Spa Treatments in Bath

For over 2000 years, people have been drawn to the waters here in Bath. They have bathed, sought healing, worshipped, and socialised in the only natural hot springs in the country. There have been numerous spa sites in Bath since the Roman period and, in the 1800s, it was a thriving spa town. The current free display in the King’s Lounge focuses on the Victorian bathing establishment.

“If they can’t be cured by drinking and bathing here, they will never be cured anywhere” Dr Oliver, A Practical Dissertation on the Bath Waters, 1707

Map of Bath (1959) showing Victorian spa sites.

This consisted of three sites:

• the redeveloped Hot Bath, known as Old Royal Baths (1829) which included Bath’s first spa swimming bath, the Beau Street Swimming Bath
• the New Royal Baths and Physical Treatment Centre, which opened as a luxurious treatment centre in 1870
• the New Queen’s Baths, next to the King’s Bath, which showcased fashionable treatments from 1889.

The Stall Street entrance to the Roman Baths
with a sign for the King’s and Queens Baths.

These centres and their spa treatments remained popular through to the 20^th century.

With the Physical Treatment Centre, new and fashionable treatments were made available, inspired by spa towns on the continent. Much of the spa equipment was custom made, and included variants on the Needle Douche, the Plombières Douche, and a sulphur bath. The Vichy Needle Douche was named after the prestigious spa town in Vichy, France. A lifting mechanism was custom made for the Hot Bath, slings or chairs lifted patients in and out of the water.

Electricity was used in conjunction with mineral water,
including the Hydro-Electric Four-cell Bath, in which
patients’ limbs were placed in four separate tubs, allowing the
controlled current to pass in any direction.

The water was celebrated for its healing properties, some believed this to be due to the presence of radium, now known to be a toxic gas. This was seen in treatments such as Radium Inhalatorium, in which radium was inhaled through the nose or mouth, or, when used with mineral water, as a nasal or throat spray. Although the water was proudly advertised as radioactive, in reality radium is only present in minute quantities.

During World War One, thousands of wounded soldiers were sent to Bath to recover. They received treatments at the Mineral Water Hospital and the New Royal Baths were enlarged in 1915 to provide facilities specifically designed for them.

After the Second World War, the baths’ popularity began to decline. Leisure travel and spa therapy were no longer fashionable, and the city’s infrastructure had been damaged during the Bath Blitz. The New Queen’s Bath was demolished in 1970 and the Physical Treatment Centre closed in 1976, following the withdrawal of NHS funding established in 1948.

Temporary display in the King's Lounge.

The objects displayed in the King’s Lounge were removed prior to work on the new Thermae Spa which opened in 2003. They include a hook and handle from the lifting mechanism used to lower patients into the Hot Bath, a pressure gauge from a Vichy Douche, a thermometer which hung in the Hot Bath, and a pamphlet which details treatments and their prices in April 1923.

You can see the display for free by accessing the Stall Street entrance during opening hours between 10am-5pm.

Eleanor 

Collections Assistant 

Lords, Land and the Law

Recently, a fascinating legal document from 1790 entered our collection (fig. 1). Found with a collection of 19th century train documents from Bath Spa Railway Station, the agreement was older, and in much better condition than many of the papers around it. It has clearly been looked after carefully, and the document is in perfect reading condition, allowing us to easily identify it as a legal agreement between Sir Thomas George Skipwith of Prewbold Prevell, and the Right Honourable Francis Seymour Conray, commonly known as Lord Viscount Beauchamp.

Fig. 1: A legal agreement dating to 1790. While the writing is very clear, it is hard to read the entire document due to its fragility.

It specifies the tenancy terms of inherited land owned by Conray, formerly leased to Skipwith. Skipwith died in 1790, and the agreement is part of a legal process which handed Skipwith’s estates to his kinsman, Sir Gray Skipworth, who was born and raised in Virginia, and was remarkably a descendant through his mother of Pocahontas.

Thomas Skipwith himself was an inconspicuous member of the House of Parliament, representing Warwickshire from 1769-1780 and Steyning 1780-1784. Despite being head of the poll for Warwickshire in 1780, Skipwith refused to stand, drawing comment from the London Chronicle. ‘The unexpected resignation of Sir Thomas Skipwith is held by the inhabitants in the number of the most paradoxical events that may have happened amongst them.’[1]

Fig. 2: Francis Seymour Conray, also known as Lord Viscount Beauchamp.

On the other side of the agreement is Francis Conray (fig. 2). Conray had a number of significant roles, including Ambassador to France (1763-5), Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (1765-6), Master of the Horse (1766), and Lord Chamberlain (1766-82). David Hume, the 18th century Scottish philosopher, wrote of him, ‘I do not believe there is in the World a man of more probity & Humanity, endowed with a very good Understanding, and adorned with very elegant Manners & Behaviour.’[2]

It is remarkable to find a document relating to such characters, and they feed into the larger picture of Georgian life in England. Families survived on inheritance, and there was a massive importance placed on an individual’s legacy. Their titles and achievements were just as significant as the land they owned, and it was documents such as this that ensured a family’s rich heritage endured.

If you would like to see the document in person, alongside a number of interesting documents relating to the origins and workings of the GWR in Bath, come to the Lansdown Local History Store Open Day – Wednesday 30th May.

Simon
Placement Student


[1] Namier, L. and Brooke, J., 1985. The House of Commons 1754-1790 (Vol. 1). Boydell & Brewer.
[2] Hume, D., Klibansky, R. and Mossner, E.C., 1954. New Letters, Edited by Raymond Klibansky and Ernest C. Mossner. Clarendon Press. p.77-78.

Having got our collections into our new store in Lansdown, described by Zofia’s blog, there was still lots to do to get it presentable for our first Open Day last week.

We dusted everything, wrote new labels for the furniture and our interns, Dulcie and Polly Mae devised a fabulous rhyming children’s trail.

 A happy Polly Mae ready to welcome people to our store...

Our handy-man, Phil, spent hours attaching grilles onto the walls, so plaques, copies of photos and many, many pipes from the old spa could be viewed without being touched, as well as balancing a model of the Pump Room above one of  the Roman Baths!

Our Operations team ferried final objects from the Roman Baths, that hadn’t fitted into the old store, as well as less prosaic but essential mops and brushes…

Two visitors ponder over the Vichy douche, with the Pump Room model above the baths model in the foreground

Thursday dawned and when the Park and Ride bus got us up the hill we remembered how we’d scoffed at the near-do-wells who all summer had warned us of Lansdown being colder, snowier than the rest of  Bath. It was cold, wet and windy... Ashley and Phil struggled to get our banners up and our bunting was a bit bedraggled but our small gazebo went up without a hitch and with volunteer, Alison’s catering skills, we were able to offer our brave visitors a warm drink and a mini cake to celebrate our opening.

 Lansdown Store on our Open Day, 26^th October

The children’s trail was a success and visitors who’d been to our Locksbrook store noticed things they hadn’t appreciated before. At the end of the day we were happy that all the hard work by everyone had paid off.

However, we haven’t finished our jobs up on Lansdown as our work will continue well into the winter, as we put the collection “to bed”: covering the furniture with Tyvek sheets to reduce dust accumulating, checking our insect traps and the dehumidifiers, lifting the objects off the floor, just in case we have floods.  So we may yet see the promised snow!

Susan

Locksbrook to Lansdown!

It’s busy-ness as usual for the Collections team this week as we’re moving the contents of our Local History store all the way from St Johns Store on Locksbrook Road up to a new and improved store in Lansdown.

Needle douches at St Johns Store

The move has involved considerable planning, as the collection ranges from rickety needle douches to beautiful wooden furniture. Originally, the new space seemed like it would be too small for the sheer amount of objects, but with the installation of a mezzanine floor and some lovely new racking, the move was fit to go ahead.

A hair hygrometer measures the humidity of the atmosphere in %RH (relative humidity)

Of course we hit a few bumps in the road – mostly to do with conservation because the environment up on Lansdown isn’t always the friendliest! On one of the first days of planning the move, we took a hygrometer with us to measure the moisture in the air, which read 92% RH (relative humidity) after just an hour! Considering the nature of the collection (lots of wood and metal), which requires a much drier, more stable environment this had to be dealt with quickly. Today, we have just the machines for the job – two dehumidifiers that consistently keep the humidity in the store at a balmy 45%RH.

Planning the move!

Even with the racking put in place, space was still an issue. The only way to solve this was to chalk it up to experience and literally draw chalk lines onto the floor, outlining the shapes and sizes of objects to make sure we were using the remaining space as efficiently as possible. It’s not just a matter of being able to squeeze around it – we also need to have access for collections purposes as well as for our visitors to view these amazing objects!

A beautiful desk fits snugly in its allotted area of floor space

I can’t express my delight when all this hard work paid off and each object slotted smoothly into its intended space to within a centimetre of the chalked outlines! Work continues today to get everything moved to Lansdown, and it’s already looking like the store we always wanted.

The move is still in progress, but we'll be open for visitors soon!

Join us up at Lansdown North on the 26^th October from 11am-3pm to celebrate the Grand Opening of our new store. For more information, please visit the Museums Week website.

Zofia

Collections Assistant