William Martin Blagden
William Martin Blagden (c1899-1949)
1949 Obituary [1]
1950 Obituary [2]
"Brigadier WILLIAM MARTIN BLAGDEN, R.E. (ret.), whose untimely death, which occurred on 30th November 1949, at the age of fifty, ended a distinguished military and administrative career, was educated at Charterhouse and at Woolwich.
He passed into the Royal Engineers in 1919, and after taking courses at the School of Military Engineering, Chatham, and the School of Electric Lighting at Gosport, served an apprenticeship between 1925 and 1928 with Messrs. Mirrlees, Bickerton and Day, Ltd., the Brush Electrical Engineering Co, and several other electrical and mechanical engineering concerns. He was appointed to Changi, Singapore, in 1928, where he was in charge of all mechanical and electrical new construction work. This was followed by the post of instructor at the School of Military Engineering, and later he was officer in charge of the wheeled vehicle test-section of the experimental establishment at Farnborough. He was made a Member of the Mechanization Board in 1939, and in the course of the next year became deputy director of tank design.
These duties he subsequently combined with those of deputy director of armoured fighting vehicles in Egypt and North Africa. In addition, he acted as technical adviser to the commander-in-chief, and as observer on behalf of the Ministry of Supply. On his retirement from the Royal Engineers in 1943, he was appointed deputy director-general armoured fighting vehicles for research and development, his next posting being that of director with responsibility to the director-general for general direction of research and development and with control of military headquarters staff of the Fighting Vehicles Division, Ministry of Supply, London.
Finally, in 1949, he was made deputy chief engineer, fighting vehicle design establishment. Brigadier Blagden had been an Associate Member of the Institution since 1947. He was also an Associate Member of the Institution of Electrical Engineers."