Thomas Reeves (VC)

He fired some borrowed muskets to hold a battery under fire.

Thomas Reeves was born at Green Street Green, Kent, on 16 April 1828. An apprentice baker, he volunteered for the Royal Navy in 1846 and progressed from boy to able seaman. In HMS Albion he served as a yeoman of signals during the Crimean War.

At Inkermann on 5 November 1854, Reeves and other seamen defended the Right Lancaster Battery. Standing on the firing step under heavy fire, they used muskets passed up and loaded by disabled soldiers sheltered below. Their resistance earned the Victoria Cross. Queen Victoria presented it at the first investiture in Hyde Park in June 1857.

He rose to captain of the foretop and then acting gunner third class, serving in HMS Excellent and Cornwallis. Invalided from the Navy in 1860, he spent time in Haslar Hospital. He died at Portsea on 4 August 1862 and was buried in a pauper’s grave. No detailed civilian employment has been established.