Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers/Volume 106/Obituary of Charles Percy Bysshe Shelley

CHARLES PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY was born in the year 1827, at Epsom, his father being a physician and surgeon practising in that town.

He received his early education at Dr. Pritchard’s school at Clapham, considered at that period as one of the best private schools in London. From thence he went to King’s College, London, and having early evinced a strong desire to become an engineer, he eventually entered the Applied Sciences Department of the same College under Professor Cowper.

Upon leaving King's College he joined the firm of Messrs. Fox, Henderson and Co., at Birmingham, where he was engeged upon many different works, but chiefly upon the designs for the ironwork of the Great Exhibition Building of 1851. Upon its erection he prepared a very interesting "bird's-eye" view of the structure as it stood in Hyde Park, which hededicated by special permission to H.R.H. the date Prince Consort. He also had the supervision of the firm's numerous pupils, to whom he regularly lectured, and generally instructed in the theoretical part of their work.

Upon the completion of his engagement with Messrs. Fox, Henderson and Co., Mr. Shelley went to Mr. Thomas Cubitt's brickworks at Burham, where he erected a pair of 60-HP. engines, which were removed from the Croydon Atmospheric Railway.

He was next engaged by the Ebbw Vale Coal and Iron Company at their Victoria Works, South Wales, and whilst here he made a very complete set of diagrams upon mechanical subjects, and gave a course of evening lectures to the workmen employed at the works during the day; and, judging from the large attendance of the men and lads, they evidently appreciated Mr. Shelley's efforts on their behalf.

Afterwards he became Chief Assistant to the late Sir William (then Mr.) Siemens, and subsequently he was appointed Principal Draughtsman in the drawing office of Mr. Edward Woods. Later, for a period of about five years, he was engaged in the drawing offic eof Mr. E. A. Cowper. He next went to Spain, where he fulfilled an important engagement upon the Tudela and Bilbao Railway.

In the year 1860 he was appointed Professor of Manufacturing Art and Machinery in King's College, London, in the same department to which he had formerly belonged as a student, and filling the "Chair" previously occupied by Professor Cowper, under whom he had pursued his studies whilst at the College, and for whom he had the very highest regard. This post he held for a period of thirty years, only vacating it about a year before his death.

At the time of his application for the Professorship, Mr. Shelley was established as an engineer in Westminster, and amongst many other and varied works upon which he was engaged in practice, he undertook and carried out the plans for the Thames Valley Railway, which ultimately became a branch of the London and South Western line.

During the earlier years of his professional career, and before the establishment of Cooper's Hill College, he was particularly successful in the preparation of young men for the Public Works Department of India; whilst later, he had many articled pupils, most of whom are now filling important engineering appointments, either at home or abroad.

Mr. Shelley was for some time associated with the late Sir Joseph Whitworth, Bart.; and in conjunction with Mr. T. M. Goodeve, M.A., he wrote a work descriptive of the "Whitworth Measuring Machine." He was engaged upon the designs for an Ironworks which was erected at Shrewsbury. He also acted as Arbitrator in many important law disputes respect in the infringement of patents.

Mr. Shelley was for many years one of the Assistant Examiners in Steam and Mechanies at the Science and Art Department, South Kensington Museum. He also set the Papers, and was Examiner in those subjects, for the Royal Military College at Woolwich. He was the Author of a very useful little book, entitled "Workshop Appliances," which was well received, and went through six editions, being also translated into Spanish.

Mr. Shelley was elected an Associate of the Institution on the 19th May, 1857, and was transferred to the class of Member on the 7th of January, 1879. He was a Fellow of King's College, London, and a Member of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, to which Society's proceedings he contributed a valuable Paper on "Rope-making."

A gentleman of the strictest integrity and honour, Mr. Shelley was a clever, and, in some respects, a remarkable man; thorough in the accomplishment of everything he undertook, accurate alike in the execution of little things as well as large. He died at Bromley, in Kent, on the 16th of June, after a short illness, although his general health had been failing for some time past.