George Bridges

Who was George Bridges?

Lieutenant General Sir George Tom Molesworth Bridges KCB KCMG DSO, known as Sir Tom Bridges, was a British military officer and Governor of South Australia.

Bridges was born at Park Farm, Eltham, Kent, England, to Major Thomas Walker and Mary Ann Bridges. He was educated at Newton Abbot College and later at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich. He was married in London on 14 November 1907, to a widow, Janet Florence Marshall; they had one daughter, Alvilde Bridges, who ws married first to Anthony Chaplin, 3rd Viscount Chaplin, and then to James Lees-Milne.

Bridges had a distinguished military career, seeing service in Africa, India, South Africa, and most notably Europe in World War I, where he was involved in the first British battle of the war at Mons, and later commanded a division at The Somme and Passchendaele. After WWI, he served in Greece, Russia, the Balkans and Asia Minor. He was Governor of South Australia from 1922–27.