I have someone in my family tree who was a civil engineer who worked for various railway companies in India. He was born in Calcutta in 1891. I know that he completed a course at The School of Practical Engineering at Crystal Palace, London in 1914. I understand that this school was extensively used for the practical training of civil engineers for employment on railways throughout the Empire. I also understand that such courses were of two years duration so he would have been 21 when he started. On completion of the course he worked for a railway company in London for a few years followed by a period on railway construction in the Belgian Congo then back to India by the mid 1920s working for M&SM Railway and others. Oral family history says that prior to his time at Crystal Palace he was at Oxford University but they have no record of him. Can anyone suggest what engineering studies he would have had to complete, and where, before he took the course at Crystal Palace? David