Peter Arthur Mackintosh
Peter Arthur Mackintosh (1849-1901)
1902 Obituary [1]
PETER ARTHUR MACKINTOSH was born at Killin in Perthshire on the 5th November, 1849. After receiving the education common to all boys in Scotland, he was articled to Mr. Alex. Sutherland, of Cefn, Merthyr Tydvil, under whom he was engaged on the construction of the Cyfarthfa branch of the Brecon and Merthyr Railway, and on other works.
In 1870-71 he attended engineering classes at Glasgow University, and in the latter year he entered the employment of Mr. John Mackay, under whom he was engaged until 1877 on several large contracts, including the London and North Western Railway extension to Dowlais, the completion of the Bristol and North Somerset Railway, and the Cardiff and Ogmore line.
From 1877 to 1882 Mr. Mackintosh undertook on his own account various contracts in Lancashire, but his health failing, he gave up that work and proceeded in 1882 to South Africa to carry out the waterworks of King William’s Town for Mr. John Mackay. On the completion of that work he returned to England, and in 1885-86 was employed by Mr. Mackay on the Woking and Byfleet widening of the London and South Western Railway, for which Company he subsequently acted as Resident Engineer on the Bodmin and Wadebridge line.
In 1888 Mr. Mackintosh entered the service of the Ceylon Government, and for six years was engaged on tunnelling and heavy work on a portion of the Haputale Extension, and also on the Galle Extension of the Government Railways.
He returned to England in 1894, and resided in Torquay to recuperate his health, which, never robust, had been somewhat undermined by hard work and the climate of the East.
In 1896 he carried out, for the Consulting Engineers to the Ceylon Government, the survey for the 2 feet 6 inches gauge railways in the Kelani Valley and Uda Pusselawa, which it was proposed to introduce into the island as feeders for the main line; and in 1898 he was appointed Chief Resident Engineer on the Ceylon Northern Railway, 200 miles in length. He devoted himself so assiduously t,o that work that his health failed, and he was invalided home in November, 1899.
From that time he suffered from repeated attacks of malarial fever, which considerably weakened him, and he died suddenly at his residence in Pendleton, Manchester, on the 20th December, 1901. Mr. Mackintosh was elected an Associate of the Institution on the 6th March, 1877, and was subsequently placed in the class of Associate Members.