Biography

Sydney Herbert Davies attended the Royal Naval School, at Deptford, England, and was a midshipman by the time of the Crimean War. He served in the trenches before Sebastopol, from July 1st, 1855. He was discharged from the Navy on November 5th, 1856, after six years of service. On October 27th, 1857 he was commissioned as ensign in the Cambridgeshire Militia. By June 18th, 1861 he was commissioned lieutenant in the 16th Regiment of Foot, British Army, and was sent to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he resigned from military service on April 28th, 1863.

Making his way into the Confederate States, Sydney Davies arrived in Richmond, where he attempted to obtain a commission as a major, but was eventually commissioned as lieutenant. His service in the Confederate States Army was highly commended, and he was indicated to have been in most of the engagements of the unit he served with, under General Henry Heth. He was then placed on the staff of General Heth, and was in service right up to the surrender at Appomattox. Davies is mentioned in several contemporary accounts, and his Confederate service file contains dispatches from several high ranking Confederate Army officers as well as Government personnel, all of which refer to his gallantry in the service.

By 1866 he was in New Zealand, where he was later appointed as sub-inspector in the Armed Constabulary, and later held a commission in the Egmont Rifle Volunteers. In August, 1870, he also attempted to raise an Artillery Volunteer Corps for the New Zealand Government, but this was rejected because the “Government does not wish to have an Artillery Corps at Taranaki – indeed there are no guns available for them.” Davies was awarded the New Zealand War Medal for service in the Maori Wars (he had previously also been awarded two medals for his service in the Crimean War).

His marriage certificate shows that Sydney Davies was married to widow, Mrs Mary Jane Bisset, at her home in Dunedin, by Reverend John Gow, on October 19th, 1874. His rank or profession is shown as “Gentleman”. In his later years he held several civilian positions, and was a member of the Imperial Veterans Alliance of New Zealand. Davies is rather unique amongst the Civil War veterans buried in Australia and New Zealand, in that he was the only one known to have been in the military of three different nations.