James Samuel (21 March 1824 – 25 May 1874) was a railway engineer who was born in

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

on 21 March 1824. He was appointed engineer to the

Eastern Counties Railway The Eastern Counties Railway (ECR) was an English Rail transport, railway company incorporated in 1836 intended to link London with Ipswich via Colchester, and then extend to Norwich and Great Yarmouth, Yarmouth. Construction began in 1837 on t ...

in 1846. He held two important

patents A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

but, in both cases, the invention was the work of another.

Career

He became engineer to the

in 1846. He was a supporter of light railway vehicles and collaborated with

William Bridges Adams William Bridges Adams (1797 – 23 July 1872) was an English author, inventor and locomotive engineer. He is best known for his patented Adams axle – a successful radial axle design in use on railways in Britain until the end of steam tracti ...

on these. He designed a pair of light

2-2-0 Under Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 2-2-0 represents the wheel arrangement of two leading wheels on one axle, two powered driving wheels on one axle, and no trailing wheels. This configuration, which became very p ...

locomotives for the

Morayshire Railway The Morayshire Railway was the first railway to be built north of Aberdeen, Scotland. It received royal assent in 1846 but construction was delayed until 1851 because of the adverse economic conditions existing in the United Kingdom. The railwa ...

. These were built by

Neilson and Company Neilson and Company was a locomotive manufacturer in Glasgow, Scotland. The company was started in 1836 at McAlpine Street by Walter Neilson and James Mitchell to manufacture marine and stationary engines. In 1837 the firm moved to Hyde Park ...

for the opening of the line in August 1852. They were not a great success. From 1858 he worked on civil engineering projects in Asia Minor, the US and Mexico.

Innovations

In 1850 James Samuel lodged patent 13029 for a form of locomotive

compounding In the field of pharmacy, compounding (performed in compounding pharmacies) is preparation of a custom formulation of a medication to fit a unique need of a patient that cannot be met with commercially available products. This may be done for me ...

, giving "continuous expansion" using two cylinders of equal diameter, a system devised by John Nicholson, a driver on the Eastern Counties Railway. Two locomotives were built using this system—one for goods and one for passenger traffic—and, according to papers read by James Samuel before the

Institute of Mechanical Engineers The Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) is an independent professional association and learned society headquartered in London, United Kingdom, that represents mechanical engineers and the engineering profession. With over 120,000 member ...

in January and April, 1852, the results were "highly satisfactory". Unfortunately, no other record of them is known to survive. James Samuel also patented a railway

fishplate A fishplate joins two lengths of track A fishplate, splice bar or joint bar is a metal connecting plate used to bolt the ends of two rails into a continuous track. The name is derived from ''fish'', a wooden reinforcement of a "built-up" ship's ...

in 1844.

References

*Gordon, W.J. (1910): ''Our Home Railways'' (volume one). Frederick Warne & Co, London, England. {{DEFAULTSORT:Samuel, James 1824 births 1874 deaths Scottish railway mechanical engineers