Alexander Buller

Admiral Sir Alexander Buller GCB (30 June 1834 – 3 October 1903) was a Royal Navy officer who went on to be Commander-in-Chief, China Station.

Naval career
Born the son of a clergyman, Buller joined the Royal Navy in 1848. He served in the Black Sea during the Crimean War. Promoted to Captain in 1869, he was given command of HMS Modeste in 1874. Buller served in the Naval Brigade as part of the Perak expedition to Malaya in 1875. He became Admiral-Superintendent of Malta Dockyard in 1889.

He was appointed Commander-in-Chief, China Station in 1895. Buller had to respond at this time to the Far Eastern Crisis of 1897/98 when the Russian Pacific Fleet was threatening to attack the Korean port of Chemulpo to back up Russia’s demands for a peacetime coaling station at Deer Island. He dispatched eight warships to Korea and the Russian forces promptly retreated. The fact that the Japanese Government had also put three battleships and ten cruisers at his disposal may have also influenced the outcome. He retired in 1899.

He lived at Erle Hall near Plympton in Devon and died at Exford, Somerset, in 1903, aged 69.

Family
In 1870 he married Emily Mary Tritton. Through his only daughter, Jane Elizabeth, who married in 1892 Major Charles Turner, he became grandfather to two Victoria Cross winning brothers, Alexander Buller Turner and Victor Buller Turner.