Edward Talbot Thackeray

Sir Edward Talbot Thackeray VC, KCB (19 October, 1836—3 September, 1927) was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.

The son of Rev Francis Thackeray and Mary Anne Shakespeare, he was 20 years old, and a Second Lieutenant in the Bengal Engineers, Indian Army during the Indian Mutiny when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the Victoria Cross (which is currently displayed at the National Museum of Military History in Johannesburg, South Africa).

On 16 September 1857 at Delhi, India, Second Lieutenant Thackeray, extinguished a fire in the Magazine enclosure under close and heavy musketry-fire from the enemy at the imminent risk to his own life from the explosion of combustible stores in the shed in which the fire occurred. He later achieved the rank of Colonel.

References

*Monuments to Courage (David Harvey, 1999)
*The Register of the Victoria Cross (This England, 1997)
*The Sapper VCs (Gerald Napier, 1998)

External links

* [http://www.remuseum.org.uk/rem_his_vc.htm#1t Royal Engineers Museum] Sappers VCs
* [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=11864746 Find-A-Grave biography]