Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Crimea 1854-56, 4 clasps, Alma, Balaklava, Inkermann, Sebastopol, of contemporary manufacture; together with an unrelated Carte de Visite photograph of Corporal J. I. Nunnerley, 17th Lancers, who rode in the Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava on 25 October 1854, by Daniel Jones, Liverpool, 94mm x 59mm, the recipient in civilian dress and wearing the Crimea Medal, the Turkish Crimea Medal, the French Medaille Militaire, and the Meritorious Service Medal, good very fine (2) £100-£140

James Ikin Nunnerley was born in Wildespool, Cheshire, in 1828 and attested for the 17th Lancers. He attended the Duke of Wellington’s funeral as a Corporal in 1852, and served with the Regiment in the Crimea. He is confirmed as having ridden in the Charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava on 25 October 1854, and during the Charge he assisted Corporal Joseph Malone, V.C., Captain Webb, and Trumpeter Brittain. He was promoted Sergeant the day after the Charge, and left the Regiment on the reduction of the army in 1857. In later life he lived at Inkermann Lodge, Ormskirk, and died on 22 November 1905.

Note: Nunnerley’s full sized group of medals sold at Sotheby’s in November 1967 and are now in the 17th Lancers Museum. The recipient’s personal narrative of the Charge, along with a similar photograph of the recipient, is published in Forgotten Heroes by Roy Dutton.