As I'm highly suggestible, Charge provided a springboard into researching the Crimean War. I first read Cecil Woodham-Smith's The Reason Why (1953), the film's primary source, which led to other popular histories and then first-hand accounts. As a collage of gallantry, imperial rivalry and military incompetence the Crimea rivals the First World War, in drama if not scope. Certainly its effects were more far-reaching than generally recognized: not only in medical and military reforms but the unification of Italy, Prussia eclipsing Austria as Central Europe's power broker and increased Turkish nationalism. Even as my appreciation of Richardson's film grew, research presented another question: how accurate is The Charge of the Light Brigade?
This article examines The Charge of the Light Brigade through an historical and thematic lens. I will lean on The Reason Why except where the film deviates from it. As with my Lawrence of Arabia pieces, I'll balance historical critique with understanding the needs for dramatic compression. Accuracy isn't an end of itself, but it's worth examining why filmmakers alter history for dramatic purposes. Especially a movie like Charge that prides itself on supposed authenticity.
The Filmmaker, the Playwright and the Angry Young Man: Tony Richardson, Charles Wood and John Osborne
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| Tony Richardson (left) and John Osborne. |
Richardson thought The Reason Why "a brilliant piece of historical writing" (231) and spent years developing the project. Along with Osborne, Richardson began researching Charge in the mid-'60s, scouting locations in Turkey and negotiating with Turkish officials and English diplomats. While in preproduction, Richardson discovered that actor Laurence Harvey owned the rights to Woodham-Smith's book, forcing Woodfall to tread carefully.
To avoid legal complications, Richardson encouraged Osborne to avoid Woodham-Smith, drawing on Alexander Kinglake's Invasion of the Crimea (1863-1887) instead. However, Harvey's company sued Woodfall on the grounds that Osborne disregarded these instructions; Richardson admits the writer "had helped himself liberally to stylistic phrases and descriptions in The Reason Why" (232). Osborne subsequently fell out with Richardson, attacking the director's "use and misuse [of] the talents of others... with mocking vampire contempt" (Heilpern 347). Connelly informs us that Richardson mostly discarded Osborne's script.
Richardson now turned to Charles Wood. Wood wrote several several plays, including Cockade, H. and Prisoner and Escort, which drew on his military background (serving, appropriately, in Lord Lucan's 17th/21st Lancers) to satirize British society. He collaborated with Richard Lester on Swinging Sixties touchstones Help! and The Knack and How to Get It (both 1965), along with the antiwar satire How I Won the War (1967). After Woodfall settled with Harvey, Wood openly utilized The Reason Why; Woodham-Smith receives a credit in the film. Wood says his script shows "everything I felt about the British Empire, the British army, England under Queen Victoria and the first of the modern wars" (Connelly 25).
One couldn't assemble a better team for a caustic satire. The son of a Jewish chemist, Richardson resented "that virus of the British - class" (37) for making his parents "tool, skimp, sacrifice so that their son would have the opportunities they never had" (45) and delaying his entry into theater and film. Working class Osborne was the original "Angry Young Man," his plays showcasing the disillusionment of postwar Britons, while Wood ridiculed English society through subversive comedy. It's hardly surprising that they produced a movie that "charges us to question authority" (Cahir & Cahir 165).
Sweating the Small Stuff
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| Bingham's Dandies cut tight to a shadow. |
Most evident are the costumes. Richardson effusively praised both the Mollos and production designer Lila de Nobili, a veteran of Luchino Visconti's epics, for their meticulous attention to detail. Though they clashed with Richardson over aesthetic decisions, the result is quite impressive. Cardigan's 11th Hussars became notorious for what The Times called "the brevity of their [gold-laced] jackets... the incredible tightness of their cherry-colored pants" (Woodham-Smith 62). However, Richardson inaccurately attired the entire Light Brigade in these britches. Historically the 15th and 17th Lancers sported dark blue trousers; only the Heavy Brigade appears correctly attired in a brief appearance.
Then there's the dialogue. Wood stressed the importance of language: "Once you find a language for the characters to speak... the rest seems to follow"; he even remained on-set helping actors master the dialect (Connelly 39-40). At one point, Cardigan and Lucan exchange arcane insults: Cardigan calls Lucan a stew stick and a poltroon (coward); Lucan replies that Cardigan is a bum roll (ladies' underwear). Wood showcases the cavalry's laughably affected lisps, with Captains Duberly and Featherstonehaugh, along with Riding Master Mogg, pronouncing r's as w's ("Gwey, sneaky coluh!") like Elmer Fudd (Woodham-Smith 140). Astonishingly this was a point of pride, distinguishing cavalry from the phonetically proper infantry.
Wood also incorporates dialogue from Woodham-Smith's account. Hence Fanny Duberly's comments on the 11th's uniforms paraphrasing The Times extract above; Cardigan saying that Lucan wasn't "fit to command an escort," though Lucan said it about Cardigan (Woodham-Smith 57); Lord Raglan wanting to keep his cavalry "in a bandbox" (176); and Cardigan muttering "here goes the last of the Brudenells" right before the Charge (237). Notably, the fateful exchange between Nolan, Cardigan and Lucan draws from Woodham-Smith's account almost verbatim (233-237).
Richard Williams: Rendering an Era
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| Victorian self-image. |
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| Punch cartoon ca. 1854. Source |
Williams draws heavily on contemporary Victorian art. The most obvious influence is Punch magazine, whose cartoons critiqued English politics and culture. Williams borrows specific images from Punch: the Russian bear menacing a fez-sporting Turkey; a sword-bearing Liberty, accompanied by an English lion, defending "Right Against Wrong." These segments illustrate Britain's sense of superiority as the 19th Century's economic and cultural center, and role as "the world's policeman."
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| Richard Williams' interpretation. |
Here it's worth mentioning John Addison's score. For live action the music is either romantic (Nolan's soulful clarinet theme), funereal (Nolan and Co. surveying the Alma battlefield) or angry (discordant trumpets over the pre-Balaclava arguments). Over the animations, however, Addison becomes positively bombastic: blaring trumpets, lively woodwinds, snatches of Rule Britannia and La Marseillaise, a chorus proclaiming "The rule of British pride and strength." For the Crimean voyage, Addison even borrows a cue from his score for The Cockleshell Heroes (1955), a much more conventional war movie. His scoring provides another layer of satire.
As we've seen, Richardson, Wood and Williams get most of the details correct. In its look, feel and syntax, Charge rings true. Whether it's more broadly truthful, of course, is another matter.
Class Warfare: Indian Officers Versus the Purchase System
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| Upper class twits. |
Richardson captures the prejudiced, anti-intellectual attitudes of the British Army. Cardigan sniffs at Nolan as "some damned novelist!" and refers to him and Morris as "Indian devils." Observing a flogging, Mogg tells Nolan that an army founded on ideals and professionalism instead of discipline would be "Hun-Christian!" Lord Raglan sums things up later in a blackly comic speech: "It will be a sad day when England's armies are officered by men who know too well what they're doing. Smacks of murder!"
These sentiments are broadly true. Prejudice against "Indian" officers was pervasive in the British Army, a curious phenomenon given Wellington's service in India. It's undeniably true that aristocrats abused the purchase system: with no prior experience, Cardigan bought his lieutenant colonelcy of the 15th Hussars for £35,000 (Woodham-Smith 35)! These facts certainly suit Richardson's satirical intentions. Even so, it's undeniable Charge greatly simplifies these issues.
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| Generals in waiting. |
All the same, the system's shortcomings were self-evident. Merit and money didn't often coincide, with many aristocrats seeing peacetime service as a platform for easy prestige. After the Crimean debacle, public outcry spelled purchase's demise. During the late 1860s Lord Cardwell enforced a sweeping series of military reforms, including abolition of the purchase system. Their leading proponent was Sir Garnet Wolseley, a Crimean veteran who opined "almost all our officers...were absolutely unfit for the positions they had secured through family and political interest" (Woodham-Smith 141).
We also can't assume the experience of Indian officers made them fitter for command. Britain's imperial armies occasionally encountered organized, well-armed foes, as in the Anglo-Sikh Wars of the 1840s. More often they were brushfire wars against Pathan brigands and African tribes, a far cry from fighting Russia. Alan Clark's influential World War I history The Donkeys (1962) ridiculed Haig, French and others for thinking experience fighting Boers and Pathans translated to competence fighting against Germany. If we accept Connelly's argument that Charge's filmmakers drew from Clark (18), this seems like Richardson and Wood having their cake and eating it.
Captain Nolan: Ambivalent Hero
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| Nolan embarks on his toughest mission: converting Vanessa Redgrave to Toryism. |
Nolan was undoubtedly an extraordinary man. Son of a Scottish diplomat, he was educated abroad, serving in the Austrian cavalry before transferring to India. His books The Training of Cavalry Remount Horses (1852) and Cavalry: Its History and Tactics (1853) became standard works; he also designed a new cavalry saddle. Adkin claims Nolan "invited criticism by many who felt him to be conceited, rash and intolerant," (33), while M.M. Gilchrist argues this accusation came from jealous peers. He nonetheless impressed Quartermaster General Richard Airey; at the outbreak of war he sent Nolan to procure cavalry horses in Syria. He became Airey's aide-de-camp, playing a key role on Raglan's staff, until selected to deliver Raglan's "fourth order" on October 25th.
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| "You are drinking beer, sir! Porter beer!" |
But Nolan also embodies the various officers who crossed Cardigan over the years. Among them: Augustus Wathen, whose feud with Cardigan led to the latter's dismissal from the 15th Lancers (Woodham-Smith 41-49); John Reynolds, protagonist of the "black bottle" affair depicted in the film (63-66); and Harvey Tuckett, with whom Cardigan fought a duel over a critical public letter (82-85). Nolan never served in the 11th Hussars and barely knew Cardigan; it was Lucan who earned most of his contempt. Additionally, while Richardson/Wood imply Nolan saw action in India this isn't the case; it was true of Captain Morris, who fought in the Anglo-Sikh War (Adkin 31).
It's acceptable for Wood to create a composite character, summing up decades of Cardigan rivalries and the
Army's broader systemic failures. Dramatically, strict accuracy would diffuse the conflict amongst a half-dozen officers with marginal screen time; concentrating on Nolan makes sense. All the same, such license distorts Nolan's character significantly. His brusque, insubordinate attitude at Balaclava is more understandable, even sympathetic, after being subjected to years of abuse by Cardigan.
Richardson and Wood don't elide Nolan's less flattering aspects. He's shown to be more eager for war than the senior officers, calling it "the stuff we've all been waiting for." His affair with Clarissa, wife of Captain Morris, undermines any claims to moral superiority. Nolan is very much an anti-hero, but still Charge's most sympathetic character. He's a smart, skilled, but arrogant man pushed over the edge by his superiors and ultimately sacrificed to their folly.
Rogue's Gallery: Lords Cardigan, Lucan and Raglan
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| The story of us looks a lot like a tragedy now. |
Richardson makes Cardigan his primary antagonist, the embodiment of aristocratic privilege against the young, reasonable Nolan. He routinely embarrasses his officers, forcing the green Codrington to eat lettuce and calling Mogg a "monkey" - and these are his toadies. Cardigan insults Nolan in the mess and enlists an unwilling Sergeant Major to spy on him. Every Sunday he pays soldiers to salute him on the street, stroking his ego and inflating his public image. While campaigning he plays the role of "gentleman adventurer"; forcing his men to pitch and repitch tents symmetrically, he spends evenings drinking on his private yacht with the porcine Squire De Burgh. Nothing shakes his sense of entitlement: not reprimands by Lord Raglan, not being booed at a theater, not the destruction of his Brigade.
Lord Lucan's portrayal is comparably one-dimensional. He's merely a foil for Cardigan, accentuating Cardigan's nastiness and providing another portrait of aristocratic idiocy. The movie omits Lucan's complicated back story: his forcible evictions of Irish tenants (Woodham-Smith 118-120), which earned him hatred in Ireland and criticism at home (123), and his service with the Russian army during the Russo-Turkish War of 1828 (34-35). But Richardson correctly shows his fractious relationship with Cardigan, stemming from Lucan's unhappy marriage to Cardigan's sister. Lord Raglan was so eager to keep them apart that he detached Cardigan to quasi-independent command. Not only did this exacerbate the feuding brother-in-laws, it opened a rift between Lucan and Raglan (194).
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| Lord Raglan, fighting the last war. |
Raglan's performance in the Crimea remains controversial. Woodham-Smith's portrait anticipates the film: Raglan is well-meaning and amiable, but completely out of his depth leading an army: "Without the military trappings... one would never have guessed him to be a soldier" (156). Raglan mistaking the Russians for the French is well-documented, though perhaps not so malign as the film suggests (Woodham-Smith 162; Hibbert 277). Raglan's undeniable mistakes were trying to avoid Cardigan and Lucan's feud rather than resolve it, and his unclear orders to Lucan at Balaclava.
Other historians take a more sympathetic view. Christopher Hibbert admits Raglan's tactical mistakes but emphasizes his courage and generous nature which ensured a smooth relationship with his French and Turkish allies (who, notably, are all but ignored in Charge). Hibbert argues the press and government leaders scapegoated Raglan for higher-level administrative failings: "Members of the Government were determined that they... should not play the part" (228). Modern writers also differ in their assessments (cf. Adkin 240-241; Royle 398-400). Viewers must decide whether the film's Raglan is a fair representation.
The Curious Case of Mrs. Duberly
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| The Duberlys observe the Charge. |
No one reading Duberly's journal, or E.E.P. Tisdall's Mrs. Duberly's Campaigns (1963), can avoid being impressed by this intelligent, fiercely determined woman. It's puzzling that Charge portrays her as a fatuous ninny, obsessed with war and sex. From her introduction Fanny ponders bedding Cardigan, drooling over his "beautiful head" and "looking like I want to be ridden by him." Richardson suggests that Duberly's promiscuity stems partially from social advancement, with his husband pushing Fanny on Cardigan. This culminates in Cardigan crudely seducing Fanny, a bawdy bedroom farce recalling Richardson's Tom Jones. This scene highlights Victorian hypocrisy, contrasting public virtue and private randiness (Cahir & Cahir 167).
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| Rumpy pumpy. |
If Richardson and Wood merely hoped to highlight Cardigan's debauchery, there were historical alternatives. For one, in 1843 Cardigan had an extramarital affair with Fanny Paget, sister-in-law of Lord George Paget of the 15th Hussars (Woodham-Smith 95-96; David 257-262). This liaison, which inevitably boiled over into public scandal, would have served Richardson's attack on aristocratic licentiousness without distorting the historical record. Even conflating George with his brother would be no more egregious than Nolan standing in for Reynolds et al.
Professor Connelly suggests that screenwriter Wood may have wanted to deflate Fanny Duberly's unblemished reputation. For him and Richardson, a war so ludicrous as the Crimea could produce no genuine heroes. This puckish conceit, in keeping with Wood's antiwar, antimilitary preoccupations, explains as well as anything the decision to misrepresent such a remarkable personage.
Balaclava: The Main Event
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| Into the Valley of Death. |
The scene opens with Lucan and his staff spotting "two flags" on the road to Balaclava. Lucan asks a subordinate if he's sure the flags mean a Russian advance - and is answered immediately by cannon fire! This remarkable moment is documented in Lord George Paget's memoirs, and recounted by Woodham-Smith (213). The shelling rouses Cardigan from slumber on his yacht, helped hurriedly into uniform by Squire De Burgh and Fanny Duberly, who first gives Cardigan a lusty kiss. The former is accurate; the latter, again, is not.
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| Any more questions, My Lord? |
More notable is the absence of Balacava's second- and third-most famous events: the "Thin Red Line," where Colin Campbell's 93rd Highlanders repulsed the Russian cavalry, and the Charge of James Scarlett's Heavy Brigade, routing a far superior enemy force. In the latter, Cardigan ignored a discretionary order by Lucan to counterattack the fleeing Russians. Many historians think that if Cardigan had advanced, the Russians would have been routed and the battle won (Woodham-Smith 227-228; Hibbert 140).
A cynic might suggest Richardson and Wood elided these incidents because British victories would distract from their antiwar theme. In fact, Richardson filmed at least the Heavy Brigade's charge (Richardson 239; Welsh & Tibbets 35-36). Since Campbell and Scarlett received prominent introductions earlier in the film (Campbell leading his brigade at the Alma; Scarlett, hosting a ball early in the movie), we can assume Richardson intended them to have larger roles. He admits having to "junk whole scenes, subplots and sequences" (239) from his four hour rough cut; he may not have missed excising his tormentor Laurence Harvey, cast as a Heavy Brigade officer.
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| This still appears to show the Charge of the Heavy Brigade. Note the blue pants and metal helmets on the British cavalry, distinct from the Light Brigade's red trousers and bearskin caps. |
When the Light Brigade takes center stage, Richardson stands on firmer ground. He has Raglan patronizingly explain to Fanny Duberly his intentions with the Light Brigade, an invented but credible conversation as the Duberlys did observe the Charge (Tisdall 97-100). Using Watkin's panoramic photography, Richardson takes care to show the crucial difference in vantage points; the south valley with the captured British guns is visible from Raglan's perspective but not Lucan's, who can only see the well-defended north valley. It helps that Richardson found a Turkish location topographically similar to the real Balaclava battlefield.
The arguments between Nolan, Cardigan and Lucan over Raglan's orders, as noted, follows Woodham-Smith, as does Cardigan insisting Colonel John Douglas of the 11th Hussars give "your best support" (237). Nolan did ride ahead of the Light Brigade and was hit by a shellburst, delivering an ear-splitting shriek before dying (240). Richardson again follows Woodham-Smith, showing Nolan trying to divert Cardigan into the right valley. In contrast, Adkin thinks Nolan meant to spur the Brigade onward (156-158); David Kelsey argues his intentions can't be inferred either way. By accepting Woodham-Smith's account, Richardson puts an exclamation point on his critique: the only sane man dies immediately, allowing his superiors to destroy the Light Brigade.
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| Competent officers to the rear! |
The coda again draws on Woodham-Smith: Captain Duberly musing that the Brigade's remnants are mere "skirmishers" (252); Cardigan fuming over Nolan's impudence, then being told "You've just ridden over his body" (252); Cardigan telling his men "It was a mad harebrained trick, but no fault of mine" and declining their offer to "Go again" (253); Raglan telling Lucan "You have lost the Light Brigade" (256). Raglan, Lucan, Cardigan and Airey commence squabbling over responsibility; juxtaposed against dead soldiers and destroyed horses, their petty bickering no longer seems amusing. A grievously wounded Captain Morris watches incredulously.
This provides Charge a grim, powerful climax, destroying any vestige of military glory or conventional excitement. In real life, it's claimed that army exercises forced the recall of the Turkish troops participating in filming, accounting for Richardson's close-ups and scaled back action. Intentional or not, the cluttered, dusty and inglorious depiction of the Charge perfectly fits his view of the Crimean War as a stupid blunder from beginning to end.
Conclusion
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| Too late the hero. |
Works Cited
Cahir, Linda Costanzo and Stephen Cahir. "History Revisited: The Charge of the Light Brigade." James M. Welsh and John C. Tibbets (eds.), The Cinema of Tony Richardson: Essays and Interviews. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1999. 161-175
Connelly, Mark. British Film Guides: The Charge of the Light Brigade. London: I.B. Tauris, 2003.
Heilpern, John. John Osborne: A Patriot for Us. London: Chatto & Windus, 2006.
Redgrave, Vanessa. Vanessa Redgrave: An Autobiography. London: Random House, 2004.
Richardson, Tony. The Long-Distance Runner: An Autobiography. New York: William Morrow & Company, Inc., 1993.
Welsh, James M., and John C. Tibbets. "Let's Talk Tony: Interviews With Colleagues." Welsh and Tibbets (eds.), The Cinema of Tony Richardson: Essays and Interviews. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1999. 23-47
Historical
Adkin, Mark. The Charge: The Real Reason Why the Light Brigade Was Lost. London: Leo Cooper, 1997.
David, Saul. The Homicidal Earl: The Life of Lord Cardigan. London: Abacus, 1997.
Duberly, Frances. Journal Kept During the Russian War: From The Departure Of The Army From England In April 1854, To The Fall Of Sebastopol. London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1856 (Second Edition).
Gilchrist, M.M. "Louis Edward Nolan." Dispatch: the Journal of the Scottish Military Historical Society. 12-15
Hibbert, Christopher. The Destruction of Lord Raglan: A Tragedy of the Crimean War, 1854-1856. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Military Library, 1999. Originally published 1961.
Kelsey, David. "Evidence and Belief: Captain Nolan's Final Moments." The War Correspondent, Spring 2003. 70
Nolan, Louis. Cavalry: Its History and Tactics. London: Bosworth & Harrison, 1860. Originally published 1853.
Royle, Trevor. Crimea: The Great Crimean War, 1854-1856. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
Tisdall, E.E.P. Mrs. Duberly's Campaigns. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1963.
Woodham-Smith, Cecil. The Reason Why: The Story of the Fatal Charge of the Light Brigade. London: Penguin, 1958. Originally published 1953.
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Additionally, I wish to thank Professor Mark Connelly for his assistance in preparing this article. He answered my questions about the film and his book quickly, succinctly and helpfully.
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