L. B. Billinton

Who was L. B. Billinton?

Lawson Butzkopfski Billinton was the Locomotive Engineer of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway from 1912 until the company became part of the Southern Railway in 1923. He joined the LBSCR in 1900 as an apprentice. By the end of 1907 he was a district locomotive superintendent at the railway works at New Cross. From February 1911 Billinton was locum tenens, or caretaker, for Locomotive Engineer D. E. Marsh at Brighton works whilst Marsh was on leave of absence due to ill health. Earle Marsh resigned in July 1911. Billinton was promoted to Locomotive Engineer at the beginning of 1912.

In 1917 Billinton was commissioned as a temporary Lieutenant Colonel in the Royal Engineers, and he served on military missions to Romania and Russia. He retired from the SR aged 40 in 1923, taking up fruit farming at Bolney in Sussex. Billinton died in 1954 at Lyme Regis in Dorset.