James Archibald Hamilton Holmes
James Archibald Hamilton Holmes (1836-1872)
1875 Obituary [1]
MR. JAMES ARCHIBALD HAMILTON HOLMES, eldest son of Lieut.-Colonel J. G. Hamilton Holmes, late 12th Royal Lancers, was born on the 13th of January, 1836, at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where his father was a student in the senior department.
His education, begun at home, was completed at a proprietary school at Blackheath. Mr. Holmes passed for the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, but ill-health prevented him continuing at the Academy, and he matriculated at Trinity College, Dublin, and articled himself to Mr. Hemans, Vice-President Inst. C.E., by whom he was employed on railways in the north of Ireland.
He next was appointed an Assistant Engineer on the Recife and Sao Francisco railway, from Pernambuco to the interior of Brazil, where he served three years, returning to England in 1862.
In the same year he went to India, as Assistant Engineer, for the Madras Irrigation and Canal Company, where he remained until the temporary suspension of the works in 1866.
On the resumption of the works, Mr. Holmes was again sent to India by the Madras Irrigation and Canal Company, and continued in the service of this company about three years, being mostly employed in surveying and levelling, part of the time in Mysore, in independent charge.
On the reduction of their working establishment, he for a short time was employed on the Carnatic railway, from which he was appointed to the Department of Public Works of Ceylon, and died of fever at Batteealoa, Ceylon, on the 17th of January, 1872.
Mr. Holmes was elected an Associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers on the 7th of February, 1871.