As an illustration of luck, it doesn’t get much more explosive.

This remarkable picture shows how two bullets from opposing troops fused after striking each other in mid-air.

The odds of the clash are said to be a billion-to-one and it could well have saved the lives of two soldiers.

Billion to one chance: Two bullets (one French, one Russian) which fused in mid-air during the Crimea War. It is almost impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins

What makes the discovery more incredible is that the bullets are 150 years old and were found on the battlefields of the Crimean War, now in Ukraine. One has been identified as Russian, the other French.

The discovery is said to have been made close to Balaclava, site of the notorious Charge of the Light Brigade, one of the most notorious events in British military history.

The finder of the bullets - a walker whose name has not been disclosed - is said to be seeking to sell the unique war memorabilia to a military museum.

Conflict: French troops march on Russian lines in the Crimean War

The Ukrainian authorities were unable to throw any light on the exact circumstances of the find or who had validated the discovery as being genuine Russian and French bullets.

A spokesman for the local authority in the Crimea said: 'We have no official information about this discovery.'

Nor has the exact site of the discovery been disclosed, though there has been a wide discussion of the bullets in blogs.

Warfare at its most courageous and tragic: The Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854 during the Crimean War

The Crimean War, between 1853 and 1856, was fought between tsarist Russia and an alliance of Britain, France and the Ottoman Empire.

More than 374,000 perished in the campaign, including 2,755 British killed in action, 2,019 from wounds and 16,323 from disease.

At issue was European influence over the territories controlled by the declining Ottoman Empire.

The bullets would originally have looked like this

The Crimea War also brought to public attention the pioneering nursing of Florence Nightingale - called 'The lady with the lamp' - who cared for soldiers killed in battle but also from diseases such as typhoid, cholera and dysentery.

The Charge of the Light Brigade was seen as highlighting the failings of aristocratic, self-centred generals who appeared to have little concern for casualties.