Chief mechanical engineer and locomotive superintendent are titles applied by British, Australian, and New Zealand railway companies to the person ultimately responsible to the board of the company for the building and maintaining of the locomotives and rolling stock. In Britain, the post of locomotive superintendent was introduced in the late 1830s, and chief mechanical engineer in 1886.

Emerging professional roles

In the early Victorian era, projected canal or railway schemes were prepared by groups of promoters who hired specialists such as civil engineers, surveyors, architects or contractors to survey a route; and this resulted in the issue of a prospectus setting out their proposals. Provided that adequate capital could be raised from potential investors, agreements obtained from the landowners along the proposed route and, in Britain, an Act of Parliament obtained (different terminology is used in other countries), then construction might begin either by a new company specially formed to build and run it or by an existing company. It obtained a Royal Charter in 1828. Later, the Institution of Mechanical Engineers was formed in 1847, with George Stephenson as its first president. These officers retained their former military rank within the Inspectorate.

In Britain, the various railway companies appointed and employed an engineer or chief engineer, who was usually a civil engineer by profession. This was a permanent management role in the company in contrast to that of contractors, for instance, who were only hired to perform specific tasks such as construction of the line. The chief engineer had his own department (and budget) and was an important company official. Soon afterwards, many railway companies were to set up their own railway workshops, although railway companies continued to buy-in locomotives from specialist manufacturers, such as Robert Stephenson and Company which was founded by George and Robert Stephenson in 1828. Some railway companies operated their own ferries, boats, and ships and these would also be the responsibility of their Chief Engineer, but they would have been ordered from shipyards. Isambard Kingdom Brunel set an example, designing three great steamships: the SS Great Western, the SS Great Britain and the SS Great Eastern – the first two being built at Bristol shipyards and the third at Millwall, London. The Institute of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland was formed in 1857 as a professional body for these trades in Scotland. otherwise railway companies could and did establish workshops to build their own locomotives and carriages. In August 1837, for example, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the Engineer responsible for the Great Western Railway, appointed Daniel Gooch locomotive superintendent to the company; and it was his responsibility to provide the locomotives, the accommodation for them and the running and the repair shops. Gooch suggested a green field site, New Swindon, and this was to lead to the building of a railway works, a railway village and eventually the town of Swindon. Swindon was not the only example of railway town or community that was created in England: Crewe being another.

Locomotive superintendent

Initially, when a railway company chose to build its own rolling stock in house, the mechanical engineering aspect was regarded as a subsidiary function to that of the chief engineer and this was reflected in various job titles, such as chief of locomotive department, locomotive foreman and locomotive superintendent.

Later, there was a desire to improve the prestige, and salary, of the locomotive superintendent and a means of achieving those aims was to seek to regrade the post as chief mechanical engineer (CME).

  • L. B. Billinton
  • London, Brighton and South Coast Railway 1912–1922
  • Córas Iompair Éireann (CIÉ) (Ireland), 1950–1958
  • Charles Collett
  • Great Western Railway 1921–1941