Excerpt from Our Fighting Sea Men

When "Billy" Russell of the Times started to tell the country the truth about the condition of our troops in the Crimea, and the murderous mismanagement of things by those in command, both the Queen and Prince Consort were furious, the latter referring to Russell as "that miserable scribbler", while Sidney Herbert, the Minister of War, writing to Gladstone, said: "I trust the Army will lynch the Times correspondent. If they were to hang Mr. Russell, I believe the public here would be very well pleased." But Russell, instead of being hanged, lived to be honoured, it was Herbert and his colleagues who were metaphorically hanged by an indignant country.

When Sir William Butler dared to be honest enough to tell the truth about the condition of South Africa, he was relieved of his post. And the Government who committed that blunder also fell, stricken and shattered at the Polls.

It is an exceedingly unpleasant, and not always a profitable task, to expose the feet of clay of a popular idol, and he who dares to do it must be prepared for the rending that is sure to follow. But I have been rent so often that really the process has no terrors for me, otherwise this book would surely not have been written.

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