Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Sergeant Frederick Nixon, 23rd Foot, Royal Welsh Fusiliers, later a Lieutenant in the Australian Artillery at Sydney

Crimea 1854-56, 1 clasp, Sebastopol (No 4232. Serjt. Frederick. Nixon. 23rd. R.W.F.) regimentally impressed naming; Indian Mutiny 1857-59, 1 clasp, Lucknow (Serjt. Frdk. Nixon, 1st Bn. 23rd R.W. Fusrs.); Turkish Crimea 1855, Sardinian issue (Staff Officer F. Nixon. H.M. 23rd Regt.) the first with edge bruising and contact marks, otherwise very fine and better (3) £500-£700

Sergeant Frederick Nixon was slightly wounded at Sebastopol on 1 March 1855 (London Gazette 16 March 1855 refers).

Sold with a copied image of the recipient in uniform wearing medals and the following (undated) obituary details from an unknown source:

‘The Late Lieutenant Nixon, Crimean & Indian Mutiny Veteran.

First-Lieutenant Frederick Nixon died at the Sydney Hospital yesterday, aged 86 years.

Deceased was educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey. He served in the Imperial Army with the 23rd Royal Welsh Fusiliers foot, 1st Battalion, as an officer, and was badly wounded in the Crimea in ‘54 & ‘55, at the Siege of Sebastopol. He received medals & clasps for the campaign. Lieutenant Nixon came home at the termination of the war in the ship London in 1856. He was sent to the college of musketry at Hythe, under General Hay, to study musketry, etc. Deceased was presented to Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle, 1856.

He was ordered on Foreign service, via the Cape, to China. When at Table Bay the order was countermanded, in consequence of the Indian Mutiny breaking out. He started to Calcutta, and saw service under General Outram, Sir Colin Campbell, and Lord Clyde in the Relief of Lucknow - and was under fire at the Dil Koosha, where he carried the Queen’s Colours, and at the Moti Maal operations, across the Goomtee, and finally at Lucknow. He helped to capture the city, & got into the Kaisar Baghe, or King’s Graden, after terrible street fighting, where Generals Outram and Havelock were besieged by the Sepoys.

Lieutenant Nixon was at Cawnpore twice and at Benares, and was also in the Trans-Gogra operations, when the rebels were driven from Oude to Nepaul. He obtained a staff appointment to the 6th Dragoon Guards, Carbineers, and was with Captain Peel’s brigade of Bluejackets and a Commissory (sic) post to the Belooches Battalion. Finally he retired from service, and came to Sydney in 1860, and got a commission as First Lieutenant in the Artillery Brigade. He commanded a Battery.

Deceased was born at St. Peter’s Port - Island of Guernsey. He was the grandson of the late commandant of the Royal Veteran Battalion 10th. His grandfather served under General Wolfe at the battle of Quebec.’