412- APPENDIX. NOTE v.* Correspondence respecting the placing of the Buoy by THE French in the night between the ISth and 14th OP Septembep.. FIRST LETTER Captain Mends on the sihjed of the Btioij. TO TUK EDITOR OF TUE 'TIMES.' SiK^ — jVIay I ask the insertion in your columns of the following remarks'? As I have been referred to by many as to the truth of Mr Kinglake's statement, in his ' Invasion of the Crimea,' ' that the landing of our army at Old Fort was materially
- delayed by the wilful misplacement of a buoy by the
' French,' I feel called upon, in justice to the French naval service, to state the facts which came under my own ob- servation ; and here I desire to observe that, during two years of very close intercourse with that service, their whole conduct, so i'ar from being such as to bring oui harmony into grievous jeopardy, was that of chivalrous, loyal allies. As I am the officer who, by the direction of Sir Edmund Lyons, planned the whole of the details connected with the embarkation, transfer, and landing of the army, it initjht suffice for me ainipJi/ to sai/ that J rememher iiothiinj about a buoy ; that Mr Lower, the master of the Agamem- non, who conned the ship under my orders, remcnihers nothlufj about a buoy ; and that Captain Spratt (who then
- The imblicalion of the above coiTesi)ond(.Mii.e as an ' Addunduiu' to
this socoiid volume takes place with the assent of Captain Mends. For the purpose of indicating passages vhich seem to me to be among the most important in regard to the rpiestiou of fact, 1 have taken the liberty of causing some portions of Captain Mends's letters to be printed in italics.
