General History:

Born the son of a prostitute and travelling soldier, Bucky is the first to admit that his start in life wasn’t the luckiest one. He grew up an only child under his simultaneously threatening and absent fathers thumb, his mother managing to tend to him when she had the time. Eventually, Barnes senior vanished, and Buckys mother was forced to make the difficult decision of struggling along with her then six year old son, or leaving him to find his own luck in the world.
She chose to take him to the local orphanage, then left town. He was under strict instructions to tell them that his parents were dead, and that he had nowhere to go. The nuns, in a flurry of tongue clucking and hand waving of indignation, took him in. When he was ten Bucky met Steve Rogers, and his life flourished from there.
Figuring his prospects were as good as they were ever going to be, Bucky dropped out of school at fifteen and started working odd jobs to raise money. When he was sixteen, he convinced Steve - then fifteen - to leave the Nuns with him and they rented a room. Bucky was thrilled at his independence, and took it upon himself as a badge of honour to keep Steve out of the hospitals and, with any luck, into Art School.

WWII:

Bucky enlisted when he was eighteen, led by the lure of adventure, a great uniform and Army pay. He was shipped out to England, then Italy. There he was captured by Hydras forces and subjected to horrific medical experimentation - or at least, the start of it, before the Star Spangled Man appeared and whisked him, along with the rest of the prisoners, to safety.
Thrilled that his friend was alive and here with him, Bucky vowed to follow Steve where-ever he chose to lead them. Which went well for most, if not Bucky himself - during a mission to capture a Hydra scientist, he fell from the side of a damaged train to die in a snow-bank on the side of the cliff.

Name:
James Buchanan Barnes
Military Rank & Serial Number:
Sergeant, #32557
Nicknames:
Bucky, Soldier, Bucky-Bear, Idiot, Buck, Jerk, медведь, The Winter Solider
Birthday:
March 10