Beschreibung:

Crimean War. ‘Log of the proceedings of Her Majesty's steam Frigate Sidon, George Goldsmith Esq., Captain, kept by George Tate Medd [1838-1907], midshipman’, manuscript, 1 January 1855 to 24 June 1857, a detailed log commencing off Sevastopol and continuing in the Black Sea for the next 18 months, most of the time anchored off Sevastopol or Balaclava or between the two, apart from voyages to Corfu transporting the 82nd Regt., and bringing back the 1st Royals, and to Malta for refitting, Medd meticulously records the comings & goings of vessels of all nationalities, notes troop movements and other military activities which he can see on shore (‘Russians throwing up earth works on N. side’), the taking on board British, French & Turkish troops and Russian prisoners, flags of truce and exchange of prisoners, crew training & discipline with fairly frequent floggings (usually 36 lashes) &c., &c., on 15 June 1856 the Crimean Medal is distributed to the ship's company, and on the 17th ‘Rec'd 24 officers & 714 rank & file of the 93rd Highlanders for passage to England’, arriving in Portsmouth Harbour alongside the Prince Regent hulk on 15 July, the troops are disembarked & the ship paid off; with various illustrations mainly from the 'Illustrated London News' (some annotated by Medd, e.g. ‘This is really a very fair birds eye view of Sebastopol as seen from the masthead of the old 'Sidon' steam frigate by me’), but including two drawings by Medd, one of which is a plan of the attack on Fort Kinburn on 17 October 1855 written on 148 pages; then on leaving the 'Sidon' the log continues with Medd's further service with two short spells on the 'Victory' in Portsmouth Harbour, mainly occupied in instructing boys in cutlass & gun drill, on 21 August 1856 a boy named George Reed is receiving 36 lashes at about the same time as Her Majesty is passing in the 'Fairy' to land at Clarence Yard; from 18 October 1856 to 12 February 1857 the volume records the voyage to and from Irish ports of H.M. steam sloop 'Driver', Ennis Chambers, commander, during which Medd exercises the watch and 'young gentlemen' at gun drill; ending with ‘Log of H.M.S. 'Sans-Pareil', Astley Cooper Key, captain, to Hong Kong’, the log of this 10-gun screw line of battle ship ends between the Cape of Good Hope & Singapore on 24 June, 1857, in all a total of approximately 248 pages of manuscript written in a standard-ruled log book, with various illustrations including wood engravings (cut from Illustrated London News) of 'Driver and 'Sans-Pareil', old boards with canvas covering, heavily soiled, folio (Quantity: 1) Sidon served in the Black Sea in the Crimean War, 1854-55, under the command of Captain George Goldsmith. In September 1854, in the Allied invasion of the Crimea, she was assigned to escorting the French troop transports, and assisted the French line-of-battleship Algiers, which had gone aground in Eupatoria Bay. She was then sent to monitor Russian movements around Odessa. William Simpson painted a scene titled 'Sebastopol from the Sea, Sketched from the Deck of H.M.S. Sidon, Feb. 1855', which was reproduced as one of the lithographs in The Seat of War in the East (1855-56). About ten years after this log was written Medd left the Navy as a Lieutenant and entered the Church, where he was eventually, for many years, Vicar of Whitchurch, Aylesbury.