George Bonham (7 September 1803 – 8 October 1863) served the East India Company and later the colonial service and is rendered in Chinese also as Man Ham or Man Hon. Born in Faversham, Kent, and once posted to Penang, he was the fourth Governor of the Straits Settlements from 1836 to 1843 before taking office as the third Governor of Hong Kong in March 1848. Facing trade well below the hopes of the opium-war years and a strained treasury, he cut expenditure, streamlined the civil establishment and widened land sales and rates revenue, gradually restoring the finances. In 1850 he brought non-official members, David Jardine and Joseph Frost Edger, into the Legislative Council for the first time, breaking the governor's monopoly on counsel, and he secured the extension of Hong Kong land leases from 75 to 999 years to encourage investment. As the Taiping upheaval spread in the 1850s, Chinese immigrants poured in, swelling the population and re-export trade and strengthening the Chinese merchant class. On 28 December 1851 a great fire in Sheung Wan destroyed about 470 houses north of Queen's Road and killed more than thirty people, prompting reviews of street planning and fire safety and supplying rubble for the 1852 reclamation. In April 1853 he sailed to Nanking on HMS Hermes for talks with Taiping leaders, whose sour reception helped push Britain towards neutrality. Created a baronet in 1852, he gave his name to Bonham Road, left office in 1854 and died in 1863.
Bonham's retrenchment and land revenue steadied Hong Kong's finances, and his admission of outside voices into the legislature broke the governor's monopoly on counsel; the street-planning review after the 1851 Sheung Wan fire was a turning point in the city's early urban management, and Bonham Road still bears his name.
Achievements
- 1850 · Brought non-official members into the Legislative Council for the first time and secured the extension of Hong Kong land leases to 999 years.
- 1851 · The Sheung Wan fire of 28 December destroyed about 470 houses north of Queen's Road, leading to reviews of street planning and fire safety.
- 1853 · Sailed to Nanking on HMS Hermes for talks with Taiping leaders, whose reception helped push Britain towards neutrality.