Public Works Department

The Public Works Department was a government department that was responsible for buildings, roads, irrigation and railways.

• The Military Works branch detatched from the PWD and became the Military Works Service under the Indian Army in 1899.

• Europeans employed on State Railways were usually on the strength of the PWD and therefore a civil servant (eligible for pension etc). NB in this context, if your ancestor turns up on a railway in India and the record contains "PWD" in the note or description, then this does not refer to "Permanent Way Department" (as it would in a UK context) but to the Public Works Department!

Departmental Structure

The PWD around 1870 was headed by the PWD Secretary to the Government of India – a consultant engineer and advisor to Viceroy and Council. Deputy Secretaries were responsible for the Departments of :

• Irrigation
• Railways and
• Military Engineering

Local Government had its PWD Secretary who was

• Advisor to Lieutenant Governor or Chief Commissioner
• Chief Engineer for his Province

Under him, Superintending Engineers were responsible for District, or a major project ie: a railway line.

Executive Engineers reported to the Superintending Engineers and were project managers for the single project. they would control:

• 2 or 3 Assistant Engineers,
• 5 or 6 European Overseer (NCO’s)
• 8/10 Native overseers and
• Office staff

Training

Assistant engineers are drawn from Civilian staff or the Royal Engineers, Artillery or line Officers. They were trained at Roorkee New officer to India spend a year at Rorkee serving with the Bengal Sappers and Miners for a year to acclimatise and become linguistically fluent.

Roorkee housed:

• Headquarters for the Bengal Sappers and Royal Engineers in Bengal
• Thomason College
• Foundry

Thomason College was a small trinaing college, with a staff of five. It offered:

• Engineering Course for potential Assistant Engineers - a two year course
• Quarter Master Course - seven month course

Appointments were town based for Military Building including architecture, or remote and rural for those chosing the Irrigation, or Railway specialities. Some became member of the Survey Dept Those with a particular interest in architecture were encouaged to specialise there was a great demand for architects.

FIBIS Resources

Hugh Wilding, "M.I.C.E. in the branches: a family history work in progress" FIBIS Journal No 23 (Spring 2010), pages 28-38. M.I.C.E. stands for Member of the Institution of Civil Engineers. An account of researching a civil engineer in the Public Works Department. For details of how to access this article, see FIBIS Journals

Records

The following India Office Records held at the British Library may help researchers:

• PWD Civil Lists 1861-1940 [IOR: V/13]

External links

• Developments in Public Works, British India from History of India, Indianetzone
• Frederick Lewis Dibblee. Railway engineer. Worked in India 1864-1888

Historical books online

• "Public Works in the Bengal Presidency" by Major General George Borlase Tremenheere, of the Bengal Engineers from Minutes of Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers (Great Britain) 1858 page 483 (Google Books). He also gave evidence in 1858 to a House Of Commons Select Committe on Colonisation and Settlement in India, see Parliamentary Papers 1858 (Google Books).
• Professional papers on Indian engineering

Volume 1 1863-64, Volume 2 1865, Volume 3 1866, Volume 4 1867, Volume 5 1868, Volume 6 1869 Google Books.

Volume 7, 1870 is available to read online on the Digital Library of India website. Preface computer page 3 Index commences computer page 10 (first page of index missing)

Second Series Volume 2 1873, Second Series Volume 5 1876, Second Series Volume 7 1878, Second Series Volume 8 1879 Archive.org

• India List & India Office List 1905 Your railway ancestor may be here.
• India and Indian Engineering by J G Medley 1873 ex Principal of Tomason College, Rorkee. Good description of the life and work of engineers in India.