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The Batu Gajah Old Courthouse
This photograph reproduced from "Sejarah Batu Gajah" shows the old courthouse located in Changkat, Batu Gajah.
Batu Gajah which was chosen to be the new centre of Kinta administration in 1884, as the Kota Bharu area was found to be unsuitable and unhealthy. The new Batu Gajah public offices ('an ambitious brick structure') were built at a cost of $20,000 by the Public Works Department. When the new offices were completed in 1892, the administration of the court shifted to the new building, sharing it with the Collector, Land Department and the Chinese Protectorate.
As senior magistrates in Batu Gajah, George Maxwell (later Sir William George Maxwell) and W P Hume had the power to pass the death sentence. They were the terror of gang robbers, as they generally ordered public beatings of notoriously bad characters.
To read more about the book ‘Kinta Valley ’, click here.
To read about the history of Batu Gajah, click here.
To read about the new Batu Gajah government offices, click here.
To read about William Pickering, the First ‘Protector of the Chinese’, click here.
To read more about Sir William George Maxwell, click here.