Too often historical writing on the Russian War of 1854-1856 focuses
narrowly on the land campaign fought in the Crimean peninsula in the
Black Sea. The wider war waged at sea by the
British and French navies against the Russians is ignored. The allied navies
aimed to strike at Russian interests anywhere in the world where naval force
could be brought to bear and as a result campaigns were waged in the Baltic, the
Black Sea, the White Sea, on the Russian Pacific coast and in the Sea of Azoff. Yet it is the land campaign in the
Crimea that shapes our understanding of events.
In this graphic and original study, Peter Duckers seeks to set the record
straight. He shows how these neglected naval campaigns were remarkably
successful, in contrast to the wretched failures that beset the British army on
land. Allied warships ranged across Russian waters sinking shipping, disrupting
trade, raiding ports, bombarding fortresses, destroying vast quantities of
stores and shelling coastal towns. The scale and intensity of the naval
operations embarked upon during the war are astonishing, and little appreciated,
and this new book offers the first overall survey of
them.
