Robert Thomson is known to be fashioning a more global Wall Street Journal. Thus far, the most striking example of this was when the managing editor sent hustling distributors to hand out copies of the Journal throughout London at the outbreak of the banking meltdown last month. But no one thought the former Financial Times man's ambitions would end there, and they haven't. In a sign he'd love to reconquer his old hometown, Thomson just announced the promotion of up-and-comer Bruce Orwall to chief of the London bureau. Anonymous sources told blogger Nikki Finke the move was coming last night; we've got the freshly-emailed memo after the jump.

Orwall is four-year Los Angeles bureau chief and a "WSJ Star", in the words of New York, and incidentally the editor of a major story on Rupert Murdoch's wife Wendi Deng. It looked like he had perhaps fallen out of favor when he was passed over for the job of Page One editor, but at Thomson's Journal chief of London bureau may be an even better gig.

One hopes Orwall was careful to build some cushion in his pay package against swings in the pound, now falling by the day. He replaces Emily Nelson, who is headed back to New York.

The memo: