KINGLAKE, Alexander William.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Autograph letter signed, to his friend John T. Delane, editor of the Times. Kinglake gives a brief, sprightly account of the Battle of the Alma, hastily jotted down within two days of the encounter while at the British camp on the banks of the river. His massive history of the war, Invasion of the Crimea (1863-87), is one of the great military narratives of the nineteenth century.Kinglake (1809-1891) travelled to the Crimea with Delane and Austen Henry Layard and was the only one of the three friends to witness the battle at close quarters. He knew Lord Raglan, the British commander, from when the two men rode with the Duke of Beaufort's hounds, and "was able to spend the whole battle-long day with Raglan and dine with him alone that night. At one moment during the battle he seems to have been quite alone with him" (de Gaury, p. 112). He writes, "I was with Ld Raglan during the whole action … we dashed through the Alma under a fire which laid low three of the staff, the animation was so like that of a sharp 'burst' in hunting that Lord Raglan's horse thought he had hounds before him, and would not be quieted for the rest of the day". After mentioning Russell of the Times he gives a glimpse of the action: "It is said that the Russians had expected to hold their position on the Alma against the allies for a fortnight or three weeks, but they were driven from it by the brilliant fighting of the Zouaves, & above all by the flesh & blood of the British infantry, in 3 hours and 20

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