Horace Stephen Virgo
Horace Stephen Virgo (1898-1943)
1943 Obituary [1]
Captain HORACE STEPHEN VIRGO, R.A.O.C., whose death occurred on active service in the Near East in January 1943, was elected a Graduate of the Institution in 1923 and was transferred to Associate Membership in 1928 and to Membership in 1934.
He was born in 1898 and received his mechanical training as a boy artificer in HMS Indus, Devonport, from 1914 to 1918. He then studied at the University of Bristol, where he graduated B.Sc. in mechanical engineering in 1923. In the same year he returned to H.M. Dockyard at Devonport as assistant draughtsman. Two years later he entered the service of the Phoenix Oil Company, Ltd., and after a year's training in the air-gas lift method of the production of oil was appointed air lift production engineer at the Unirea oilfields, Roumania.
In 1929 he became chief mechanical engineer, with responsibility to the managing director for the planning and erection of all mechanical installations, in addition to the inspection of the operating plant, the design of special equipment, and the construction of a large terminal station to provide facilities for the discharge of 3,000 tons of oil a day. In 1940 Captain Virgo received a commission in the R.A.O.C. and was promoted to the rank of captain in 1942. During membership of a military mission, Captain Virgo held the acting rank of major, reverting to the rank of captain on transfer to the R.E.M.E., which was his unit at the time of his death.