http://www.andrewgrantham.co.uk/afghanistan/1548/tajikistan-building-railway-to-afghanistan/ Afghan railroads, past, present and future Wed, 25 Jan 2012 20:50:55 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.3 http://www.andrewgrantham.co.uk/afghanistan/1548/tajikistan-building-railway-to-afghanistan/comment-page-1/#comment-44 Michael Quatermass Sat, 09 May 2009 15:04:02 +0000 http://www.andrewgrantham.co.uk/afghanistan/?p=1548#comment-44 By chance I came across your article on the the history of Afghan railways and was interested to learn of the part played by Capt. J L R MacDonald in early suveying of possible routes. You are probably aware that he also surveyed a route for the East Africa line from Mombasa to Kisumu and the railway, by-and-large, follows his survey, (his original drawings are preserved in the railway museum in Nairobi), He seems to have had a varied if somewhat chequered career and rubbed-up a number of people the wrong way, notably antagonising Francis Younghusband, who was the political officer in charge of an expedition to Tibet in 1904, with his heavy-handed if not murderous approach to subjugating the tibetans. He did write a book, 'Soldiering and Surveying in British East Africa' a rather dour account of his experiences and one looks in vain through its pages for the essence of the man. I believe he ended his military career as the officer-in-charge of balloons at the siege of Peking. Further comment on that would only risk a number of puns. Kind regards, Mike Quatermass. By chance I came across your article on the the history of Afghan railways and was interested to learn of the part played by Capt. J L R MacDonald in early suveying of possible routes.
You are probably aware that he also surveyed a route for the East Africa line from Mombasa to Kisumu and the railway, by-and-large, follows his survey, (his original drawings are preserved in the railway museum in Nairobi),
He seems to have had a varied if somewhat chequered career and rubbed-up a number of people the wrong way, notably antagonising Francis Younghusband, who was the political officer in charge of an expedition to Tibet in 1904, with his heavy-handed if not murderous approach to subjugating the tibetans.
He did write a book, ‘Soldiering and Surveying in British East Africa’ a rather dour account of his experiences and one looks in vain through its pages for the essence of the man.
I believe he ended his military career as the officer-in-charge of balloons at the siege of Peking. Further comment on that would only risk a number of puns.
Kind regards,
Mike Quatermass.

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