He became an officer cadet in the East India Company's Presidency armies just before the Indian Rebellion of 1857.

Nicknamed 'Young Skull' by his father,[2] Walter Dickens showed early signs of aspiring to be an author like his father, but Charles Dickens instructed Walter's tutor to encourage him to not write, stating "The less he is encouraged to write the better, and the happier he will be.

Following the introduction of direct rule in India in the wake of the Rebellion, the armed forces were reorganised.

He was due to be invalided back to England but died of an aortic aneurysm on New Year's Eve at the Officers' Hospital in Calcutta in India.

This was done as a tribute to the author and his father, and the tombstone is now placed among the memorials of the notable Europeans who died in the 18th century.