Swindon Victorian Turkish Baths

Milton Street entrance

Swindon Victorian Turkish Baths, in Swindon, England, were initially opened in Taunton Street by the GWR Medical Society Fund in 1868. In 1906, the fund replaced them with Victorian-style Turkish baths in their new medical centre in Faringdon Road. In 1948, when the fund’s medical services were replaced by the NHS, management of the baths passed to Swindon Borough Council, who later outsourced them. The baths are uniquely important since despite changing locations and managements, they are the oldest continuously running baths institution of its type in the British Isles, and the world.

The present building is a Grade II* listed building. The Turkish baths entrance in Milton Road currently leads to the Swindon Health Hydro which, until the recent closure of the baths for refurbishment, managed the baths which became one of the hydro’s major facilities.

History

New Swindon was originally a company town built for its workers by the Great Western Railway Company. In addition to housing, the company provided educational, religious, and health facilities, the latter under the aegis of its Medical Fund Society.

In February 1858, its Mechanics’ Institute invited David Urquhart to talk about the baths built by his Manchester Foreign Affairs Committee seven months earlier. But due to the death of his baby son, Urquhart’s close associate, Stewart Erskine Rolland, spoke instead. Asked about the cost of such a bath, Rolland offered to build one for £100, able to accommodate 100 persons daily, and costing from fourpence to sixpence a day for fuel. But Turkish baths were still new, and the offer was not taken up.

Swindon Institute. Slipper baths can be seen bottom left of plan.

Shortly afterwards, the company directors were asked whether Turkish baths could be built behind the Mechanics' Institute (which already had eight slipper baths on the first floor). They agreed, provided the fund, which was required to be self-supporting, paid for it. This temporarily killed the proposal, but further discussions were held, most notably in July 1861 when a meeting chaired by William Gooch reconsidered the subject. £250 was a large sum to find, and an opposing amendment defeated the proposal.

But it was soon easily recognised that eight slipper baths, without any showers or changing facilities, was totally inadequate for the growing Swindon. In February 1863, it was decided to build a new bathhouse in the yard of The Barracks, nearby.

The baths, now overseen by an elected committee, and managed for them by a Mr West, had to move again in 1868 when The Barracks was converted into a Methodist chapel. A new bathhouse was to be erected on a narrow triangle of land fronting Faringdon road. Meanwhile, West was successfully running a small Turkish bath, at his home, and in September, the Baths Committee of Management minuted that it would be ‘advantageous to members’ if Turkish baths were included in the new building.

The bathhouse would be divided into two with an entrance to the slipper baths from Faringdon Road and to the Turkish baths from Taunton Street. There would be two hot rooms, a shampooing room, and a cooling-room with nine changing cubicles. West resigned as manager of the original slipper baths, and later, the committee accepted his tender of £30 to run the new baths for 15 months, ‘he to provide all the sheets and accessories needed’ as part of the deal. The Turkish baths were open from 6am till 9pm on weekdays, from 2 till 9 on Saturdays, and were reserved for women for three hours every Wednesday afternoon. There were two prices for members, which would have separated the workers from their supervisors and managers.

The new building opened on 1 October 1868, West having closed his own establishment and, by 1869, moved house to Taunton Street. By 1878, leasing the baths by tender ceased, and the manager became a paid employee. Opening hours were shorter, from 1pm till 8pm daily, but for society members and their families, they were now free.

In 1891, the company built a large red brick ‘Queen Anne’ style building in Faringdon road opposite the existing baths. Designed by local architect, John James Smith, it housed a new dispensary, treatment rooms, and separate swimming pools for men and women.

Part of the original plunge pool tiling

Partial view of the two hottest rooms

New Turkish and slipper baths were opened in December 1906 to bring both sets of baths together, with their own entrance round the corner. The men’s Turkish baths were well designed, and although, over the years, alterations were made, the structure and appearance of the three original hot rooms remain virtually unchanged. The adjoining shampooing room had two marble slabs and a circular needle shower, and shampooing continuing until well into the 1990s. In its place are three additional modern showers. The men’s baths also include a Russian steam bath and a cold plunge pool. When it was built, the pool, at 9ft wide, was twice the width of most of those later provided by local authorities. When the baths were refurbished, probably at the end of the 1980s, it was split lengthwise, and one half is now aerated like a whirlpool while the original tiling has been replaced by plain tiles.

The cooling-room in the 1940s

Stained glass door panel

The cooling-room was particularly spacious, with mosaic floors and, at the other end, a large fireplace. The original women’s Turkish baths on the first floor have been closed since at least the mid-1950s, though the door leading into them remains, complete with its coloured glass panel designed by the company’s Mr Rice. The door now leads into offices.

The women’s baths were smaller than the men’s, with only two hot rooms. These led off a shampooing room, with its slab, needle shower, wash basin, and drinking fountain. A cooling-room, toilet, and six dressing cubicles completed the suite. The hot rooms were directly above the men’s, so that the heated air could be ducted vertically up from the basement furnace.

The Turkish baths were but one of the facilities provided for its workforce by the GWR through its Medical Fund Society, a service so comprehensive that it was used as a model for the future National Health Service.

And although Swindon’s Turkish Baths successively occupied premises on each side of Faringdon Road, and were run by a series of managements, they are the longest surviving Turkish baths establishment in the British Isles.