 He was then for three years an apprentice at the engineering company Walter May & Co of Birmingham and was afterwards a draughtsman with P. and W. MacLelland, and Howden & Co of Glasgow and a fitter with Fawcett, Preston & Co of Liverpool.In 1869 he went to Smyrna in Turkey as a mechanic and draughtsman with the Ottoman Railway, and two years later he returned to England as a fitter in the Doncaster Locomotive Works of the Great Northern Railway.In 1871 he went to India and was engaged on the construction of a bridge two miles long over the river Chenab in the Punjab, first as assistant engineer and then as executive engineer in charge of half the bridge.