Henry Ginn - Royal Marine d. 1855

Henry Ginn  (brother of Charles and Timothy Ginn of Farnham in my posts of 7th July and 7th September ) was born in early 1822. There is no record of what he was about until the 1841 Census, when he was noted as being an Agricultural Labourer: he was then 19 and living with his dad William in Farnham.

William Ginn died in January 1842, he died of dropsy and thus it is likely that the family had known that he was likely to die. Henry had probably considered his options, he would almost certainly have lost the poor law cottage at his father's death.

His father had died a pauper and two of Henry's brothers had been transported to Australia as convicts.  Others were constantly in trouble for petty thefts and other offences.  Indeed in this environment it is not surprising that Henry himself was suspected and charged for a petty offence for which he was found not guilty.  He decided to make a fresh start and he joined the Royal Marines, part of the Navy of course: "er Majesty's Jollies" as Kipling called them, "soldier and sailor too".

At the time of his enlistment Henry was described as 19 years of age, 5ft 6ins, sandy haired and grey eyed. He had a fresh complexion.

                                         

The Royal Marines were (of course) effectively soldiers who helped to man naval ships. They did carry out some seamanlike duties while at sea, but their primary purpose was to direct fire at enemy ships in naval engagements, and to take part in any land based raids or expeditions.

Henry was allocated to the 48th Company, which formed part of the Woolwich division.  He would have been taken from Hertford to Woolwich, and after a few months basic infantry training he is likely to have been posted to a ship.  I know nothing of what he got up to until 1850, and in the meantime he could have taken part in a number of actions in which marines are known to have been engaged, including the Maori War of 1845.  It's all speculation.

In early 1850 Henry was in Marine Headquarters at Woolwich Common, probably having been there for some years, three years in barracks seems to have been quite usual. Henry received orders to join H.M.S. Vengeance at Portsmouth, he and many of his divisional comrades joining the ship on 12th July 1850.

The Vengeance was an 84 gun 2nd Rate.  Built in 1824 (so she was an "old lady") she was a wooden hulled sailing ship, commanded by Lord Edward Russell.  When Henry boarded her she was just completing a major refit in Portsmouth dockyard, and shortly afterwards she sailed for the Mediterranean, her ship's company including 185 marines, more than enough for a line of battle ship.

At the time he boarded her Henry Ginn was 28, he was single, and his hair had now darkened to brown. The muster records show that his service conduct had been "very good", the highest standard noted, and it was not lightly given.  The men of the navy still faced the lash if they transgressed, and the records of these ships show three dozen lashes as a standard, and it was freely handed out with "all hands to witness punishment".

                         Only surviving photo of HMS Vengeance

The Royal Navy at this time was by far the largest in the world of course, and Britain had major naval bases of her own around the globe.  One of these was Malta, and this was the Vengeance 's destination when she sailed in the autumn of 1850, returning to Portsmouth in 1851

The ship was at Spithead for some time in the spring and summer of 1851, where she was engaged in the Royal Review of the Fleet, the ship shown below in a painting of the event.  On 25th May 1851 Henry Ginn paraded before the relatively young Queen Victoria, she and Prince Albert boarding HMS Vengeance from the royal yacht and conducting an inspection.

The ship then sailed for Alexandria, before returning to Malta and joining the Malta Squadron under the command of Admiral Dundas in his flagship Trafalgar.   
 

The ships cruised between Malta and Gibraltar, and the surgeon of Vengeance - William Graham M.D. - lets us know what life was like aboard ship July '51 to July '52 with the following entry in his journal:

The Vengeance sailed from Spithead on the last day of August 1851 with a complement of 750 officers and men, the greater proportion of the latter were merchant seamen, raised from London, Liverpool and other seaports, and only joined a few days before we sailed.....  the weather was exceedingly fine, the winter very mild and all the places we have visited have been extremely healthy.

Halcyon days then, with the squadron staving off boredom by staging races between the ships.

The Vengeance stayed off Spain until August 1852, then cruised the Greek Islands.  She was then ordered home, the latter part of the winter of '52/3 was spent at Plymouth, with the ship sailing for Malta in the spring, but the good times were certainly over for the Malta Squadron, events in Turkey and the Black Sea already casting a cloud on the horizon.

Russian attacks on Turkey in 1853 had had some success, to the disappointment of Britain and France (the “allies”) Turkey's friends, even if they were not yet militarily on the same side. The Malta Squadron was reinforced, and with French ships proceeded to the Aegean, there to await developments. They were not long in coming.

In November 1853 a Russian force wiped out a Turkish squadron off Sinope, committing massacres in the process. French and British public opinion was outraged at the atrocities and demanded something be done. The combined fleet was thus moved into the Dardanelles, the Vengeance being off Constantinople (Istanbul) in late November, the force (under Admiral Dundas) then moving into the Black Sea. But we were still not at war.

The French and British finally declared war (the Crimean War) on 28th March 1854.  Shortly before the Russians had broken a truce when the steam frigate Furious was attempting to take off the British Consul.  The allied fleet was thus sent to punish Odessa.

The Vengeance and other ships of the allied fleet stood off Odessa while twelve French and British steamships (together with rocket ships) entered the port and bombarded it.  No Russian ships were prepared to come out and fight, though several were sunk in this action anyway.

It took quite a while to assemble the forces to campaign in the Black Sea. The first part of the British army left Malta on 31st March, arriving at the Dardanelles in April and disembarking at Gallipoli. A constant stream of ships followed, and accommodation became so congested that the British established a major base at Scutari, where Florence Nightingale was to later site her hospital.

The army sat here for a month, the navy still at sea. In May the Turks requested that the army sail for Varna in the Black Sea, where the British and French were to support the Turks.  Both of these were accomplished, the Russians withdrew from the occupied territories and the "war" seemed to be over.

Unfortunately, the jingoism and bravado let loose by all this could not easily be curtailed. British and French public opinion insisted that the Russians be rebuked.  It was thus decided that the British and French armies should invade the Crimea and seize Sebastopol, the major Russian base in the region.  It still is.  The single aim of the whole Crimean War was thus to take Sebastopol.

The army lay at Varna for some months, they had disembarked.  Fever and Cholera were rife (it was very hot) and decent pasture for the cavalry horses had been hard to find.  The first hints that this campaign was ill judged had begun to appear.  Everybody was pleased therefore when, in early September, they were ordered to proceed to the Crimea.

The fleet arrived off of Eupatoria Point in the Crimea on 13th September.  From the 14th to the 18th there was furious activity as the ships' boats and small steamers were landing the army and a force of marines.  The navy ships stood just off the coast as the army began to march south towards Sebastopol, never straying far inland.

At the River Alma the British and superior Russian forces clashed on 20th September, the British gaining the upper hand in the first battle of the Crimean War.  

The priority now was to establish a safe base for supply and reinforcement.  A number of ports presented themselves, the British commanders making the fatal mistake of choosing Balaclava, which, while it looked spacious on Admiralty charts, was actually a narrow inlet.

The first of the British army began trickling into Balaclava at the close of September, the navy on the 29th. Lord Raglan (the overall British commander) had ordered the navy to supply a Naval Brigade of seamen, principally to man great siege guns to be taken from the ships.  He also expected a brigade of Royal Marines to be landed, and 1200 men were rapidly selected for the latter, principally from the sailing ships of the fleet.

The ships' logs show feverish activity by the fleet over the "long weekend" of Friday 29th September to 2nd October 1854.  Small steamships were speeding back and forth between the large battleships like worker bees feeding their queen. Men were picked off of one ship, ferried to another, and then brought ashore by boat.

Henry had presumably been given some warning that he was one of the marines chosen for the Royal Marine Brigade; many of his comrades stayed on board.

On 2nd October the log of the Vengeance records the following "sent Lieutenant Spey, one Sergeant, one Corporal, one Drummer and sixteen Privates to Vesuvius for passage to Balaklava". Vesuvius was a small steamer that had arrived at 10.30 am, loaded up the men and departed "to the westward" with Henry and company. A note in the ship's muster for that day shows that Henry was sent to HMS Agamemnon, a new 91 gun steam battleship, built at Woolwich in 1852.

Agamemnon was like an antheap on that day, the muster shows marines were arriving by small steamer from all over the fleet. Field says that the whole brigade, over 1000 men, passed through the ship on that single day. Units were forming up, kit was checked, muskets cleaned. And we see: Private Henry Ginn No. 830 "lent from Vengeance sent for duty at Balaclava per order of the Commander in Chief”. At this point I think we can assume that Henry was reconsidering life as an agricultural labourer!

The marines came ashore at Balaclava to find the army stripping the place of anything of use. An Irishman called Russell was the war correspondent for the Times and he describes how he saw the two battalions of the Marine Brigade dragging 24 and 32 pounder guns through Balaclava and up the heights surrounding the town. He watched them make a large tented camp on these heights (to be called 'The Marine Heights") their tents in some places as much as 1000 feet above sea level he says.  It was difficult to get equipment up there, as already there was a shortage of horses. Everything had to be man-hauled.

            The crowded harbour at Balaclava in 1855 - note the tents

The marines dug in. They created a large system of trenches (nearly 3 miles long) that ran from the position called Kadikoi (in the valley) up to the heights, the brigade being placed under the authority of Sir Colin Campbell, commander of the Highland Brigade which occupied the marines' left flank.

This trench system formed part of a series of trenches that were designed to put a stranglehold on Sebastopol.  It was obvious from 18th October that the Russians were going to attempt a break out.  On both the 18th and 20th the marines were called to arms as large numbers of Russian infantry approached their positions.  On 25th October a huge Russian force launched an attack at Balaclava

Tens of thousands of Russians advanced, a large cavalry force breaking through some Turkish positions and attacking the Highland Brigade. The 93rd (Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders) immortalised as "the thin red line" held this charge, a counter- charge by the heavily outnumbered British cavalry (Heavy Brigade) scattering the Russians.

All this took place under the noses of the marines, one later described their perfect view, it being "a crisp fine autumn day".  Their artillery certainly opened fire on the Russians.  Russell describes watching the marine infantry "coming under arms" and flooding into the trenches as the Russians advanced, and one account of the marines' contribution says that Russians actually skirmished with marine positions, some marines being armed with the newly issued (1853) Minie rifle, this having a range of 1000 yards, five times that of the old smooth bored muskets.

There then occurred that celebrated British blunder, when the furiously brave Light Brigade (led by idiots) misunderstood their orders and attacked the wrong Russian positions. They were slaughtered, but luckily the Russians were in no position to exploit the situation, and so the Battle of Balaclava introduced a position of stalemate.

The Russians made another serious attempt to break out on 5th November (The Battle of Inkerman) which involved serious loss of life on both sides, but resulted in a British victory.  Three hundred members of the Marine Brigade were present at that battle, but Henry Ginn was not among them.

Both sides now settled down for the winter. That of 1854-5 was quite short (November to January) and by Russian standards not particularly cold, but the British forces were not prepared for it - they lacked suitable clothing, shelter and adequate supplies.

There were no warm clothes. The price of a locally bought fur coat was £15, and only officers could afford them. So many horses had now died that all stores had to be man-hauled out of Balaclava (up steep hillsides) and mud was everywhere. The mighty British navy had no problem getting stores in to the port, but organisation within was so poor that much of the stuff remained unloaded - often rotting in the ships' holds.

The troops were living in conical tents, the sort (and in cases the same tents) as those used in the Napoleonic Wars.

The men were living in appalling conditions and news of this began to filter home. There was a national outcry, but conditions started to improve,  warm clothing was sent out, women at home knitting comforters (long scarves) and a new type of wool headwear (the "Balaclava").  By March the weather was considered too warm!

But already a great part of the British army was either too sick to carry on or dead.  In January the Prime Minister was asked what had happened to the 55,000 men that had (up until that time) been landed in the Crimea.  Only 15,000 were considered fit, and the P.M. could not account for the rest: the organisation being so non existent. He was forced to resign.

The marines had suffered along with the rest. The Marine Heights were obviously particularly exposed to the elements.  One of the marine other ranks was later to remember that winter:

There were strings of stretchers every day going to our graveyard in the ravine; a sergeant in our camp coming round each morning, calling out at each tent "Have you any dead?". Trench duty was heavy - I spent six consecutive nights in them. We had been reinforced by the Marines of the lately arrived screw liner [steamship] Algiers - all boys, more fit to be at home with their mothers.  They were dying off so rapidly that we borrowed the French mule ambulance to carry what remained of them back to their ship.

The Vengeance sailed for home in mid-January 1855, and Henry and many of his comrades were transferred to the books of the Rodney, he first appearing on their muster on the 18th. Henry certainly knew this ship well from its years in the Malta Squadron, but according to my research it seems unlikely that he ever walked her decks.

All hopes had now been built up for the planned attack on Sepastapol. The fresh troops were green, the veterans of the winter somewhat desperate to get the thing over with: they did not wish to endure another winter in the Crimea.   A massive assault (by both French and British) was launched in early June and beaten off with heavy loss of life. The morale of the British army all but collapsed.

Cholera and fever had never left the army, and in the humidity it spread again.  Exhausted and depressed men had little resistance, and on 28th June even Lord Raglan the army commander died of cholera, his spirit reportedly broken by seeing so many British dead on the redoubts.  Two days later the Marine Brigade lost Henry Ginn, he died "in camp at Balaclava" (ie on the Marine Heights) - he was 33.

Sebastopol fell in the end of course. In November 1855 the Marine Brigade marched back to their ships, embarking for home. When they had landed in 1854 a staff officer had called them "as fine a body of men as you could wish to see". Now they left over two hundred of their comrades behind, 95% of whom had died of disease and exposure.  Hundreds more, their health ruined, had been invalided out of the service.

                    Group of Royal Marines with Crimean War Medals in 1856
                                                   (Imperial War Museum)

The Marine Brigade Roll re cords that Henry Ginn was posthumously awarded the Crimean War Medal, with clasps for Balaclava and Sebastopol, one awarded to a colleague of his in the Marine Brigade is shown below.

Henry, like his cousin Benjamin in my post of  25th July and countless other men and boys, served their country and died to build and keep the Empire that Queen Victoria, the "widow of Windsor" that lady whom Henry had once met, prized so much.  It is fitting to mention the tribute of Kipling here -

You 'ave ‘eard of the Widow at Windsor

It’s safest to leave 'er alone

For 'er sentries we stand, by the sea and by land

Wherever the bugles are blown

Walk wide o' the Widow at Windsor

For 'alf o' Creation she owns

We 'ave bought 'er the same, with the sword and the flame

And we've salted it down with our bones