John Freeman (VC)

John Freeman was born in Kent in 1833 into a working-class family and earned his living as a labourer before enlisting in the British Army in 1851. Assigned to the famous 9th Lancers, he was sent to India shortly before the outbreak of the Indian Mutiny.

The campaign proved to be one of the British Army’s most brutal nineteenth-century conflicts. Freeman fought throughout many of its major operations, including:

* Siege of Delhi * Bulandshahr * Aligarh * Battle of Agra * Relief of Lucknow * Capture of Bareilly

His defining moment came at Agra on 10 October 1857. During fierce mounted combat, Lieutenant Hugh Gough was shot from his horse and left helpless among enemy cavalry. Without hesitation Freeman charged directly into the melee. He killed the attacking enemy leader and stood over his wounded officer, fighting off numerous attackers until reinforcements could reach them. His fearless intervention saved Gough from certain death.

Queen Victoria personally presented Freeman with the Victoria Cross at Windsor on 9 November 1860, one of the earliest investitures of Britain’s highest award for gallantry.

Freeman continued serving until wounds sustained during the campaign, particularly at Bareilly where he was dangerously wounded, forced his discharge on medical grounds in 1860. He spent his remaining years in England before dying in London in 1913.

Today his Victoria Cross is displayed in the Lord Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum in London.