Joseph (John) Payne Bridge – Fighting for Justice
First Class Prison Officer, John Bridge
John Bridge, as he was
commonly known, was not your common, every day prison officer. He was a man to be admired. His achievements went far beyond the pale considering
his background and how he believed in, and fought for justice for all.
John Bridge was born on 6th
January 1942, and sadly passed away at the age of 75 years on 7th
July 2017.
He was an Australian
Aboriginal man who was reared under horrific conditions on a cattle property,
aptly named Koonjie, meaning “Place of Home”, in the Bungle Bungle Range area
of the east Kimberly region of Western Australia, and was of the Gijia
People. He later moved to Halls Creek
to work on a cattle property there.
His father Ernest Kimberly
Bridge was of European decent and his mother, Sarah Parnell, was a Gijia
person. Sarah was part of the “Stolen
Generation”. They had seven children together, Joseph (John), Ernie, Benny,
Margaret, Peter, David and Ethel. Ernie
Bridge went on to become a State Politician.
He became famous for his visionary
attributes, including his proposal in 1984 to pipe water downwards from the
Kimberly to Perth and everywhere in between, a dream I’m sure most people would
like to see eventuate. He also was a renowned
singer and released several records.
Remarkably, John Bridge completed
only one year of schooling at the age of 16 in 1958, at Halls Creek at the
original town which is about 11 miles from Halls Creek as we know it
today. This was to be the catalyst for
his yeaning to learn more and from then on, he never stopped.
In 1969 he became one of the very first
Australian Aboriginal men to become a Justice of the Peace (JP) in Western
Australia. He was required to travel to
various police stations in the harsh Australian outback, including Halls Creek,
Wyndham, and Kununurra. As a JP he
would often be called upon to adjudicate and sentence people, delivering swift
justice wherever and whenever it was required in these hard country townships.
I had already more than 12
months service with the Department of Corrective Services and had completed my
probationary period when John Bridge became a prison officer in mid 1972 at the
Long Bay Prison Complex at Malabar, Sydney.
He remained at Long Bay for about a year whilst completing his 12 months
probationary period, after which he moved on to Her Majesty’s Gaol,
Parramatta.
* *
* * *
John Bridge stayed in the
Department of Corrective Services for ten years, reaching the rank of First Class Prison
Officer at Emu Plains Training Centre in New South Wales.
It is what John achieved following his resignation from the Department
of Corrective Services, right up until he passed away in 2017 that made him a
man to be admired and a man among men.
To read more about John’s
dedication to justice for all during his life time, read my latest eBook “Officers,
Criminals and Amazing Prison Stories”, available through this webpage or
Amazon.
This I believe.
Peter T Egge
