Born at Otley, Yorkshire, the son of James Wright and his wife, Martha. He was baptised there on the 7th of May 1833.
Enlisted by Sergeant Charles Northcott at York on the 19th of September 1851.
Age: 18.
Height: 5' 7,"
Trade: Painter.
Sent to Scutari on the 14th of September 1854 and rejoined the regiment in the Crimea on the 4th of October.
Wounded in action at Balaclava, being "sent on board ship, without having been seen by the surgeon."
Returned to England aboard the "Indiana" on the 27th of February 1855.
Discharged from Chatham Invalid Depot on the 25th of December 1855:
"Found unfit for further military service - Disabled by partial amputation of left foot after severe frostbite in Turkey during last February. Was also wounded on the exterior surface of the right thigh by a piece of shell at the battle of Balaclava. Femur uninjured."
Served 4 years 3 days, to count.
Conduct and character: "good." Not in possession of any Good Conduct badges.
Awarded a pension of 1/- per day.
To live in Otley after discharge.
Entitled (according to the medal rolls) to the Crimean medal with clasps for the Alma, Balaclava, Sebastopol and the Turkish medal.
From the musters however, it appears he was at Scutari at the time of the battle of the Alma.
Medal sent to him on the 30th of March 1858.
EJB: Lummis and Wynn state that he was present at the 1896 Dinner, but from the date of his death (1879), this was obviously not so.
He was in Constantinople in June 1856, in Leeds from April 1860 to 1861, and in Vancouver, Canada, from 1862 to 1874. Payment was made to him through the Hudson Bay Company of £127/17/0.
He was back in Leeds from the 4th of April 1874.
Possibly his pension was allowed to accumulate.
Died 3rd of May 1879.
His death certificate shows that he died at Birstwith, Pateley Bridge, on the 3rd of May 1879, aged 46 years, a Gentleman, from "Cardiac Disease, Albuminaria". Richard Wright, his brother, of Otley, was present at and the informant of his death. (See copy of the death certificate in the 13th Light Dragoons "Certificates" file.)
He was shown in his will as a "Gentleman", his executors being his brothers, Richard Wright, gentleman, of Birstwith, and Arthur Wright, a joiner, of Ottley.
Buried in Birstwith Parish Churchyard, Yorkshire.
The following information came from his grandson, Frank Wright, M.C., living in Rugby in the mid 1970s:
"Edmund Wright was born on the 27th of March 1833. After his discharge from the Army he travelled in Europe and spent some years on the Western coast of the U.S.A. prospecting for gold, and was not married until the 3rd of July 1874 (at Otley Parish Church) when more than 40 years of age.
Dying on the 3rd of May 1879, he left two sons, and was buried in Birstwith Parish Churchyard in Yorkshire, where his tombstone remains in a good condition." (See photo of this in file and that of his discharge documents)
[RM:Leeds Mercury, May 10 1879: Death of One of the Six Hundred - Edmund Wright. Great-grandson Paul Wright of Brownings Farm, Blackboys.]