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Fr Hugh Bridge. - A potted biography
1. Early Days (this page)
Fr Hugh was born in 1948 in the same house near Orpington where his parents still live. (This was in the days before births usually tool place in Hospitals.) His father, James Marley, who was 59 when he was born, had been a Labour MP in the twenties and thirties for St Pancras... and because of his interest in the Indian Empire had known and been friendly with Gandhi, some gifts from whom are still in family ownership. When in 1954 his father died, he was placed in an orphanage....but fortunately was only there a year because his mother re-married and the first thing she did was to get him and his brother Andrew (b 1950) back. He remembers well the journey to the wedding and the joyous news that he would not be returning. He was subsequently formally adopted by his step father and took the new name Bridge. His step father too had a history of involvement in labour politics but was also a very active lay reader in the Church of England - into which Church Hugh was rapidly baptized - as he had not been baptized a Catholic despite having a myriad of RC aunts and uncles to whom his natural father was a black sheep of the family.
Childhood consisted of education at Crofton Junior School following - after passing the 11+ by a spell at Chislehurst and Sidcup Grammar School for Boys. During this period two new sisters arrived - Anne (b1956) and Cathy (b1963). (There were other pseudo sisters - always known as aunts - who had been the daughters of his natural father's first wife but who were always grown up and their exact relationship was never clear in childhood.) Hugh was never particularly good but from the age of about 12 took a great interest in religion partly through the influence of the then Vicar of Bickley - Hugh Glaisyer - to whom he was entrusted for confirmation classes. He was very much an old fashioned romantic Anglo-Catholic of the bells and smells variety. Hugh was enrolled as an altar server and joined the Guild of St George rapidly (at 14) rising to be secretary. This was impressive as most members were older, had wealthy parents, drove cars, were interested in the opposite sex and frequented select bars in the area. In reaction to this and by way of contrast Hugh also joined the Labour Party Young Socialists who did none of these things. By the spring election of 1966 - having left school - he was active in the canvassing team - sometimes operating in challenging territory - viz Orpington - sometimes in "solid" Labour areas (which was an eye opener.) and acted as a labour teller at the count in Orpington Civic Hall. He had also - by then - met several of the characters who were to form the Wilson administrations and got to understand far more about "life" than many of his peers. He was only 14 when he sat his O levels, 16 when he sat his A levels and only 17 when he won an open Exhibition to Oriel College Oxford to study Natural Sciences (Chemistry). For the year before he went to Oxford he worked in the Quality Control Lab at Dartford Paper Mill - and this experience not only helped fill his newly opened bank account - but also engendered a degree of independence from home that made leaving for Oxford less traumatic.
At Oxford Chemistry, Biology and then Chemical Pharmacology occupied only a part of his time. From about the first week the SCM attracted Hughs attention combining as it (then) did fairly radical politics with fairly fervent Christianity. It also brought together Christians of many denominations including Roman Catholics. Hugh was elected secretary after about two terms at Oxford, a post he held for three years. This brought him - de facto - into contact with Michael Hollings at the Catholic chaplaincy - but also with a myriad of Roman Catholic speakers whom came to address the SCM such as Michel Quoist, Archbishop Camara, Charles Davies etc etc. He did not become a Roman Catholic immediately but felt drawn that way very quickly. Eventually just before he left Oxford, Fr Hollings made a very direct approach and asked him what he was frightened of.... and that did it. When asked to talk about his "conversion" he has to admit that it was not a rigorous intellectual struggle but rather more a matter of feeling more at home.... even so to this day he does not feel altogether "not at home" in Anglican Churches especially as they have mostly jettisoned squirearchy and the things that made him uneasy in the 1960s.
Leaving Oxford, a Catholic, in 1970 having got a good 2nd in Chemistry (and a Credit in Special Subject - Chemical Pharmacology), he felt he was still called to the priesthood but needed to wait. An offer of a job in Tanzania fell through as the Tanzanian government decreed a ban on expatriate teachers. After this had a range of holiday jobs finally getting a job teaching in a residential school which he thought was mainstream but turned out to be one for delinquents. At that time any teaching staff were hard to find - so he saw the ad at 10am, rang the school at 10.15, was interviewed at 2pm and started work at 5pm. Three days later he was promoted to the post of housemaster. The other staff consisted of an ex army Major who had seen service in World War 1, a cook who went around with his kitchen knife slung through his belt and a matron who had started work a few days before and left a few days after Hugh arrived. Hugh stayed a year - and then got a job teaching at St Olaves School (at that stage masquerading as a comprehensive) in Orpington until the time came to think about going to a seminary. Having been advised by Michael Hollings and the other priests he knew to avoid the Southwark Diocese like the plague, Hugh had nonetheless got to quite like John Wright the then Catholic PP of Petts Wood into whose church he had sometimes repaired even as an Anglican (you passed it on the way to Bickley). Far from being a chip off the old conformist block or looking suitably oppressed, he soon convinced Hugh that life in Southwark Diocese could be exceptionally challenging and told him to write to Cyril Cowderoy, then Archbishop - which he did. He did not expect the Archbishop to reply by return and be sitting talking to him the following Saturday - which is what happened. This swift action clinched the matter as previously Hugh had been minded to join the Redemptorists with whom he had stayed on occasion but who had let him down by borrowing a book from his (even then) extensive library and not returning it.
Thus in September 1973, Hugh set out to join the first year at St Johns Seminary, Wonersh, and a new chapter in his life opened...... next