Born "At Sea" c.1813.
[PB: When his parents were en route to India?]
Enlisted at Cawnpore, India, on the 11th of June 1827.
(He must have enlisted during the Regimental tour of duty in India 1819 — 1838.)
Age: 14.
Height: 5' 4".
Trade: Musician.
Appearance: Fresh complexion. Grey eyes. Red hair.
Served "under age" until the 9th of June 1831.
From Private to Corporal: 26th of October 1854.
Corporal to Sergeant: 1st of February 1855.
(He was appointed Deputy Provost Marshal in the latter part of 1855 and through to 1856, for which he received 4/9d. per day.)
Discharged from Chatham Invalid Depot on the 5th of May 1857 as "Worn out by chronic rheumatism, constitutional infirmity and length of service. Not influenced by any means on his part."
Service to count, 25 years 296 days.
In Turkey and the Crimea: 2 years, India, 9 years.
Aged 44 years on discharge.
Conduct: "very good". In possession of five Good Conduct badges.
Served in the Regimental Band.
Awarded a pension of 1/3d. per day.
To live in Rochester, Kent, after discharge, but he was living in Deptford, London, from January of 1868.
The last available pension books (1875) show "Off N.A.", but no indication as to exactly what is meant by this, and a series of figures which would suggest official letter numbers. His name is not crossed through as is usual as if a pensioner was deceased.
Entitled to the Crimean medal with clasps for Alma, Inkerman and Sebastopol, and the Turkish medal.
Awarded the Long Service & Good Conduct medal on the 10th of May 1854.
1871 Census
2 Roslin Place, St Annes Limehouse, Tower Hamlets.
Luke Malloy, 55, boarder, Labourer, Carpenter, born at sea.
1881 Census
The 1881 Census shows a man of this name living at 32, Arlington Road, St. Pancras, London, an Artist's Colourman, aged 54, born in Soho, (sic, a misreading of At Sea, perhaps?) London, with his three children, Mary A., aged 21, a Warehouse girl, Luke, aged 16, a Porter and Alexander, aged 12, a Scholar. [Is this the same man as appears in 1871? QUERY]
In his "Memoirs" George Loy Smith refers to Luke Molloy after the battle of Inkerman as being a Private, and the orderly to a General of an infantry division. The latter had ordered him, if the battle had gone against the Allies, to go to his hut, take possession of all of his papers, gallop down to Balaclava, get on board the first ship that he could, and bring them home to England.
The records of the Cantonment Cemetery at Meerut show that a Mary Molloy, (Drowned) wife of Private Luke Molloy of the 11th Hussars, was interred there on the 30th of December 1833, aged 50 years. Also recorded is that "No service read." From this one can infer that the cause of her death was suicide. Even more confusing is the recorded death (from the muster rolls) of 134 Luke Molloy at Meerut on the 28th of September 1835 after spending the previous nine months, one can only presume, in a local military hospital. (There was a separate cavalry and infantry one at the time of the Mutiny in 1857 and presumably before this.)
He is not shown as being buried in the Cantonment Cemetery, neither is his death recorded at the India Office in the returns of the deaths at Meerut during the September-December quarter of that year, or in any of the other two provinces, Bombay and Madras. So did he perhaps commit suicide as well, and the priest-in-charge at the time was not as favourably disposed towards giving him a part-Christian burial as his wife had been given. Both Luke Molloys are recorded in the musters for 1833 (as No's 1 and 2.) and it is almost certain that the pair were father and son, the elder having more than 17 years service (and so qualifying him for a higher rate of pay) at the time of his death.
Earlier musters show him as having transferred from the 21st Light Dragoons from the 25th of October 1819 (then at Cawnpore, and who were being relieved) to the 11th Light Dragoons, (all of the former regiment's horses were taken over as well as 197 O.R. volunteers) just previous to the former regiment leaving India for disbandment at Chatham in 1820, and he in particular being posted to Captain John Jenkin's Troop. The 21st L.D. had gone to the Cape of Good Hope in 1805, one troop being sent to Tristan De Cunha in 1815 to prevent its being used as a base for any attempted rescue of Napoleon Bonaparte and another troop formed part of the garrison at St. Helena (this remaining until the Emperor's death in 1821.) Remaining at the Cape until 1817, it then went to India.
Luke Molloy (senior) had enlisted at Dublin on the 21st of March 1813 for "Unlimited Service" at the age of 18, his height being 5' 5" and being recruited by Major Hart. He joined the Maidstone Cavalry Depot from Liverpool on the 28th of March 1813, and the regiment at the Cape of Good Hope on the 17th of March 1814. He was not one of the men sent to St. Helena, these seemingly being selected from amongst the 8 Troops of the regiment and neither did he go to Tristan De Cunha.
(The "Casualty Returns" of the regiment for the period show him as having been born in the parish of St. Michael's [sic] Dublin, and having enlisted at Dublin on the 13th of March 1813. He was a labourer by trade. He is merely shown as "Died", during the particular quarter of 1835, leaving no will and his credits of £1/14/9 were "handed over to his son." He is not named, nor are there any entries in the next-of-kin columns.)
Census information for 1871 kindly provided by Chris Poole.