 He was educated at the Mansion House School, Cork; St. Colman's College, Paris; the Irish College in Paris; and the Catholic University, Leuven.Buckley was in Leuven when the Piedmontese invaded the Papal States in 1860, and at the request of Count Carlo MacDonnell, Private Chamberlain to Pope Pius IX, he brought the recruits of the Irish Papal Brigade from Ostend to Vienna, where they were placed under representatives of the Holy See.He served under General Lamoricière, and after the war returned to Ireland.