Towards a Modern Army, 1825-1874The Crimean theatre posed an almost unfair test of the army's supply
.ystem, since the peninsula produced little except cattle and wine, and the
·oads in the south were so bad that trains of ox-drawn carts crossing the
;teppe from ih~ 1iearest magazines took ages to reac:-h their destination.
:lome supply bases were destroyed by enemy naval action. The Russian
:roops made matters worse by looting, which cost the local Tatars one third
:>f their herds; the natives sold the rest for whatever they could get and fled
in panic, leaving the country around Sevastopol' all but deserted.ss Various
units sent out purchasing units of their own which outbid each other, so
driving up prices further. Yet some officials, trained to carry out orders un-
questioningly, insisted on adhering to totally unrealistic fixed prices.s^9 General
F. K. Zatler, an experienced but tactless administrator, was placed in charge.
He embarked on a series of desperate expedients which gave ammunition to
his many critics. Mutual recriminations and jurisdictional struggles raged
at the top, while in the besieged city of Sevastopol" soldiers went without
biscuit for ten days at a stretch.9(J Eventually Zaller got them some, a feat
that occasioned one of those ambivalent ditties that Russian soldiers were
so fond of:
General Zatler
got us the biscuit,
what a fine fellow is he!
He issued an order
to tighten our belts
and oh, how our stomachs do ache!^91
'The food was of very poor quality', writes a recent historian of the campaign,
'and it was impossible to cook it properly. The rations contained much salt
meat, which caused terrible thirst. The local drinking water was brackish and,
since little or no fresh water was brought in... there was much digestive
disease. '^92 In the circumstances it is surprising that the soldiers' morale held up
as well as it did.
The authorities now showed greater concern than before over the effects
which unwholesome diet, overstrain, and epidemics had on soldiers' health.
Simultaneously advances in medical knowledge were making it possible to heal
more of the wounded and sick. Nicholas devoted a great deal of attention to
the state of military hospitals, paying surprise visits and summarily punishing
those responsible for inadequacies, such as dirty linen.^93 Unfortunately inspec-
88 Ibid., i. 44, 77.
19 Ibid., i. 47 n., 84, 354.
90 Ibid., i. 116; Pirogov, Sevast. pis"ma, p. 56.
91 'A Zaller general I sukhariki dostavlyal I bol"no khoroshi, bol"no khoroshi! I On izvolil
prikazat" I nam, chtob dietu soblyudat" I Bryukho zabolit, bryukho zabolit!' Neizvestnyy, 'Za
mnogo let', p. 119. There are less complimentary versions.
92 Curtiss, 'Sisters of Mercy', p. 466.
93 Yezersky, in SVM iii(ii), pp. 13-14 (Moscow, 1830).