50 Fun Facts About Crimean War

Which empire fought alone against Britain, France, the Ottomans and Sardinia in the Crimean War?

The war ran from October 1853 to February 1856; Russia was diplomatically isolated by the end and sued for peace.

Which tsar's demand to protect the Ottoman Empire's Orthodox subjects was the war's proximate cause?

After the Sublime Porte refused, Russian troops occupied the Danubian Principalities in July 1853.

Outrage over the destruction of an Ottoman squadron at which port drew Britain and France into war?

The press called it 'the massacre of Sinope', though the two empires were already at war and no atrocities were proven.

Allied forces landed in Crimea in September 1854 to capture which Russian naval base?

The siege lasted eleven months and 337 days before the city fell in September 1855.

The allies' first victory in Crimea, on 20 September 1854, was fought on the banks of which river?

The Russians later admitted that had the allies pressed south that day, they could have walked into Sevastopol.

Which Italian state joined the allies in 1855 with 15,000 troops under General La Marmora?

Cavour wanted a seat at the peace table to raise the Italian question with the great powers.

The French assault that finally broke the besieged city in September 1855 took which redoubt?

The British assault on the Great Redan the same day remains disputed; the Russians blew their magazines and withdrew north.

Which agreement, signed on 30 March 1856, ended the Crimean War?

It forbade Russia from basing warships in the Black Sea, a clause Russia renounced in 1870 after France fell to Prussia.

Which reform, five years after the war, is counted among its consequences for the losing side?

Alexander II read the defeat of a serf army by free British and French troops as proof that emancipation was needed.

Which nurse gained worldwide attention for pioneering modern nursing during the war?

A Jamaican nurse, Mary Seacole, also won praise from The Times correspondent for her skill with the wounded.

Which historian argued that 'mutual fear, not mutual aggression' caused the Crimean War?

Taylor held that none of Nicholas I, Napoleon III or the British government could retreat once the crisis was launched.

Which French emperor's bid for Catholic support over the Holy Places set off the chain of events?

He sent the ship of the line Charlemagne into the Black Sea, breaching the London Straits Convention.

Which abrasive Russian envoy was sent to the Sublime Porte in February 1853 with sweeping demands?

He demanded a protectorate over all 12 million Orthodox Christians in the Ottoman Empire; the Sultan refused the most sweeping terms.

Which British ambassador, nicknamed 'the Great Elchi', had a direct hand in Ottoman policy?

Nicholas fumed at 'the infernal dictatorship of this Redcliffe'; Disraeli blamed him and Aberdeen for making war inevitable.

Which British prime minister's government fell on 30 January 1855 over the war's mismanagement?

Parliament voted 305 to 148 to investigate the war; the veteran Palmerston replaced him and took a harder line.

Russian ships of the line assaulted the Ottoman fleet at Sinop on 30 November of which year?

Six Russian ships of the line and five smaller warships destroyed eleven anchored Ottoman vessels, mostly frigates.

Which Russian admiral, victor of the 1853 naval battle, fell in the siege in June 1855?

Lord Raglan, the British commander, died two days before him.

Russian troops crossed which river in 1853 to occupy Moldavia and Wallachia?

Fewer than half of the 80,000 men who crossed survived, almost all dying of sickness rather than combat.

The Russian siege of which Danube fortress was lifted on 23 June 1854?

Some 60,000 Russians faced 15,000 defenders; Austrian pressure forced the Russians to abandon the principalities.

Which Ottoman general crossed the Danube at Vidin and captured Calafat in October 1853?

He later landed in Georgia in 1855 in a failed bid to relieve the besieged fortress of Kars.

Which neutral power occupied the Danubian Principalities after the Russians withdrew in 1854?

Austria's abandonment of its old Russian alliance left it isolated and cost it dearly in 1859 and 1866.

On which Black Sea coast city did the allied expeditionary force land in June 1854 before Crimea?

Karl Marx quipped that 'the French doing nothing and the British helping them as fast as possible'.

How many ships sailed for Crimea in September 1854, each steamer towing two sailing ships?

They anchored first at Yevpatoria, which surrendered, then landed at Kalamita Bay, surprising Russians expecting Katcha.

The allies landed on the sandy beaches of which Crimean bay on 14 September 1854?

The Russians had expected a landing at Katcha; the last-minute switch showed Russia knew the original plan.

Which engineer advisor recommended attacking the besieged city from the south, not the north?

He had earlier surveyed the Dardanelles and persuaded Napoleon III to prepare a land expedition.

The British established their port facilities for the siege at which harbour?

The French used Kamiesch; the British had the longer, more exposed supply line to the east.

Sir Colin Campbell's 93rd Highlanders met Russian cavalry in what formation?

Campbell trusted the new Minié rifles; William Howard Russell's 'thin red streak' became the Thin Red Line.

Which Times correspondent coined the phrase behind the 'Thin Red Line'?

He wrote of a 'thin red streak topped with steel'; his dispatches are credited with helping bring down the Aberdeen government.

Which aide-de-camp delivered the confused order that launched the Charge of the Light Brigade?

Asked which guns, he allegedly pointed at the wrong battery and said 'There is your enemy, there are your guns'.

Who led the Light Brigade's charge down the valley?

The charge caused 278 casualties in the 700-man unit, but it also unnerved the Russian cavalry into flight.

Out of a 700-man unit, how many casualties did the Charge of the Light Brigade cause?

Tennyson's poem fixed the charge in memory as a glorious but wasted sacrifice, though some historians see partial success.

Which poet memorialised the Light Brigade in a famous 1854 poem?

The poem helped make the charge an iconic symbol of logistical, tactical and command failure.

The Russian attempt to raise the siege on 5 November 1854 became which bloody battle?

It followed directly from the allies' failure, through shortage of men, to exploit Balaclava.

The 'Balaklava Storm' of 14 November 1854 sank how many allied transport ships?

Among them was HMS Prince, carrying a cargo of winter clothing the troops desperately needed.

The tsar died in March 1855 of which illness, worn down by the strain of the war?

He was described as full of remorse for the disasters he had caused; his son Alexander II made peace the next year.

The first general assault of 18 June 1855 fell on the 40th anniversary of which battle?

Legend says the date was chosen to please Napoleon III, though historians have not confirmed it; the assault failed.

How long did the great siege last before the city fell on 9 September 1855?

Over the winter that followed, mines blew up the five docks, the canal and three locks.

The 1855 attack on Kinburn in the Dnieper estuary saw the first naval use of what?

Armoured floating batteries proved so effective that Britain and France planned to use them against Kronstadt in 1856.

Which Sea of Azov port, defended by Don Cossacks, refused an allied ultimatum in May 1855?

Governor Yegor Tolstoy replied that 'Russians never surrender their cities'; a fisherman later lured HMS Jasper aground.

Which Ottoman fortress in the Caucasus surrendered to the Russians on 28 November 1855?

Russia handed it back under the Treaty of Paris, then annexed it after the 1877–78 war.

Naval battles on the Finnish coast during the war are known locally by what name?

A Franco-British force captured and destroyed the Bomarsund fortress on the Åland Islands in August 1854.

Which Swedish inventor, father of Alfred, developed naval mines for the tsar's Baltic defences?

A US Army major in 1860 dated modern naval mining to the Russian defences of Kronstadt and Sevastopol.

On which peninsula did a Russian garrison beat back an Anglo-French landing in September 1854?

The Petropavlovsk defence was, for Russia, 'a ray of light among the dark clouds'; the garrison slipped away in the snow in 1855.

British and French forces occupied which Greek port from 1854 to 1857 to restrain King Otto?

Greece had invaded Thessaly and Epirus hoping for a Russian win; Otto's popularity collapsed and he abdicated in 1862.

A January 1855 anti-war protest in Trafalgar Square saw 1,500 people throwing what?

About 1,500 people pelted cabs and pedestrians, then the police; troops with truncheons ended it.

Which Russian writer's sketches of the siege earned him the label of first war correspondent?

The sketches record the short truces both sides agreed so corpses could be removed after the failed assaults.

Whose photographs, alongside Russell's reports, documented the war for the public?

Once Britain laid an underwater cable to Crimea in April 1855, news reached London in a few hours.

Fear of losing which territory to Britain in a future war led Alexander II to sell it to the US?

The 1867 sale followed directly from the exposed weakness of Russia's overseas position.

Timothy, the last living veteran of the war when she died in 2004, was what kind of animal?

Found on a Portuguese ship in 1854, she served as a mascot on HMS Queen throughout the war.

By one calculation, what fraction of Russian deaths in the war were due to combat?

Estimates of Russian dead range from 450,000 to 630,000, the vast majority lost to disease.