Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The Indian Mutiny Medal to Joseph Henry Lockwood who, as an Assistant Apothecary, was attached to the Shannon’s Naval Brigade, serving throughout all of the affairs of the mutiny with the Brigade.

Indian Mutiny 1857-59, 2 clasps, Relief of Lucknow, Lucknow (Asst. Apothy. J Lockwood. Shannon. Naval Brigade) extremely fine and scarce £1,800-£2,200

Captain K. J. Douglas-Morris Collection, Dix Noonan Webb, October 1996.

Joseph Henry Lockwood was born into a Eurasian family on 21 June 1835, at Berhampore, the son of Joseph Lockwood, Drum Major 40th Regiment N.I., one of only two Bengal Marine Native Infantry Regiments that, because of caste, could voyage overseas, and his wife Diana. He joined the Bengal Subordinate Medical Department as Hospital Apprentice on 13 January 1853; was advanced Assistant-Apothecary on 11 May 1858; advanced Hospital Steward on 26 February 1863; and advanced Apothecary 1st Class on 20 September 1867.
On joining the service, Lockwood was attached variously to H.M. 27th and 70th Regiments at Rawalpindi and Peshawar, with stints at the Presidency's General Hospital and 2nd Company 6th Battalion Artillery.
Lockwood was on medical leave at the outbreak of the mutiny. Recalled, he was one of a very small number of Subordinate Medical Officers seconded from the Bengal Army to the British and Indian Naval Brigades. Lockwood served under Dr Anthony Beale, who later stated that Lockwood ‘had been attached to the Naval Brigade under my Medical charge from 18 August 1857,’ the date the Shannon's First Party departed Calcutta, ‘his rank then being described as Acting Assistant-Apothecary and Assistant Steward.’
Lockwood remained with the Brigade until 25 May 1858. James Flanagan, Assistant Surgeon of Shannon’s Naval Brigade, reported in April 1858 that ‘I have known Mr Lockwood for the last nine months, while acting with me as Assistant Apothecary. His strict attention to his duties and gentlemanly bearing have elicited my warmest admiration as well as the officers and men of this Brigade with whom he has come professionally in contact. I consider him a young man of considerable ability, and one who, if he followed in the course he has pursued while acting with me, will yet prove an ornament to his profession’. Furthermore, in 1862, Flanagan confirmed Lockwood’s application for his Mutiny medal and two clasps when stating that ‘he had been engaged in the Relief of Lucknow, and the operations against the city from 2nd to 16th March, including the battles of Khujwa, Futtehgurh and the second battle of Cawnpore’. (IOR L/MIL/5/100 dated 11 March 1862 refers.)
After the mutiny he worked for many years at the Garrison and General Hospitals Allahabad. In early 1870 he sailed to Ireland to study and qualified there as a Licentiate of the King’s and Queen’s College of Physicians (Ireland) L.K.Q.C.P., Licentiate of Royal College of Surgeons (Ireland) L.R.C.S.I. and a Licentiate of Midwifery L.M. On return to India he was posted, 7 December 1872, to the Sutlej Bridge Division, Indus Valley (State) Railway and took charge of medical affairs. The district was notoriously unhealthy and in 1874 a pestilence caused the deaths of countless bridge workers. Sadly Lockwood, too, succumbed and he died on 22 August 1874 while recuperating at Almora.
Though a qualified doctor, Lockwood was unable to be promoted beyond Apothecary 1st Class due to the regulations existing at the time, a situation that changed a few years after his death when, in 1881, the government recognised the iniquity of the situation.
Lockwood married Jane Fleming on 12 December 1867 at Allahabad without issue.
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