Charles Stone
Charles Stone (1820-1900)
1900 Obituary [1]
CHARLES STONE, born at Bath on the 3rd October, 1820, early displayed a talent for mechanics and drawing.
At the age of 16 he entered the office of Mr. Luke Herbert, engineer, with whom he served several years, first in London and subsequently in Birmingham. At the commencement of what was then termed “the railway mania,” he entered the office of Captain W. S. Moorsom, in Great George Street, Westminster, under whom he was engaged in making designs and working drawings and estimates for the Southampton and Dorchester, West Cornwall, and Waterford and Hilkenny lines.
In January, 1857, he went to Ceylon on Captain Moorsom’s staff for the survey of the Ceylon Government Railway from Colombo to Kandy; and at the end of 1858 he was appointed a District Engineer in the service of the Scinde, Punjab and Delhi Railway Company, and entrusted with the task of selecting the executive staff for that line from Mooltan to Lahore and Umritsur.
On the completion and opening to traffic of that line in 1865, he was posted to a section of the Delhi line between Umballa and Meerut.
In 1870 he was appointed Chief Engineer to the Company, and held that post until 1881, when ill health obliged him to resign and return to England.
Three years before, he had received the thanks of the Government of India for his “great personal exertions in restoring through communication on the line over two large breaks near Jullundhur.”
From the year 1881 Mr. Stone lived in retirement, his health not admitting of his undertaking professional employment.
He died at his residence, Dalhousie, Outram Road, Addiscombe, on the 20 April, 1900.
Mr. Stone was elected a Member of the Institution on the 2nd February, 1864. In 1874 he contributed to the Proceedings a Paper entitled “The Implements Employed, and the Stone Protection Adopted, in the re-construction of the Bridges on the Delhi Railway.”