BRIDGES GEORGE WILSON: (1788-1863) English photographer, writer and Anglican cleric. An ...

BRIDGES GEORGE WILSON: (1788-1863) English photographer, writer and Anglican cleric. An acquaintance of William Fox Talbot, Bridges toured the Mediterranean taking 1,700 early photographs of Egypt, Greece, the Holy Land and Mount Etna erupting. A somewhat controversial figure, Bridges eloped to Gretna Green to marry, causing a scandal and family rift, and whilst in Jamaica he spoke out against William Wilberforce and the abolition of slavery, and was an enemy of Methodist missionaries. A.L.S., Geo W Bridges, three pages, 8vo, Bath, n.d. (4th July 1860), to Miss [Caroline] Fox. Bridges commences his letter by stating ´It seemed such a joke for a boy to spend his 72nd Birthday with his mother at 94 that I came over here yesterday to do so´, adding that his mother is strong and well, thanking Fox for her present of a book (´the very best thing on the subject that has ever been written´), recalling having been introduced to the author and further remarking ´The American Mission has over taken the lead in the Holy Land - in spite of all our boasting & expenditure. Did I give you any of the enclosed (no longer present) - by a friend of mine whom I am now hastening home to meet - a glorious & long neglected work - too long - for the Muslims are riper for conversion than the Jews´. VG

Caroline Fox (1819.1871) English diarist and correspondent whose diary records memories of major Victorian writers including Thomas Carlyle and John Stuart Mill.