Hugh Pembroke Vowles

Hugh Pembroke Vowles (1885 – 1951) was a British engineer, socialist and author.

Early life and education

Reverend Henry Hayes Vowles, father of William Hugh Pembroke Vowles. Photograph taken in Guernsey in about 1900

Hugh Vowles was the son of Henry Hayes Vowles, a Wesleyan minister, author, and theologian; and of Hannah Elizabeth Thistle. Although he published under the name Hugh Pembroke Vowles, early records refer to him as William Hugh Pembroke Vowles.

He married twice. First to Margaret Winifred Pearce of the Pearce family of Priday, Metford and Company Limited. After her death, he married Eleanor Biss.

He was educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey and at the Technical School, Gloucester, where he served an apprenticeship and passed through the shops and drawing office of W. Sisson Ltd, power plant engineers from 1901 to 1906. After gaining experience as a junior draughtsman with G Waller and Son Ltd of Stroud, Gloucester, he was employed from 1909 to 1913 as a contract engineer with Messrs Williams and Rugby Robinson. This was followed by a brief connexion with the Gas Light and Coke Company as senior assistant engineer. During World War I, he first acted as assistant district manager to the Metropolitan Munitions Committee and later as assistant Manager at the Ailsa National Shell Factory, London.

In 1918, he became associated with Cox and Company Ltd, bankers of London as technical advisor and factory manager. In April 1921, he was resident at Redcliff, Caswell Bay, Glamorganshire and was described as "general manager and Chief Engineer to a large industrial concern" In 1922, he went to join W.H. Allen, Sons & Co Ltd mechanical and electrical engineers, for which firm he was engaged as district manager and engineer of the Cardiff office until 1929, when he went into practice on his own account as a consulting engineer.

Later life During the 1939–1945 war, he was editor of technical literature for the British Council, London; he travelled to London on Monday mornings after spending the weekend at home at the Leaze, Oxlynch. He was a member of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, of the Newcomen Society, the Society of Authors and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. He was a self-declared communist and had a keen interest in the Soviet Union, in particular the Ukraine. Because of his fondness for the Soviet Union he was known to his family as "Popski". He owned a cat called Pushkin. He retired in 1929 to devote himself to his writing. He continued to write articles for technical journals and newspapers. He was a frequent contributor to The Citizen of Gloucester.

Children

He had two sons by his first marriage: Francis Hugh Vowles (born Rugby 18 September 1911 died Gloucester 2 May 1990) Christopher David Vowles (born Gloucester March 1916) completed articles in Gloucester.

In 1935, HP Vowles met Eleanor Biss, who became his second wife. They had no children. She later lived in Stonehouse in a cottage named "Elscot".

Political ideas He recognised that there would be increased competition for resources and markets as productivity rose and that this would impact upon people's lives both by taking resources away from good causes, such as health and the advancement of science and by the effects of war:

In "post-war conditions of politics and trade... trade ... must find a vent in export for the huge increase of capacity in the productive machinery of this and other countries, leading to fiercer and fiercer competition for foreign markets and for 'control' of the raw material producing regions – particularly coal and oil areas – and so to another large scale war beside which the last will pale into insignificance, a war possibly with America, as part of the price I have to pay for the goods I buy under the present system. Many other items I have also entered up which do not commonly figure in a manufacturer's cost accounts, although they must inevitably be paid for all the same-neglect of science, neglect of health, neglect indeed of all that might to-day make life fair and gracious, simply because industry is run from the point of view of 'frenzied finance' and not for the service of mankind. . . . ." The Price We Pay

He felt that in the 1920s political change was around the corner, in particular to the left: "Nevertheless, in spite of all my doubts there are times when I am upon the whole more hopeful of the world ridding itself of its innumerable burdens; when I see signs of more and yet more fires being kindled in the minds of men; smouldering as yet, but soon it may be to blaze up and spread the knowledge that a time of great change is at hand." Ukraine and its People (W. and R Chambers, London, 1939) James Watt and the Industrial Revolution (with Henry Winram Dickinson) ; published in 1943, new edition 1948 and reprinted in 1949. Also published in Spanish and Portuguese (1944) by the British Council)

Scholarly articles

The Tradition of the Great State. Chapter in "Socialism and the Great State, Essays in Construction", by H. G. Wells et al., Harper and Brothers Publishers, New York (1912). The Price We Pay. The New Age: A Socialist Review of Religion, Science, and Art. No. 1503 Edition Vol 29, No.9 (1921) Essence of The Matter The New Age: A Socialist Review of Religion, Science, and Art. No. 1521 Vol 30, No 1 (1921) A Reply to Mr Lethaby. The Hibbert Journal: A Quarterly Review of Religion, Theology, and Philosophy (Jan. 1929) Engineer as Ruler (1930) Joseph's Well. Correspondence published in Mechanical Engineering (Monthly Journal of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers), February 1930, page 163. Includes details of Le Demour's 1732 pump.

Ancient Windmills, letter to Nature, 22 February 1932, page 317 Early Evolution of Power Engineering Isis, Vol. 17, No. 2 (1932), pp. 412–420 Science and Industrial Insanity. Article published with Margaret Vowles. July 1932. Electrification in the USS.R. in Science & Technology in the Soviet Union. Articles based on papers read at the Symposium at Easter, 1942, held under the auspices of The Faculty of Science of Marx House, 1, Doughty Street, London. British Association for the Advancement of Science, Report. Vol. II, No. 5. Science and World Order. Transactions of a Conference of the Division for the Social and International Relations of Science. British Association. 5s. net. On page 52 Vowles, speaking of the advance of mechanical science in Russia, said: "Most large Soviet cities have their pipe networks conveying hot water or steam to domestic, municipal and industrial consumers."

Children's stories

"Freaks of the Road" Boys' Own Paper, July 1932. A story.

Newspaper articles

Vowles published regularly in the South Wales News in the 1920s and 1930s.

The Crook is beating the Scientist. The Daily Mail, Wednesday, 27 April 1932. Article about Hubert Cecil Booth, published c1951 in the Gloucester citizen under the title "an interested reader"