Sergeant John Salter was born in the Parish of St. Anne's, London and attested for the Miliary Train at Westminster in October 1856, aged 24 years. Subsequently engaged with the 4th Battalion in New Zealand in the mid-1860s, he was one of 76 men of that unit to receive the Medal - the officially altered rank on his award is probably accountable to the fact he was reduced from Sergeant to Private for being 'drunk on duty' in late 1866. Salter transferred to the Army Service Corps in February 1870 and was finally discharged as a Sergeant in late 1877.