George Turnbull was a British engineer responsible from 1851 to 1863 for construction of the first railway line from
Calcutta
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, commer ...
to
Benares
Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world.
*
*
*
* The city has a syncretic tra ...
, some – later extended to
Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...
. Turnbull was acclaimed by the Indian government as the "first railway engineer of India".
[Diaries of George Turnbull (Chief Engineer, ]East Indian Railway Company
The East Indian Railway Company, operating as the East Indian Railway (reporting mark EIR), introduced railways to East India and North India, while the Companies such as the Great Indian Peninsula Railway, South Indian Railway, Bombay, Bar ...
) held at the Centre of South Asian Studies
Center or centre may refer to:
Mathematics
*Center (geometry), the middle of an object
* Center (algebra), used in various contexts
** Center (group theory)
** Center (ring theory)
* Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentrici ...
at Cambridge University
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
, England
Early life
George Turnbull was born in
Luncarty
Luncarty (; pronounced ''Lung''-cur-tay) ) is a village in Perth and Kinross, Scotland, approximately north of Perth, Scotland, Perth. It lies between the A9 road (Scotland), A9 to the west, and the River Tay to the east.
Etymology
The name ''L ...
, 5 miles north of
Perth
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...
, Scotland in 1809, the 11th child of William Turnbull and Mary Sandeman – they moved in 1814 to nearby
Huntingtower village, where his father developed a
bleachfield. His two grandfathers
Hector Turnbull
Hector Turnbull (September 11, 1884 – April 8, 1934) was an American screenwriter and film producer. He wrote for 25 films between 1915 and 1937. He was born in Arlington, New Jersey and died in New Hope, Pennsylvania from a heart attack. ...
and
William Sandeman
William Sandeman (1722 in Luncarty, Scotland – 1790 in Perth, Scotland) was a leading Perthshire linen and later cotton manufacturer. For instance in 1782 alone, Perthshire produced 1.7 million yards of linen worth £81,000. Linen manufactur ...
had jointly developed
linen
Linen () is a textile made from the fibers of the flax plant.
Linen is very strong, absorbent, and dries faster than cotton. Because of these properties, linen is comfortable to wear in hot weather and is valued for use in garments. It also ...
bleachfields in Luncarty. Initially largely schooled by his older sister Mary, George in 1819 from age 10 rode a pony to
Perth Grammar School. In 1824 he attended
Edinburgh University
The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted ...
learning Latin, Greek and mathematics.
[''George Turnbull, C.E.'' 437-page memoirs published privately 1893, scanned copy held in the British Library, London on compact disk since 2007]
Career in England
In 1828 he sailed from
Dundee
Dundee (; sco, Dundee; gd, Dùn Dè or ) is Scotland's fourth-largest city and the 51st-most-populous built-up area in the United Kingdom. The mid-year population estimate for 2016 was , giving Dundee a population density of 2,478/km2 or ...
to London to train under the famous civil engineer
Thomas Telford
Thomas Telford FRS, FRSE, (9 August 1757 – 2 September 1834) was a Scottish civil engineer. After establishing himself as an engineer of road and canal projects in Shropshire, he designed numerous infrastructure projects in his native Scot ...
building
St Katharine Docks
St Katharine Docks is a former dock and now a mixed-used district in Central London, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and within the East End. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, immediately downstream of the Tower of London an ...
. In 1830 he became Telford's draughtsman and clerk, living in Telford's house in 24
Abingdon Street. He became an Associate of the
Institution of Civil Engineers
The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) is an independent professional association for civil engineers and a charitable body in the United Kingdom. Based in London, ICE has over 92,000 members, of whom three-quarters are located in the UK, whi ...
at age 19 and eventually the oldest member.
In 1832, he helped survey the options for supplying water to London both from the north and south, gauging the north-side rivers
Colne
Colne () is a market town and civil parish in the Borough of Pendle in Lancashire, England. Located northeast of Nelson, north-east of Burnley, east of Preston and west of Leeds.
The town should not be confused with the unrelated Colne ...
,
Gade,
Lea,
Odess and
Ver; and on the south side the
River Wandle
The River Wandle is a right-bank tributary of the River Thames in south London, England. With a total length of about , the river passes through the London boroughs of Croydon, Sutton, Merton and Wandsworth, where it reaches the Thames. A sho ...
. He was involved in 1833 with experiments for
fast passenger canal boats on the
Paddington Canal with
Cubitt Cubitt is a surname, and may refer to:
* Bertram Cubitt KCB (1862–1942), civil servant in the British War Office
* Clayton James Cubitt, a.k.a. SIEGE, American art photographer
*David Cubitt (born 1965), Canadian television actor
* Eleni Cubitt, ...
, Dundas and other prominent engineers.
In 1834
Telford died: Turnbull (Telford's clerk) made arrangements for his house and correspondence and was involved with his burial in
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey, formally titled the Collegiate Church of Saint Peter at Westminster, is an historic, mainly Gothic church in the City of Westminster, London, England, just to the west of the Palace of Westminster. It is one of the United ...
.
Turnbull was promoted to be resident engineer building the
Bute ship canal and Bute Dock (now
West Bute dock) in
Cardiff
Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of Wales. It forms a Principal areas of Wales, principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a ...
, reporting to
William Cubitt
Sir William Cubitt FRS (bapt. 9 October 1785 – 13 October 1861) was an eminent English civil engineer and millwright. Born in Norfolk, England, he was employed in many of the great engineering undertakings of his time. He invented a type o ...
and meeting
Lord Bute regularly.
In August 1836 George was in Bristol to see the 1½-inch bar drawn across the river at
Clifton
Clifton may refer to:
People
* Clifton (surname)
* Clifton (given name)
Places
Australia
*Clifton, Queensland, a town
** Shire of Clifton
*Clifton, New South Wales, a suburb of Wollongong
* Clifton, Western Australia
Canada
* Clifton, Nova Sc ...
for the future
suspension bridge
A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridges, which lack vertical ...
.
Brunel
Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859) was a British civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history," "one of the 19th-century engineering giants," and "one ...
visited him at the Cardiff works in 1839.
Amongst other journeys, Turnbull's January 1837 diary records travel from Cardiff to his parents'
Perthshire
Perthshire ( locally: ; gd, Siorrachd Pheairt), officially the County of Perth, is a historic county and registration county in central Scotland. Geographically it extends from Strathmore in the east, to the Pass of Drumochter in the nort ...
home: the mail coach to Bristol (with no
Severn Bridge or
tunnel
A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube cons ...
of course); all the next day Bristol to London ''"on Cooper's coach, sitting on the box seat outside with the coachman"'' (there was snow 10 feet deep near
Marlborough); the steamer ''Perth'' for the 41-hour journey to Dundee; and then overland to
Huntingtower, near Perth.
From 1840 to 1842 Turnbull built
Middlesbrough
Middlesbrough ( ) is a town on the southern bank of the River Tees in North Yorkshire, England. It is near the North York Moors national park. It is the namesake and main town of its local borough council area.
Until the early 1800s, the ...
Dock which was later bought by the
Stockton and Darlington Railway
The Stockton and Darlington Railway (S&DR) was a railway company that operated in north-east England from 1825 to 1863. The world's first public railway to use steam locomotives, its first line connected collieries near Shildon with Darli ...
. In 1841 he travelled through deep snow to
Stirling
Stirling (; sco, Stirlin; gd, Sruighlea ) is a city in central Scotland, northeast of Glasgow and north-west of Edinburgh. The market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the royal citadel, the medieval old town with its me ...
to agree a contract to supply
sleepers for the railway. In 1843 he was resident engineer for William Cubitt for the railway line from the
Shakespeare Tunnel along the shore to
Dover station (he entertained the
Duke of Wellington
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, (1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and Tory statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister ...
, ''"pale, old and shaky on his legs"'', who visited the works) and built a pier and landing stages at
Folkestone
Folkestone ( ) is a port town on the English Channel, in Kent, south-east England. The town lies on the southern edge of the North Downs at a valley between two cliffs. It was an important harbour and shipping port for most of the 19th and 20t ...
.
In 1845 he was the engineer in
Birkenhead
Birkenhead (; cy, Penbedw) is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Merseyside, England; historically, it was part of Cheshire until 1974. The town is on the Wirral Peninsula, along the south bank of the River Mersey, opposite Liv ...
for the complex
Seacombe Wall sea defence that helped drain the marshes behind the town of Seacombe.
In 1846-9 he was the resident engineer for the
Great Northern Railway making cuttings and the
South Mimms
South Mimms is a village and civil parish in the Hertsmere district of Hertfordshire in the East of England. It is a small settlement located near to the junction of the M25 motorway with the A1(M) motorway and is perhaps more widely known because ...
,
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan a ...
and three other tunnels for the first 20 miles out of London, and making the first plans for
King's Cross station
King's Cross railway station, also known as London King's Cross, is a passenger railway terminus in the London Borough of Camden, on the edge of Central London. It is in the London station group, one of the busiest stations in the United Kin ...
.
East Indian Railway
In 1850 he was appointed Chief Engineer of the
East Indian Railway
The East Indian Railway Company, operating as the East Indian Railway (reporting mark EIR), introduced railways to East India and North India, while the Companies such as the Great Indian Peninsula Railway, South Indian Railway, Bombay, Barod ...
building 1851–1862 the first railway miles from
Calcutta
Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, commer ...
to
Benares
Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world.
*
*
*
* The city has a syncretic tra ...
(on the route to
Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders w ...
), including branches. He designed Calcutta's
terminus at Howrah which now has 23 platforms and the highest train-handling capacity of any station in India. The monsoon-ravaged Ganges tributaries such as the wide
Sone River were particularly challenging to bridge: a major constraint for Turnbull was the lack of both quality clay and brick-building skills resulting in the change to importing much ironwork from England for the many bridges and other structures (all rails were imported from England as no Indian steel works existed). Another constraint was the difficulty of moving enormous volumes of materials from Calcutta up the Ganges on its primitive "country boats", particularly during the period of the
Indian Mutiny
The Indian Rebellion of 1857 was a major uprising in India in 1857–58 against the rule of the British East India Company, which functioned as a sovereign power on behalf of the British Crown. The rebellion began on 10 May 1857 in the for ...
when many boats were sunk and materials stolen.
Cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium '' Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting an ...
killed thousands.
Offered a knighthood
Turnbull was offered a knighthood for his railway building in India, but declined it as he felt that he did not have sufficient money to live to the standard he felt was needed (he later regretted declining the knighthood, if only because it reduced his later earning power).
Calcutta drainage and sewerage
In 1856 the Bengal Government appointed Turnbull to be the Commissioner of Drainage and Sewerage.
Calcutta University Syndicate
In 1861 Turnbull was appointed a member of the Syndicate of the Calcutta University.
[''George Turnbull, C.E.'' page 178 of the 437-page memoirs published privately 1893, scanned copy held in the British Library, London on compact disk since 2007]
Sulkea Dock
In Calcutta in 1861 the
Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company
P&O (in full, The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company) is a British shipping and logistics company dating from the early 19th century. Formerly a public company, it was sold to DP World in March 2006 for £3.9 billion. DP World c ...
employed Turnbull to redesign the
Sulkea Graving Dock, at
Sulkea, and widen its entrance.
Great Indian Peninsular Railway
In February 1868, Turnbull was offered £2000 to settle the claim by contractors who had built part of the
Great Indian Peninsular Railway. He travelled via
Marseilles
Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...
,
Alexandria
Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandri ...
, train to
Suez
Suez ( ar, السويس '; ) is a seaport city (population of about 750,000 ) in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez (a branch of the Red Sea), near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal, having the same bou ...
, and on to
Bombay
Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...
. He and others had a private train for four days ''"getting down and inspecting every bridge and large culvert"'' and making copious notes for the between
Bhusawal
Bhusawal is the largest municipal council (established in 1882) in the Jalgaon district of the Indian state of Maharashtra, situated along the banks of the river Tapi. The city emerged as a major railway junction during the British Raj, and s ...
and
Nagpore
Nagpur (pronunciation: aːɡpuːɾ is the third largest city and the winter capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the 13th largest city in India by population and according to an Oxford's Economics report, Nagpur is projected to ...
.
Personal life
In 1845 he married Jane Pope in
St. Margaret's, Westminster. She died of fever on 23 August 1850 in Calcutta, only four months after arriving there. In 1855, after leave in England and on his way again to India, he married Fanny Thomas, the engineer
William Cubitt
Sir William Cubitt FRS (bapt. 9 October 1785 – 13 October 1861) was an eminent English civil engineer and millwright. Born in Norfolk, England, he was employed in many of the great engineering undertakings of his time. He invented a type o ...
's niece (in
Neuchâtel
, neighboring_municipalities= Auvernier, Boudry, Chabrey (VD), Colombier, Cressier, Cudrefin (VD), Delley-Portalban (FR), Enges, Fenin-Vilars-Saules, Hauterive, Saint-Blaise, Savagnier
, twintowns = Aarau (Switzerland), Besançon (Fra ...
, Switzerland because of concern that UK marriage to his deceased wife's half-sister might not be
legal
Law is a set of rules that are created and are law enforcement, enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. ...
in England). Their first child
llenNelly was born on 14 July 1856 in Calcutta 9 months after their wedding. They had six children: their infants Jane and later Rose were born in Calcutta and successively buried in the same grave in Circular Road. Born in Calcutta on 17 March 1860 was their son George. Born in London were their son Alexander Duncan Turnbull on 10 March 1863 and daughter Katie on 4 June 1864.
The family retired to Cornwall Gardens in London and then in 1875 to Rosehill,
Abbots Langley
Abbots Langley is a large village and civil parish in the English county of Hertfordshire. It is an old settlement and is mentioned (under the name of Langelai) in the Domesday Book. Economically the village is closely linked to Watford and w ...
, Hertfordshire, England. The house Rosehill was built in the 1820s and demolished circa 1952. The house stood on Gallows Hill where the Gade View flats are today. He was the Vice-Chairman of the
Assam Tea Company – his son (Alexander) Duncan Turnbull worked for the company in
Assam
Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...
and his granddaughter Doris was born there. George Turnbull's wife Fanny died in 1903.
Abbots Langley
Applying his engineering skills, Turnbull wrote the prospectus for the Abbots Langley Water Company and was much involved with the village's drainage and sewerage scheme in 1885. In March 1877, he also took a lease on 24 Collingham Place in London.
The village church includes a stained-glass memorial window
[''Luncarty's Engineer: A short biography'' by John Andrews of Luncarty, West Stormont Historical Society, 2018, page 50 of 51 pages.] with the inscription ''To the Glory of God in memory of George Turnbull C.E. born 1809 died 1889''. It was donated by his widow Fanny.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Turnbull, George
British canal engineers
British bridge engineers
British railway civil engineers
People of the Industrial Revolution
People from Perth and Kinross
Railway officers in British India
Scottish civil engineers
1809 births
1889 deaths
Alumni of the University of Edinburgh