Walter Montgomerie Neilson

Walter Montgomerie Neilson (28 November 1819 – 8 July 1889 was a Scottish locomotive and marine engineer and manufacturer. He was born in Glasgow, the son of James Beaumont Neilson, inventor of the hot blast furnace. Walter was trained as an engineer in the Oakbank Foundry run by his uncle John Neilson. The company was based in Hydepark Street in central Glasgow before expanding to include nearby Finnieston Street. The company started by building ship engines but quickly expanded to building locomotives, at the time a fledgling industry, but with the British empire still expanding, a very lucrative one.

The locomotive business flourished and when Walter finally retired in the late 1870s, and even though Reid and Neilson had a falling out, the company went on to merge with others into North British Locomotive Co. Ltd. He served as the second President of The Institution of Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland from 1859 to 1861. He served as a director of the Consolidated Copper Company of Canada in the 1870s. He was also elected chairman of the Technical College of Glasgow in 1872.

Family Walter married Janet Ellen Henderson on 14 March 1867, at the British Consulate in Livorno, Italy; Janet came from a Scottish family long associated with trading from the Tuscany region. They had two children, Elena Marion Montgomerie Neilson born in 1876 and Walter Montgomerie Neilson in 1877.

Retirement and death Walter retired to Queenshill and spent the harsh British winters at his property called Monte Picini near Florence, Italy. aged 69.