The Minutes of the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, 1892
William Bell was born at Leith on the 21st of September, 1818. He was educated at the High School, Leith, and afterwards at Edinburgh University, where, in 1839, he gained the gold medal and prize for Natural Philosophy, and was second in Mathematics.
On leaving the University in the following year, he became a pupil of the late John Hammond, then Resident Engineer on the Great Western Railway at Reading, where William Bell had many opportunities of making practical experiments on the working of locomotive engines, and on other subjects connected with mechanical engineering.
In 1842 he was placed by Mr. Hammond with the late John Thornhill Harrison on the Bristol and Gloucester Railway, and was subsequently Resident Engineer on the Cheltenham extension and on the Dawlish contract, which he measured up.