by Peter Frost
The Crimean war has been back in the news this
month. Education Secretary - and history dunce - Michael Gove has done another
U-turn and we can all be relieved that Mary Seacole, one of the greatest ever
black Britons, is to remain on the national curriculum.
Seacole, a nurse who cared for soldiers during the
Crimean war, was one of the first and most prominent black figures in British
history. Gove, it seems, planned to replace her with more
traditional Tory figures, such as Winston Churchill. A huge campaign, including
a petition signed by more than 35,000 people, was just one reason Gove changed his
mind.
Coincidentally, I am always reminded of the Crimean war
at this time of year but for a much more prosaic reason. Drifts of snowdrops
normally paint the winter woodlands white at this time of year and they have an
amazing link with the Crimea.
For me, the delicate nodding white flowers, piercing
frozen earth, herald the arrival of spring. Others declare them to be the last
flower of winter.
There are over 2,000 different types of snowdrop, or
galanthus, growing wild in our countryside and in our gardens. There are even
snowdrop clubs and snowdrop societies, and today rare and exotic bulbs change
hands for large sums of money.
Many of the more interesting snowdrop varieties were
introduced to Britain during and just after the Crimean war. Out of the horror
of one of Britain's worst examples of imperialism and military incompetence has
come this tiny but beautiful addition to our native flora.
British soldiers found themselves fighting in the rugged
hills of what today is Ukraine. Jingoistic propaganda convinced them they were
there to tame the Russian bear.
In July 1853 Russia occupied territories in the Crimea
that had previously been controlled by Turkey. Britain and France decided to do
something about Russian expansionism. After the Russians destroyed the Turkish
fleet at Sinope in the Black Sea in November 1853, Britain and France joined
the war against Russia.
The war was hard and diseases like cholera and malaria
took a greater toll of British troops than did the Russian guns. The famous
charge of the Light Brigade was perhaps the classic example of an incompetent
and uncaring officer class using the fighting man as cannon fodder. It still
happens today.
In the midst of all the horror of war came the hard
Crimean winter and with it came the miracle of the snowdrops. These pretty and
delicate flowers flourished in the harsh Crimean snows.
Snowdrops grew wild near the terrible blood-stained battlefields
of the Crimean peninsula and British soldiers, homesick for their gardens,
collected the tiny bulbs to bring home or to slip into letters to their wives
and sweethearts. You find them today planted on the graves of soldiers of the
Crimean war.
Specialist lists of snowdrops still have varieties named
after fighting men of that war.
Huge naturalised swathes of the tiny flowers are found in
areas with rich military history and traditions.
The flower's delicate and fragile beauty must have been a
small comfort and contrast to the horror of war. Returning soldiers planted the
tiny bulbs and enough survived to change the nature of our countryside forever.
Officers, as well as enlisted men, brought home the bulbs too, and many a
stately home has its drift of the tiny white flowers transplanted from the
shores of the Black Sea.
So if enough of the snow melts this weekend try to get
out to see the snowdrops. Remember another group of British working men sent to
die in a pointless foreign war. And remember too the brave Mary Seacole who
bought healing and comfort to both sides in the battles among the snowdrops on
the battlefields of the Crimea.
Michael Gove? I think perhaps we should confine him to
the dustbin of history.
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