The Invasion of the Crimea Author:Alexander William Kinglake Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: of Lord Lucan's services as commander of our Char cavalry in the Crimea; but I have sought to pre- 1 pare for my account of the action in the plain of Bala... more »clava, by conveying beforehand some impression of the officer who there commanded our cavalry. Some such glance was the more to be desired because Lord Lucan's abilities were evidently of a higher order than those he found means to disclose by the part he took in the battle. It should be understood that Lord Luean did not thrust himself into the command of our division of horse. All he had asked for was to have charge of a single infantry brigade. The English division of horse numbered two brigades, one of which comprised the Light Cavalry, the other our Heavy Dragoons. The Light Brigade, as we know, was commanded by the Earl of Cardigan. Lord Cardigan, when appointed to this com- urdcr mand, was about fifty-seven years old, and had never seen war service. From his early days he had eagerly longed for the profession of arms, and although prevented by his father's objections from entering the army at the usual period of life, he afterwards—that is, at about twenty-seven years of age—was made a cornet in a cavalry regiment. He pursued his profession with diligence, absenting himself much from the House of Commons (of which he was at that time a member) for the purpose of doing orderly duty as a subaltern in this 8th Hussars. Aided partly by fortune, but OH A P. partly by the favour of the Duke of York and the ' operation of the purchase system, he rose very quickly in the service, and at the end of about seven years from the period of his entering the army, he was a lieutenant-colonel. He had a passionate love for the service—a fair knowledge, it is believed, of so much cavalry business as is taught by p...« less