However, with the onset of war, when his father was deployed to serve in Egypt, the family went to Sussex in order to escape the possibility of bombs. He was born in Esher on June 12, 1938, and spent his early years in Kingston.
David resided in a rented house on the West Dean Estate while he was staying with relatives in Chilgrove, which is located close to Chichester. In the future, he planned to spend his entire life in Chichester or the surrounding area.
After receiving his first education at Bognor Technical School, he transferred to Chichester High School for Boys to complete his ‘A’ Levels. Subsequently, he joined the Southern Region in the District Engineer’s Permanent Way Drawing Office at Brighton.
Both of these institutions are located in Brighton. The terms of his employment provided a day leave so that he could attend Brighton Technical College for his education. During the year 1967, he was given the opportunity to work at Horsham as an Assistant Area Civil Engineer, a position that he thoroughly enjoyed.
However, when the Area Civil Engineer moved on, he applied for the top post, but he was not successful in getting it. Even though he was discouraged, he persisted and succeeded the second time around.
Very quickly, he had the region operating just like he desired it to, and he earned the trust and respect of all of his superiors. He moved from Horsham to the CCE Permanent Way Drawing Office at Southern House in Croydon, where he was in charge of all specialist activities, including gauging, and became the champion for ballast glueing as a means of reducing the kinematic effects of rolling stock in tight places.
There were many of these tight places on the South Eastern Division, including the Penge Tunnel, where the kinematic envelopes of slam-door stock actually overlapped. He was responsible for everything from gauging to ballast glueing.
This method was successfully implemented in a number of locations between Dollands Moor and Waterloo as part of the Channel Tunnel Project. These locations were specifically chosen because the Eurostar stock, which included projecting yaw-dampers, presented challenges that had not been encountered with any of the preceding new stock.
