what end?”, and they crowded round, plying me with questions – all very friendly, mind, so that I began to get my bounce back, and played it off as though it were just another day’s work. What they couldn’t fathom was how we’d held together all the way to the guns, and hadn’t broken or turned back, even with four saddles empty out of five, so I just told ’em, “We’re British