Born circa March of 1827, the son of Charles Henry Barber, one of Her Majesty's Counsel, at Rugby.
Educated at Rugby School.
Ensign in the 1st Regiment of Foot: 1st of December 1846.
Lieutenant in the 15th Hussars: 17th of January 1851.
On to half-pay: 7th of March 1851.
On the 26th of September 1854 he married Diana Eyre, the daughter of the Revd. R.B. Eyre, of Eyrecourt, Co. Galway, at the parish church of Downpatrick, Co. Galway. He was then 27 years of age and she 22. The ceremony was conducted by her father and the witnesses were Algernon Thomas Brimpton and John Eyre.
Lieutenant in the 17th Lancers: 15th of December 1854.
Arrived in the Crimea aboard H.M.S.T. "Arabia", on the 29th of April 1855 and returned to England aboard H.M.S. "Etna" on the 21st of October 1855.
Retired, by the sale of his commission, on the 26th of May 1856.
Lieutenant Barber served the Eastern campaign from the 29th of April 1855, including the Siege and fall of Sebastopol. (Medal and Clasp.)
Entitled to the Crimean medal with clasp for Sebastopol and the Turkish Medal.
In 1988 a Mr. Childs, of Bromsgrove, Worcester, wrote to the then Regimental Secretary of the 17th/21st Lancers saying that he had purchased a 1822 pattern Light Cavalry sword from the Barber family, and seeking further information on him.
The letter being passed on, and further enquiry made of Mr. Childs, it transpired that he had not bought the sword from the actual family, but from someone who had purchased it several years earlier from an elderly lady who was the great-granddaughter of Lieutenant Barber. Mr. Childs had made further enquiries in the village of Burtsmorton in Worcestershire, where she (a Mrs Clenthorn) had lived, but no one was met who remembered her. A check of the two village churchyards was also made, without result.