Impact of Crimea War - Press Coverage

Question 1

How was news reported in the 18th Century (before Crimea) ?

Answer 1

• News travelled slowly, town criers would announce what would happen weeks after battle
• This would lead to rumours and gossip, leading to inevitable inaccuracies

Question 2

Why were Newspapers in the 19th Century also not that useful?

Answer 2

• They were based on edited official dispatches or eyewitness accounts that were weeks out of date

Question 3

What helped increase education in Britain?

Answer 3

• Church Sunday Schools, Charity Schools for the poor and laws forcing factory owners to give workers a basic education
• By 1850 over half the population could read and write increasing demand for reading materials
• Novelists such as Charlotte Bronte, Mrs Gaskell, Charles Dickens and William Thackeray now had a broad appeal

Question 4

What was the Public Libraries Act?

Answer 4

• 1850, gave free reading materials to all

Question 5

What was being developed in the 1830’s and 1840’s?

Answer 5

• Inventors were developing photography so images could be taken with cameras to be preserved and printed

Question 6

When were cameras reliable enough to take onto the Battlefield and what was the limitations?

Answer 6

• 1850’s there could be taken into zones of warfare
• No action shots could be taken as the subjects had to hold a pose for several seconds for a picture to be taken
• Nonetheless this gave real insight to what war was like

Question 7

How did railways improve communication?

Answer 7

• ‘Railway Mania’ in the 1840’s gave Britain the worlds first steam rail network connecting major population centres
• Newspapers could be printed in one day and taken all over the country the following day
• National public opinion started being reflected in the press and involved in politics

Question 8

Apart from railways, what was also a key factor in the quicker spread of information?

Answer 8

• Electric telegraphs, a system for sendin coded messages electrically through metal wires
• Telegraph would allow briefs to be transported in hours
• Despite no direct link between Crimea and Britain, British laid a line from Crimea to Varna allowing telegraphs to be sent in stages

Question 9

Give an example in Crimea of war stories being covered by the press more quickly?

Answer 9

• The Battle of Alma was reported by The Times just a week after the battle

Question 10

Give an example of slow coverage of war events in the Napoleonic Era?

Answer 10

• BA in Spain sent reports carried by horse wagons to Lisbon
• This took weeks, and after this they were shipped to Britain
• The Battle of Salamanca (22nd July 1812) was in The Times on 17th August, nearly a month later

Question 11

Who was the first photographer to be sent to Crimea?

Answer 11

• Richard Nicklin was the first official photographer in the Crimea
• He was sent by the War Office early in the conflict
• However all his photos were lost as the ship carrying them sank

Question 12

Who was Roger Fenton and how did he end up in Crimea?

Answer 12

• Fenton was a commercial photographer who worked for the publisher Thomas Agnew
• He was encouraged to go to the Crimea by the Duke of Newcastle and Prince Albert
• Albert believed he would counter negative press with his photos and even gave Fenton a letter of intro for the army command

Question 13

What was Roger Fentons photography like?

Answer 13

• His publisher believed that his main demographic would be servicemen and their families who would buy the pics as souvenirs
• Officers were wealthier and more likely to buy so Fenton often photographed them
• Fentons pictures were of motionless people and landscapes

Question 14

What did Roger Fenton avoid photographing and how long was he in the Crimea?

Answer 14

• He avoided photographing injury, death and the horrors of war as they were less likely to sell
• Fenton was only in the Crimea from March to June 1855, he missed all the big wars and the winter of 1854-5
• Can be said he did not depict true war

Question 15

How did ‘The Times’ react to people being interested in war reporting?

Answer 15

• Sent William Howard Russel and Thomas Chenery to Crimea as war correspondents
• Chenery was stationed in Constantinople where he wrote about Florence Nightingale and conditions of Barrack Hospital in Scutari
• Other papers like ‘Illustrated London News’ and ‘The Daily News’ also sent correspondents to Crimea

Question 16

What was William Howard Russel’s reporting like?

Answer 16

• Was in Crimea at the beginning of the Siege on Sevastopol and the Battle of Alma and Inkerman, spending a lot of time at the front
• Russel reported many issues with the allied troops at Alma and reported the horrors of war he had witnessed

Question 17

What kind of things did William Howard Russel report?

Answer 17

• Was interested in the treatment of wounded, battlefield surgery and evacuation of casualties
• Made unflattering comparisons between the BA’s medical service and the French’s medical service
• Provided detailed performance reports of BA army generals, e.g criticised Raglan for refusing to pursue the defeated Russians after Alma

Question 18

Who did William Howard Russel report on the side of?

Answer 18

• He reported on the side of the ordinary soldier
• He was keen to describe the appalling conditions they had to experience
• He was not afraid to criticise army command

Question 19

What did Raglan do to William Howard Russel?

Answer 19

Raglan forbade any of his officers to speak to him as he was critical of him

Question 20

What was the primary impact of press coverage on politics?

Answer 20

• Russel exposed the negligence of the War Office
• January 1855 a motion calling for a committee of enquiry to conduct of war passed by a huge majority in the House of Commons
• Aberdeen took this as a veiled vote of no confidence and resigned

Question 21

What was the impact of press coverage on public opinion?

Answer 21

• Press helped highlight issues such as midwife training and found solutions, e.g the Nightingale fund
• Public meeting in London at the end of 1855 to recognise Florence Nightingales work
• Large sum of money was raised in her honour through public subscriptions, concerts and fund-raising activities
• A committee of the Nightingale fund was set up with Sidney Herbert as the Honorary Secretary and the Duke of Cambridge as Chairman

Question 22

What was the use of the press after Crimea?

Answer 22

• Palmerston had understood the Press as a tool and of great political importance
• Discrete censorship existed in the Press in the later years and a hatred began to form for it from higher ups
• Lord Clarendon, the BA foreign secretary called the press “enemies we had not taken into account” in a letter to his ambassador in Constantinople