George Turnbull (1809-1889): Autobiography: Chapter 17

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Chapter 17. 1864. (pages 219-223). East Indian Railway (UK based).

1864. January. Uneventual. Correspondence about my design for a bridge over the River Hooghly, with W. R. Thomson and Mr. Wm. Fairbairn.

There was a meeting of the Indian Rolling Stock, which proved to be a final one. Sir J. Peter Grant in the chair: Mr. Macpherson, Gen. Ramsay, Col. Money, Mr.. Brookett, Mr. Young, Mr. Leith, Mr. Morewood. Col. Baker was much in favour of it, and so were other old Indians, but Morewood had no power of organisation.

On the 26th I took a room - which was called the Octagon Room - 37, Great George Street, for an office; £50 for one year, certain.

Lingard Stokes died on the 19th of this month; he was only thirty-eight. He caught cold while hunting, and it settled on his lungs, producing inflammation, causing his death in a few days. He was locomotive superintendent on the East Indian Railway.

On the 30th Fanny and I went to W. Pursell’s marriage, at St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields. Mrs. Pursell was sister to my friend Frederick Burr, resident engineer at Monghyr. We then went to the wedding-breakfast, at Mr. Robert Rough’s house (in St. Paul’s Churchyard), the uncle of the bride. A large party, nearly sixty in number. A number of Purcell’s Irish friends were there. On the sth February we had a dinner party in honour of the newly married couple : Mr. and Mrs. Purcell, Mr. and Mrs. Henry Carr, Mr. and Mrs. (Capt.) Henderson, Mr. and Mrs. George Smith, jun., Miss Burr, David Murray, Gledstanes, Mrs. Cleverly, Charles Henfrey, Hordon Woodgate ; George Freer Smith came in.

February. Baron von Streng came about the house now and then: he was looking out for a house to purchase, and got me to survey one in Cleveland Gardens, Kensington.

My first cousin, Mrs. Ramsbotham, died on the 4th of this month, formerly Mary Lindsay, of Woodend.

Severe frost at this time. Thermom. minimum, 20°, or 12° below freezing point.

On the 11th I went to Cambridge to Mary Ramsbotham’s funeral; she was sixty-one. Dr. Ramsbotham, his son Frank, Dr. John Ramsbotham, from Leeds, who is a homoeopathic doctor there, John Lindsay, and I, were the only mourners. Jane Lindsay was there, but we did not see her.

The baby, that was Duncan, had a kind of convulsive fit on the 14th, which alarmed Fanny and me, but Dr. Hensley took him in hand, and he soon got over it.

Mary John Turnbull, my first cousin, died on the 27th of this month. I think she was the eldest of the family of my aunt, Mrs. John Turnbull, of the Millwynd, Perth. She was a remarkable old lady, full of common sense, singularly truthful and plain spoken, but not such an able woman as her mother. She was sometimes called her mother’s shadow, as she almost always accompanied her in shopping and calling expeditions ; vehement in expressing her opinions occasionally. It was she who called out to J. Waterston, her nephew, “Johnnie Waterston, laddie, will ye be ten years coming down that stair ? ” which became one of the absurd Perth stories. “ Requiescat in pace ; ” she was a good woman.

March. On the 2nd I took Geordie to London Bridge Station, and sent him off, with Lawrence, to Tunbridge Wells, on a visit to his aunt, Mary Cleverly. On the 8th we went to St. Leonards, to Brunswick House, Marina; met Mr. Brassey there, who was on a visit. Duncan quite recovered from his illness. On the 15th we all returned to London, picking up Geordie at Tunbridge Wells. My diary says of him ; “He is growing fast - a fine boy; long, light, flaxen, curly hair!” Four years old.

On the 17th a small dinner party, being Geordie’s birthday: Admiral and Mrs. Denham, Miss Denham, Mr. David Murray, Major and Miss Samler, Mrs. Thomson, Capt. and Mrs. Robinson.

Mr. Luard, the Marquis of Bute’s agent, called and asked me to go down to Cardiff with Capt. Robinson, to confer about the great dock- extension proposed, and to report and give evidence. Mr. Maclean was the engineer, and the scheme was a magnificent one, estimated to cost above a million sterling. Capt. Robinson and I went down to Cardiff on the 28th, and next day went with Lord Bute’s trustees and Mr. Boyle over the works, accompanied by McConnachy, the resident engineer, and Johnson, dockmaster; then in a steam tug-boat down the entrance channel to the Eastern Hollows, Penarth Head ; and landing, came back by road. Next day Admiral Denham arrived, and with him we repeated inspection of docks and site of proposed extension. It was pleasant to go over the old works and see my own handiwork all in good working order, and the enormous increase of trade, of ships there was scarce room to move. John Lloyd was there and Vachell, but many old friends had passed away. It was stated 9,299 ships had been admitted last year, 1863.

April. On the 6th there was a grand conference in Mr. McLean’s office as to proceedings to be arranged regarding the Bute Dock Extension Bill: Scott Russell, Admiral Dunbar, Capt. Robinson, Abernethy, Binder, Harrison, Mr. Boyle, McConochie, Luard, and the parts to be taken by each of us was duly arranged. After five or six days before Parliamentary Committees, where there was no great contention, the bill was passed, nearly as originally proposed ; but McLean’s plan was not carried out.

The East India Rolling Stock Company was not quite defunct, for on the 16th April, it appears, I was at Vallance’s, the solicitor’s office, Essex Street, Strand, and went with him to Froom, the Broker’s, where we met Col. Money, Morewood and Froom, and we all went to the Credit Mobilier office, where we had a long interview with Albert Grant. He offered to bring out the concern for the sum of 0,000 in cash, being one per cent on the capital, but would give no assurance about it; it was not a guarantee, but only a promise to do what he could. This was the only time I saw the celebrated Baron Grant. He impressed me favourably as a shrewd man of business, pleasant and agreeable, and was not long in coming to the point, and soon closed the interview, as he said he had many things to attend to besides this one.

My dear sister, Sibella, died at this time, and I went down to Edinburgh to the funeral. Mr. Pitcairn conducted the funeral service in Union Street, and the body was taken over to Perth and interred in Greyfriars burial-ground, beside my father and mother. Those present at the funeral were: George Turnbull, of Dundee; George Turnbull, of Barnhill; W. S. Turnbull; John, Hector, and Alexander Sandeman; James Morison, Francis Morison, Gen. Robert Sandeman. These have all passed away, except Hector Sandeman, of Tulloch. I made a round of visits among friends in Perth, and visited Dunkeld, and my old friend, Charley Blair, a staunch Glassite as ever. He was then 75 years of age, hale and hearty, to all appearance, and as quaint as usual. Arrived in London on 23rd April, after a week’s absence.

June. Katy was born on the 4th of June.

The new Blackfriars Bridge works were going on at this time; very interesting operations in making foundations. Henry Carr and Joseph Cubitt, joint engineers.

10th. Mr. and Mrs. Boyle came to call on their return from India.

Lady Cubitt died without completing her will, which was much to be regretted, as some confusion, uncertainty, and “disagreeables” ensued. Mrs. Smiles, her housekeeper, obtained, among some valuable furniture, a portrait of her mistress and granddaughter Grace Cubitt. No one seemed to care about it, and so I hired a cab and made a polite call on Mrs. Smiles, and asked her for the picture. She said I was welcome to it, and 1 brought it home with me. It is not a bad picture, and an undoubted good likeness of her ladyship and Grace. It is now here in the dining-room at Rosehill.

Charles Cleverly arrived from Hong Kong on the 14th of this month ; he went out there in 1843. He made his first appearance at our house (with Mary his wife on the 16th).

Fanny came down to the drawing-room on the 19th, first time since her confinement. Mrs. Denham, and old Mr. Denham, Miss Denham, Miss Moulton, Miss Malins, called to see her.

August. My two good friends, R. W. Thomson and John Bourne, urged me at this time to write a book about Indian railways and public works in India, and I at that time fully intended to do so, and collected a good deal of data for the purpose. I wish now that I had done so, but my fatal dilatoriness, and shall I say laziness, came in the way, and I put it off from time to time, and it is too late now.

On the. 13th we all went for a jaunt to the sea-side; that is, Fanny, Nelly, Geordie, Duncan, baby Kate, nurse Phoebe, nursemaid Sarah. We went to Ramsgate, Broadstairs, Deal, Walmer, Margate, Dover, Folkestone, finally settling down in comfortable quarters at Sandgate.

On the 31st I took Fanny and the baby upto No. 38, Craven Hill Gardens, and then on to the Cleverlys, at Thanet Lodge, Southfields, Wandsworth. Next morning, 1st September, Fanny’s birthday, we all went to Grace Cubitt’s wedding. She was married in St. Margaret’s Church, to Lewis Conway-Gordon, of the Bengal Engineers. We returned to Sandgate, making various pleasant trips to places in the neighbourhood : Shorncliffe Camp - the so-called Csesar’s Camp, on top of the Chalk Hills, north of Shorncliffe - the remains of the entrenchments and ramparts are visible; also Saltwood Castle, a fine old ruin, about half a mile north of Hythe, a polygonal enclosure, with a high wall, something like the keep of Cardiff Castle ; Norman, no doubt.

October. We were all in London again on the ist October.

On the 12th we had a dinner party in honour of the newly-married couple: Joseph Cubitt, Ellen, Alice, Mrs. Conway-Gordon, Gen. Goodwyn, Mrs. Goodwyn, Mrs. Denham, Dr. Campbell, Major Leahy, C. Cleverly, Mary, Mr. Thornton and Admiral Denham.

The Cleverlys were now settled at Derby Lodge, East Sheen.

November. Fanny and I to Birmingham on a visit to Mr. Thornton. He had bought the copper image of Buddha from J. B. Harris, of Sultangunge, for, I think, £130, and gave it to the Birmingham Museum.

I had brought from India a very fine stone figure of Buddha; if I remember rightly, about four tons in weight; it was found in a hillock about a mile from the bank of the Hullohur river. It was an expensive affair. The British Museum did not care to have it; they said there was not room for it, so I told Mr. Thornton if he would take it out of the London Docks warehouses and take it down to Birmingham, he should have it. This was done, and it is now in Birmingham, with a suitable inscription, and no doubt duly appreciated.

I took shares in the Birmingham Small Arms Company, of which Mr. Thornton was a director; but after a few years, and on Mr. Thornton’s death, the business declined; prosperous at first in a high degree, it has become now unremunerative, though not insolvent. We went to see the pin-making factories and pen-making steel works, most ingenious and interesting ; returning to London.

Fanny Kate was vaccinated by Dr. Hensley on the i6th.

December. Fanny and I visited the Cleverlys at East Sheen, and returned home on the 29th; and so ended 1864.

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