John Buckley

He defended Delhi's magazine through the final deadly blast.

John Buckley was born at Cocker Hill, Stalybridge, on 24 May 1813. He worked in cotton mills before enlisting in the Bengal Artillery in January 1832. After training at Chatham he sailed to India that June. Promotion and ordnance appointments followed, and by 1856 he was a conductor of ordnance. His family life in India included the loss of his first wife and several children before the uprising of 1857.

On 11 May 1857 Buckley was one of the nine British defenders of the Delhi Magazine. The small party resisted repeated attempts to seize the ammunition stores, firing the guns they had prepared within the compound. When their position became untenable, the defenders deliberately blew up the magazine to prevent its contents falling intact into rebel hands. Buckley survived the explosion, wounded. His wife and surviving children were killed during the violence in Delhi.

He subsequently served at Badli-ki-Serai and became provost marshal at Meerut, where he supervised the execution of 150 rebels. The Victoria Cross recognized his part in the defence of the magazine, alongside George Forrest and William Raynor. The award was gazetted in June 1858, and Queen Victoria presented it to him on Southsea Common on 2 August.

Ill health brought two years' sick leave in Britain. He later returned to India on the veteran establishment at Lucknow before retiring as a captain in October 1861. In retirement he lived in the East End of London. Buckley died at his home in East India Dock Road, Poplar, on 14 July 1876 and was buried in what is now Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park. A modern memorial marks the burial of a soldier whose years in India encompassed both sustained professional service and devastating personal loss.

Official Victoria Cross citation

For gallant conduct in the defence of the Delhi Magazine, on the 11th May 1857.