William Henderson (d.1944)
William Henderson (c1884-c1943)
1944 Obituary [1]
WILLIAM HENDERSON was an Associate Member of the Institution for 23 years, having been elected in 1919. He served a six years' apprenticeship, beginning in 1901, with Messrs. Andrew Barclay, Sons and Company, Ltd., Kilmarnock, and received his technical education with the Kilmarnock School of Science and Art, and the Royal Technical College, Glasgow.
He was appointed to the Great Indian Peninsula Railway, Bombay, in 1913 as Assistant Locomotive Superintendent and promoted to District Loco Superintendent in 1917. During his period of service with that railway he was responsible for the design of a four-cylinder ten-wheeled-coupled locomotive; and also for the equipment of locomotives for burning pulverized fuel, the design and layout of proposed new locomotive shops, of hydraulic presses for 18-pounder and 4.5-inch shells.
From 1917 to 1919 his services were lent to the Government of India where he occupied the position of Deputy Controller (Manufactures) Indian Munition Board, acting as Government Consultant to firms engaged in the manufacture of munitions, as well as the handling and inspection of all outgoing munition contracts for the Armies in Mesopotamia. Latterly he was appointed to the staff of the Chief Inspector of Armaments at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, being attached to the Fuze Division. In this capacity he went to Canada and the United States in 1940 as a member of the British Inspection Board of the United Kingdom Technical Mission.