[1][2] His father was "one of the most eminent jurists and advocates of his state",[2] and one of the few prominent Mississippians to publicly oppose secession during the American Civil War,[1] and his mother was a well-regarded author.

[1] After the war ended, the family moved to Bayou Teche area in St. Mary Parish, Louisiana, and then in 1869 to join relatives living outside Sedalia, Missouri.

[1] Buck moved to New Haven, Connecticut, to attend Hopkins Grammar School in order to gain admission to Yale College.

[1] Buck gained admission to the bar in Missouri in 1878,[2] but chose to pursue success in other regions, working for part of that year as a harvest hand in Dakota Territory, and as principal of a public school in Shakopee, Minnesota.

[2][3] Buck died in Lewis and Clark County, Montana, of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, at midnight on December 6, 1897.