10 
OBITUARY. 
COLONEL WALTER RALEIGH GILBERT, C.B., late R.A. 
Tuoucu the subject of this brief memoir left the Royal Artillery so far back 
as 1857 and for the last 40 years has been living quietly in Cornwall, where he 
discharged important duties up to the last, and therefore was not much en évidence at 
or near Woolwich where he was once so well known, still there are yet some 
officers serving or retired who will remember Capt. Gilbert as the smart and 
efficient Adjutant of the Horse Brigade at Woolwich, and they will without doubt 
agree that the close of the career of a man who reflected honour on their Regiment, 
both during and after his service in it, deserves more than a mere mention in 
the ‘“‘ Proceedings.” 
Walter Raleigh Gilbert was born at Menheniot Vicarage, Cornwall, on April 
9th, 1813, of an old and distinguished Cornish family, one of his ancestors being 
Sir Humphrey Gilbert, knighted in 1557, the discoverer of Gilbert’s Straits and 
distinguished as a navigator, being a half brother of Sir Walter Raleigh, whence 
the name since borne by several generations of the Gilbert family. His father 
was the Rey. Pomeroy Gilbert, Vicar of Menheniot and Prebendary of lxeter 
Cathedral. An uncle, Lt.-General Sir Walter Raleigh Gilbert, did good service 
in India in the Campaigns of 1803-4, 1845-6 in the Sutlej, and 1849 in the 
Punjab, for the last of which he was made a Baronet and G.C.B., and received 
other honours. The services of the late Col. Gilbert (No. 1796, Kane’s List) 
in the Royal Artillery were briefly detailed in the obituary notices of last 
month’s ‘‘ Proceedings.” 
‘He was unfortunate in not seeing active service, and the writer of this memoir un- 
derstood from him that his not being able to get out to the Crimea disheartened him 
so much, that it had a good deal to do with his decision to leave the Regiment and 
accept the important appointment of Chief Constable of the county of Cornwall, 
which he entered on (as the first occupant of the post) at Christmas 1857. This post 
he only relinquished when death claimed him on October 17th of this year 
(the anniversary of his commission as Ist. Lieut.) after a long and conspicuously 
useful life. No man in the county has been held in greater respect and affection 
by all those he came in contact with, and few public servants deserved better of 
their country. ; 
The County Constabulary of Cornwall have been brought by Col. Gilbert to a 
great pitch of excellence, and his tact and firmness in dealing with the few cases of 
serious disturbance which have occurred in the county during the last 40 years 
have invariably borne good fruit. 
The late unhappy riots at Newlyn this spring between the Cornish and Norfolk 
fishermen entailed serious exertions and anxiety on the Chief Constable, but 
notwithstanding his advanced age he never spared himself, and there can be no 
doubt that his last illness, which dates from May 25th, when he returned home 
