Philip Cardew

Educated at Guildford Grammar School, he passed first into the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, in 1868, and left it at the head of his batch.

At the end of 1876 he was transferred to Chatham, where the headquarters of the submarine mining was on board HMS Hood, which lay in the Medway off Gillingham.

[1] In addition to his work of instruction, Cardew assisted in carrying out some important experiments with electric searchlight apparatus for the Royal Engineers committee, at a time when the subject was in its infancy.

[1] Cardew's invention of the vibratory transmitter for telegraphy was perhaps his most important discovery, and in the case of faulty lines proved most useful, not only on active service in the Nile Expedition and in India, but also during heavy snowstorms at home.

He then entered into partnership with Sir William Preece & Sons, consulting engineers, and was actively engaged on large admiralty orders, involving an expenditure of £1,500,000.

[2] In 1881 Cardew wrote a paper on "The application of dynamo electric machines to railway rolling stock"; in 1894 he contributed a paper to the Royal Society on "Uni-directional currents to earth from alternate current systems"; and in 1901 he delivered the Cantor lecture before the Society of Arts on "Electric railways".