Francis Bolton

Sir Francis John Bolton (1831–1887) was a British Army officer, known also as a telegraphic and electrical engineer.

The son of Dr. Thomas Wilson Bolton, surgeon, of London and Manchester, he enlisted in the Royal Artillery, in which he rose to be a non-commissioned officer, getting his first step as acting bombardier at Halifax, Nova Scotia.

The Army and Navy Signal Book was compiled by Bolton and Colomb, assisted by an officer of Royal Engineers, and was used during the British Expedition to Abyssinia of 1867/8.

Bolton was largely instrumental in 1871 in founding the Society of Telegraph Engineers and Electricians, of which he became honorary secretary.

[2] Bolton designed the displays of coloured fountains and electric lights which formed prominent features of the exhibitions at South Kensington from 1883 to 1886; they were worked from the central tower under his personal superintendence.