The Charge of the Light Brigade
(Warner). On Oct. 25, 1854, the suicidal advance of 673 British cavalrymen into the teeth of Russian cannon fire through a valley at Balaklava, in the Crimean war, proved to be a maneuver less beneficial to England's military than to its literary history. Caused by a mistake in orders, the sole practical significance of the charge was to give the glamour of a spectacular British victory to what was really a minor British defeat. Its significance in literature, as the inspiration of Tennyson's famed ballad, will be...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
