Four: Gunner H. Ley, Royal Navy, Crimea, one clasp, Sebastopol [loose on riband] (H.M.S. Princess Royal, September 8 1855); Baltic, unnamed as issued; India General Service 1854-95, one clasp, Perak (Gunr. 2 Cl., H.M.S. Thistle); Turkish Crimea, Sardinian die, unnamed as issued, the first and last with refixed suspension, slight contact wear, generally very fine or better (4)

Details

Four: Gunner H. Ley, Royal Navy, Crimea, one clasp, Sebastopol [loose on riband] (H.M.S. Princess Royal, September 8 1855); Baltic, unnamed as issued; India General Service 1854-95, one clasp, Perak (Gunr. 2 Cl., H.M.S. Thistle); Turkish Crimea, Sardinian die, unnamed as issued, the first and last with refixed suspension, slight contact wear, generally very fine or better (4)

Lot Essay

Gunner Henry Ley was born in Devon in December 1835 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 1st Class aboard H.M.S. Impregnable in November 1853. Transferred to H.M.S. Princess Royal, he was present in operations in the Baltic and off the Crimea and gained advancement to Ordinary Seaman in April 1857, to Able Seaman in the following October and to Leading Seaman in June 1860. Thereafter specialising in Gunnery, Ley gained, among other certificates, a First Class rating for his Armstrong Gun Drill, and in late 1861 was appointed Gunner's Mate. Promoted to Acting Gunner in March 1864, he ran into trouble with higher authority in early 1866, being 'sentenced by Court Martial to be placed on the bottom of the list of Gunners 3rd Class and kept there over one year'. But following service in H.M.S. Thistle in the Perak operations of 1875-76, he regained the rate of Gunner and was finally pensioned ashore in early 1880.