The Crimean (Eastern) War, 1853 - 1856
Published by Primary Source Microfilm
The Crimean War was a conflict which pitted Ottoman,
French, British, and eventually Piedmont-Sardinian (Italian) forces
against Russia, with the participation of volunteers and mercenaries
from a dozen other states and nations. The threat of Austria, Prussia
and Sweden joining the coalition in a grand rollback of the Russian
Empire complicated matters, and the final butcher's bill approached
a million dead, wounded, and disappeared without a trace. This prolonged
armed confrontation witnessed novel weaponry such as rockets, new forms
of logistics and communication via steamship, rail and telegraph, a
fresh organization of military medicine with organized female nursing,
and innovative forms of military journalism with a few war correspondents
and some photography.
The Military Science Archive Crimean War collection
is staggering in scope and importance, ranging from directives and
official correspondence to position papers and memoirs; political and
military intelligence reports and reports on foreign intelligence;
accounts of action inaction, logistics, fortifications, and engineering;
and, among other things, information on native militias and foreign
volunteers, spies, traitors, prisoners-of-war and their treatment,
disinformation, domestic morale, field hospitals, military justice,
and Russia's military cipher.
The cast of major characters in some
of the files especially devoted to correspondence include Emperor Nicholas
I and War Minister Prince V.A. Dolgorukov; the local commanders-in-chief,
Field Marshall I.F. Paskevich, Prince Alexander Menshikov, and Prince
M.D. Gorchakov; some of their top subordinates, Generals A.N. Luders
and P.E. Kotsebu (Kozebue) and Adjutant General Annenkov. Among the
memoranda and memoirs are contributions of General F.V. Rudiger, Col.
A.P. Khrushchov, the experienced statesman and architect of Balkan
policy, P.D. Kisilev, and the rising specialist of military statistics
and future reforming War Minister, Dmitrii Miliutin.
A perusal and analysis of all the memoranda and proposals
in the collection may produce some fundamental reevaluations of the
received wisdom in standard accounts of the Crimean War.
104 reels
A published guide to the collection is in the Microtext Reading Room
under the call number Z2519.C75 2005 (LC)+.
Sterling Library's hours
of operation
LOCATION: SML, Microform (Non-Circulating)
CALL NUMBER: Film B19208
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