WI The Charge of the Light Brigade was a success

[bard32]

We're all familiar with the Alfred, Lord Tennyson poem The Charge of the
Light Brigade. "Half a league, Half a league, Half a league onward, All in the Valley of Death rode the six hundred..." The poem tells the story of an
actual event. The Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaklava in the
Crimean War. The Charge of the Light Brigade was an unmitigated failure.
Most of the Light Brigade was killed. According to the History Channel series
Battlefield Detectives, the charge was ordered by a British officer after
the Russians took the British cannon. The officer pointed in the direction of the
cliffs, saying "There are your cannons!" when he was asked where the cannons
were. What if the Charge of the Light Brigade was a success and they were able to retrieve the cannons?

 

[rcduggan]

There was something like 10,000 soldiers (my guess of 20 battalions) involved in the Russian side, along with the cannons and Russian cavalry. Six hundred British cavalrymen attacked the Russians.

10,000 against 600. There is almost no way this could succeed.

 

[bard32]

There was something like 10,000 soldiers (my guess of 20 battalions) involved in the Russian side, along with the cannons and Russian cavalry. Six hundred British cavalrymen attacked the Russians.

10,000 against 600. There is almost no way this could succeed.

Kind of like Pickett's Charge nine years later in the Battle of Gettysburg. Good
propaganda though for the British. The legend, or myth, take your pick, of the
"Thin Red Line," was born during the Crimean War. Add to this, that the British officer who'd ordered the charge pointed to the wrong cliffs, the British didn't
know exactly where the captured cannons were, and when the commander of the Heavy Brigade saw the decimated Light Brigade returning,
he's reported to have said: "They had the Lights! They won't have the Heavies
too!"

 

[67th Tigers]

Simple, Lucan (not Scarlett) doesn't halt the Heavy Brigade half way up the valley. The Light Brigade had totally smashed the Russian right, and was standing on the Russian Line of Retreat. Had the Heavy Brigade been committed to drive off the remaining Russian cavalry (as they did in both their earlier charges that day), then the British would have completely enveloped the Russians.

 

[bard32]

Simple, Lucan (not Scarlett) doesn't halt the Heavy Brigade half way up the valley. The Light Brigade had totally smashed the Russian right, and was standing on the Russian Line of Retreat. Had the Heavy Brigade been committed to drive off the remaining Russian cavalry (as they did in both their earlier charges that day), then the British would have completely enveloped the Russians.

That's a good point.