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Walter Brown FRSE (29 April 1886, Glasgow - 14 April 1957, Marandellas, Rhodesia) was a Scottish mathematician and engineer.
The younger son of Hugh A. Brown, a headmaster in Paisley, Walter was educated at Allan Glen's School and then studied at the University of Glasgow (BSc Hons Mathematics and Physics 1907; and BSc Pure Science 1910). He began his career as a teacher at Allan Glen's. Brown became a member of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society in March 1911.[1]
In 1914 he took up the post of Lecturer in Engineering at Hong Kong University. He was soon promoted to become Professor in Pure and Applied Mathematics, a post he held from 1918 to 1946.[2]
In 1920 he was elected an Associate Member of the Institution of Electrical Engineers. In 1923 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Andrew Gray, George Alexander Gibson, John Walter Gregory, John Gordon Gray and Dugald McQuistan.[3]
He was President of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Society, and a member of the Hong Kong English Association, the Hong Kong Sino-British Association, and the Hong Kong Institute of Engineers and Shipbuilders.
A member of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, Brown was captured when Hong Kong surrendered to the Japanese, and he was held as a Prisoner of War at Stanley Camp (1941 - 45). He organised study groups in the internment camp, and helped attend to the medical needs of the prisoners.[4]
Returning to Scotland after the war, he taught civil and mechanical engineering at the Royal Technical College in Glasgow (1946 - 47), and mathematics at the University of Glasgow (1947 - 48).
He travelled extensively and died in Marandellas in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in April 1957.