James Ransome was born in Newark-on-Trent, England in 1865 and was articled to Charles Henry Driver (1832-1900) in London from 1884 to 1887. He then worked as an assistant to Ernest George (1839-1922) and Harold Ainsworth Peto (1854-1933) in 1887-88, and to Ernest Turner (1844-1895).
Ransom established his own architectural practice in London in 1888. He passed his qualifying exam in 1893 and was elected an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects (ARIBA) in 1889 and a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (FRIBA) in 1902. From 1902 to 1907 he was Consulting Architect to the Government of India. He was later in partnership with Lionel Francis Russell Coote. He died in the Jersey, The Channel Islands on 19 February 1944.
Wellesley Place approach to Government House, Calcutta; Government Offices, Council House Street, Calcutta; Agricultural College, Pusa; Government Offices: — Lahore, Nagpur, Mount Abu, and Dacca; police training school, Ranchi: students' hostel, Agra; library, Simla; Imperial Cadet Corps Buildings, Dehra Dun; Government House, Chittagong; school buildings, Delhi; hospital, Delhi: churches at Lebong and Umballa; Stanley works, offices and factory, Newark-on-Trent; country houses at Honiton, Huntingdon, Leicester, Marlborough, Maidstone, Aldeburgh, Winchelsea, Wimbledon, etc.: restoration of "Lindridge" (seat of Baron Cable of Ideford); and of Tudor House, Petworth [Source: Who's Who in Architecture 1923]
Directory of British Architects 1834-1914. Compiled by Antonia Brodie, et al. Volume 2: L-Z. London; New York: British Architectural Library, Royal Institute of British Architects/Continuum, 2001
Gray, A. Stuart. Edwardian architecture: a biographical dictionary. London: Gerald Duckworth & Co., Ltd., 1985
‘Obituary’. The Builder vol. 166, 28 April 1944 p. 345
Who's Who in Architecture 1923. Edited by Frederick Chatterton. London: Architectural Press, 1923