“For the conveyance of all this there was no means of transport except the horses of the field batteries, and though they worked from daylight till dark the progress was very slow. But for the blue jackets it would have been slower still. The zeal and hearty goodwill with which these gallant fellows dragged up their ships' guns to the front was really admirable. Sometime half a ship's crew might be seen harnessed to a huge sixty-eight pounder, and walking away with it cheerily to the tune of some well-known sea-song; while the ship's fiddler, seated astride of the gun, plied his bow vigorously.”
[Scenes in Camp and Field, Sketches of the War in the Crimea, Vol.I, 1857]
General Sir Richard Wilbraham KCB (1811–1900)