Most people lead relatively mundane lives. But there is a select handful whose experiences read like a bestselling adventure thriller.

One such person was Sergeant Mark Benn, a Worthing veteran of the Crimean War and Indian Mutiny.

On a bright August summer's day in 1908, old soldier Mark Benn was laid to rest.

He was buried in the south-west corner of Broadwater Cemetery, near the junction of South Farm Road and Carnegie Road.

Today, there is no trace of his grave, which was probably destroyed by vandals with no concept of history, let alone decency.

Benn was born in Ferring on May 1, 1830, and probably joined the Army to escape a life of grinding poverty.

He enlisted in the Rifle Brigade on December 13, 1848 and, after a short posting to Canada, witnessed the spectacular London funeral of the Duke of Wellington, hero of Waterloo, four years later.

In 1854, Benn was on his way to the Crimea to fight against Russia.

He took part in the first major engagement of the war, the Battle of Alma, when the Tsar's troops were swept from the field despite holding a seemingly impregnable position.

Benn was among the first company of men to cross the river under withering fire from the hillside above.

To my knowledge, he left no account of his experiences but others recorded the battle.

War artist Captain Henry Clifford, who served in the same regiment as Benn, wrote: "It was sad to see the poor fellows, Russian and English, lying on the ground groaning and suffering so much."

Private Harry Blishen, also a member of the Rifle Brigade, wrote: "We crossed a river and faced a strong entrenchment camp.

"We shot and made dreadful havoc amongst them, for as we advanced we stumbled over their dead and wounded, knapsacks and horses, and I am sorry to say that our poor fellows fell like grass before a scythe."

Benn was present at Balaclava but we can only speculate on whether he witnessed the famous Charge of the Light Brigade.

What a sight that must have been as 600 cavalrymen galloped to their doom.

The war was a disaster for the British Army, with thousands of its soldiers dying of cold and disease in the trenches before Sebastopol.

The Russians held a fortified strongpoint called the Redan, which the British repeatedly tried to take, with horrendous losses.

In the final assault, when the attackers had to run into a wide ditch and up a steep bank raked by grapeshot and musket fire, Benn was severely wounded in his right thigh and left arm.

He was lucky to survive this near suicidal assault, which left the ditch choked with dead and dying redcoats.

Among the victims was Private Blishen, who was bayoneted to death.

Benn recovered sufficiently to also take part in the Indian Mutiny, when he was in the field for 20 months and marched 1,745 miles over forbidding terrain.

He witnessed the aftermath of the massacre at Cawnpore, when 250 women and children were butchered and thrown down a well, sparking equally horrific reprisals from the British, who blew mutineers from the mouths of cannon.

He chased the Sepoy leader Nana Sahib across the dry, baking hot, dusty, disease-ridden subcontinent to Nepal.

Thirty-six years after taking the Queen's Shilling, Benn retired to a terraced home at 20 Cranworth Road, Worthing, on a pension of ten pence a day, increasing to two shillings in 1901, plus a special allowance of four pence a day for his wounds.

He was much respected and became an instructor with the local territorials.

He died on August 21, 1908, aged 78, leaving a virtually destitute widow and we can only hope the town helped her financially.

He was buried with full military honours in a coffin of polished elm with brass fittings, covered by the Union Flag, with his medals, sword and helmet resting on top.

The funeral cortege started at his home and wound its way to St George's Church, where it was met by the local company of Sussex Territorials, 44-strong.

The West Tarring Brass Band played the Dead March as the procession moved off along Brighton Road, Chapel Road and Teville Road to the cemetery.

A firing party discharged three volleys over his grave and the last post was sounded by buglers, closing the final chapter on a remarkable life.

In 1855, William Henry Cecil George Pechell, who was born at Castle Goring, fell during the Crimean War leading his men to repel an attack by the Russians on the advanced trenches before Sebastopol.

After his death on September 3, his body was shipped back to England and buried at Angmering Churchyard.

There is a stone plaque recording his life in St Mary's Church, Goring.

In 1854, a private in the 19th Foot, from Worthing, who fought at the battle of Alma in the Crimea, where his regiment suffered severely, wrote a letter to his mother about his experiences.

Sadly, his name is lost to history, but he penned the following from his camp near Sebastopol: "Dear mother, I have to tell you that we are near Sebastopol, and the shot and shell are flying about us like hail.

"As good luck is, they do not hurt anyone. We are at work at entrenchments close to the walls and I could jerk a stone into the town on the top of the people.

"They fire on us with their big guns every night, and they are no joke mind you, for the shot are 56-pounders. We are up five or six nights a week, and what is worst of all, we get green coffee, and when we should be sleeping or eating we have that to burn and pound.

"I don't know how we shall get on, for we have a queer task to do and no mistake. There is a talk that we are to make an attack tomorrow morning; so if you do not hear from me any more you must write to the War Office, and enquire whether I am dead or not. You must put my number 2462, and tell them the regiment I belong to; and if they tell you I am dead, you must write for the money that is coming to me.

"But I hope, please God, to come back again."