City Hall: Past and Present (Distant View of Banks with Trees)

Left: City Hall
Right: Distant View of Banks with Trees

John Thomson’s view looks about west-southwest, from the ‘cricket ground’ marked on maps of the times – and which, only separated by a praya, met Victoria Harbour. Thomson looked onto the classically inspired City Hall, just completed in 1869. The open ground became the Hong Kong Cricket Club, and today is Chater Garden. The site of the City Hall is now the old Bank of China and the HSBC building. Precisely replicating the view was impossible, since Chater Garden is surrounded by trees and walls. Given this, the 2015 image was taken from some distance back and also from higher up, on the fifth floor of the Murray Road Car Park. The Former French Mission Building, an AMO Declared Monument, is seen at left in the modern photo. Its precursor, then privately owned, also appears in John Thomson’s image.