Big questions of the Crimean War: into the Valley of Death
HistoryExtra podcast
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The Battle of Sevastopol
It's clear that the Russians had underestimated how determined the Western Allies were. They didn't believe Britain and France could cooperate effectively, but their long-standing rivalry would simply prevent this happening. And they'd underestimated how quickly an army of 50,000 men can be moved by steam-powered shipping. If they'd followed the battle up, they would certainly have taken Sevastopol within a week. The French Marshal decides that he doesn't want to rush off the battlefield. He's actually dying of cancer, and his mood swings mean that on some days he's quite aggressive, and on other days he's really rather passive. By the end of the day of the battle he's had enough
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