James Richard Bell (1841-1913)
1858-1861 Apprenticed under John Gardner
1862 Completed his apprenticeship on the Merthyr and Abergavenny Railway
1862-4 Worked in Egypt
1865-7 Worked on the Potteries, Shrewsbury and North Wales Railway
1868 Worked in Liverpool then went to India to join the P. W. D.
1870s Worked on various railway lines in India
1879 Member of Inst Civil Engineers, of Lukkur.
1895 of Indian Government Railways
1914 Obituary [1]
JAMES RICHARD BELL died at Ightham, Kent, on the 14th July, 1913. Born at Wick in 1841, he joined the Indian Public Works service in 1868.
At first employed in the Madras Presidency, he was later transferred to the State Railways department of India, in which service he remained until his retirement in 1896. He gained a high reputation in the construction of bridges, amongst the more notable structures erected by him being the Empress bridge over the Sutlej, the Muttra bridge across the Jumna, Ferozepur bridge and the Sher Shah bridge over the Chenab. He also devised successful means for training rivers by means of bunds.
He carried out a large number of difficult surveys and constructed many miles of railway on the North Western, East Coast, Indus Valley and other systems, but perhaps his most important service to India was the construction, in a remarkably short time, of the line from Ruk to Bolan, giving military access to Kabul. Mr. Bell was for several years Consulting Engineer to Government for State railways.
He was elected a Member of The Institution on the 2nd December, 1879.
See Also
Sources of Information
- Civil engineer records