The troops halted for the night at Katcha, where the French were reinforced by 8000 men who were landed from transports just arrived, and the English by the Scots Greys and the 57th.  As it was found that the enemy had batteries along the northwest of the harbor of Sebastopol which would cause delay and trouble to invest, while the army engaged in the operation would have to draw all its provisions and stores from the harbor at the mouth of the Katcha River, it was determined to march round Sebastopol, and to invest it on the southern side, where the Russians, not expecting it, would have made but slight preparations for a resistance.

Towards the sea-face, Sebastopol was of immense strength, mounting seventeen guns at the Telegraph Battery, 104 at Fort Constantine, eighty at Fort Saint Michael, forty at battery No. 4, and some fifty others in smaller batteries.  All these were on the north side of the harbor.  On the southern side were the Quarantine Fort with fifty-one guns, Fort Alexander with sixty-four, the Arsenal Battery with fifty, Fort Saint Nicholas with 192, and Fort Paul with eighty.  In addition to these tremendous defences, booms had been fixed across the mouth of the harbor, and a three-decker, three two-deckers, and two frigates sunk in a line, forming a formidable barrier against the entry of hostile ships.  Besides all this, the whole of the Russian Black Sea fleet were in harbor, and prepared to take part in the defence against an attack by sea.  Upon the other hand, Sebastopol was naturally weak on the land side.  It lay in a hollow, and guns from the upper ground could everywhere search it.

At the time when the Allied Armies arrived before it the only defences were an old loop-holed wall, a battery of fourteen guns and six mortars, and one or two batteries which were as yet scarcely commenced.

The march from the Katcha to the south side was performed without interruption, and on the 26th, six days after the battle of Alma, the Allied Army reached their new position.  According to arrangements, the British occupied the harbor of Balaklava, while the French took possession of Kamiesch and Kaznatch, as bases for the supply of their armies.  At the mouth of Balaklava Harbor are the ruins of a Genoese fort standing 200 feet above the sea.  This was supposed to be unoccupied.  As the staff, however, were entering the town, they were astonished by four shells falling close to them.

The “Agamemnon,” which was lying outside, at once opened fire, and the fort immediately hung out a flag of truce.  The garrison consisted only of the commandant and sixty men.  The officer, on being asked why he should have opened fire when he knew that the place could not be held, replied that he did so as he had not been summoned to surrender, and felt bound in honor to fire until he did so.