Barnaby, Kenneth C.

SUBJECT AREA: Ports and shipping

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b. c.1887 England

d. 22 March 1968 England

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English naval architect and technical author.

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Kenneth Barnaby was an eminent naval architect, as were his father and grandfather before him: his grandfather was Sir Nathaniel Barnaby KGB, Director of Naval Construction, and his father was Sydney W.Barnaby, naval architect of John I. Thornycroft \& Co., Shipbuilders, Southampton. At one time all three were members of the Institution of Naval Architects, the first time that this had ever occurred with three members from one family.

Kenneth Barnaby served his apprenticeship at the Thornycroft shipyard in Southampton and later graduated in engineering from the Central Technical College, South Kensington, London. He worked for some years at Le Havre and at John Brown's shipyard at Clydebank before rejoining his old firm in 1916 as Assistant to the Shipyard Manager. In 1919 he went to Rio de Janeiro as a chief ship draughtsman, and finally he returned to Thornycroft, in 1924 he succeeded his father as Naval Architect, and remained in that post until his retirement in 1955, having been appointed a director in 1950.

Barnaby had a wide knowledge and understanding of ships and ship design and during the Second World War he was responsible for much of the development work for landing craft, as well as for many other specialist ships built at the Southampton yard. His experience as a deep-sea yachtsman assisted him. He wrote several important books; however, none can compare with the Centenary Volume of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects. In this work, which is used and read widely to this day by naval architects worldwide, he reviewed every paper presented and almost every verbal contribution made to the Transactions during its one hundred years.

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Principal Honours and Distinctions

OBE 1945. Associate of the City and Guilds Institute. Royal Institution of Naval Architects Froude Gold Medal 1962. Honorary Vice-President, Royal Institution of Naval Architects 1960–8.

Bibliography

c.1900, Marine Propellers, London. 1949, Basic Naval Architecture, London.

1960, The Institution of Naval Architects 1860–1960, London.

1964, 100 Years of Specialised Shipbuilding and Engineering, London. 1968, Some Ship Disasters and their Causes, London.

FMW