Admiral Sir Alexander Buller GCB (30 June 1834 – 3 October 1903) was a Royal Navy officer who went on to be Commander-in-Chief, China Station.
Buller joined the Royal Navy in 1848. He served in the Black Sea during the Crimean War. Promoted to Captain in 1869, he was given command of HMS Modeste in 1874. Buller served in the Naval Brigade as part of the Perak expedition to Malaya in 1875. He became Admiral-Superintendent of Malta Dockyard in 1889.
He was appointed Commander-in-Chief, China Station in 1895. Buller had to respond at this time to the Far Eastern Crisis of 1897/98 when the Russian Pacific Fleet was threatening to attack the Korean port of Chemulpo to back up Russia’s demands for a peacetime coaling station at Deer Island. He dispatched eight warships to Korea and the Russian forces promptly retreated. The fact that the Japanese Government had also put three battleships and ten cruisers at his disposal may have also influenced the outcome. He retired in 1899.
Following the succession of King Edward VII, he was among several retired admirals advanced to Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath (GCB) in the 1902 Coronation Honours list published on 26 June 1902, and received the insignia in an investiture on board the royal yacht Victoria and Albert outside Cowes on 15 August 1902, the day before the fleet review held there to mark the coronation.