BRIDGES W. T.
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The name Bridges recalls one of the most interesting personalities who resided in Hongkong for a number of years - Dr. Bridges, a lawyer by profession, who at one time acted as Colonial Secretary, and came in for a great deal of criticism at a period when it seemed impossible to refrain from the acrimonious discussion, in the press and at law tribunals alike.
Mr. William Thomas Bridges was appointed to the local bar in April 1851, being a barrister-at-law of the Middle Temple. The following year he was appointed acting Attorney General, and when Mr. W. T. Mercer, then Colonial Secretary and Auditor General, went on leave in February 1857, Dr. Bridges (he had since become a D.C.L.) was recommended by Mr. Mercer as his temporary successor, and became Acting Colonial Secretary and Auditor General with permission to continue private practice, an arrangement which led to many unhappy incidents later, and laid him open to much contemporary abuse. Simultaneously he became automatically a member of the Legislative and Executive Councils.
He left Hongkong in April 1861 with hardly a kind word said of him by any members of the local legal profession at the time, if one is to judge by the records. Dr. Bridges' chief claim to unpopularity appears to have lain in his alleged effort to oust the substantive Attorney General, Mr. Thomas Chisholm Anstey, from the post in order to obtain it for himself. While in the Colony, Dr. Bridges was on several occasions accused of "disgraceful" conduct in his business, but it is not for a historian after this lapse of time to attempt any comments on the incidents complained of.
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