Bath Road

Thornbury

The origin of current name of Bath Road is simple.  It was the road which led from the town centre to the Baths.

The Baths were the town's bathing place.  We know it was there in 1841.  It was referred to in the census, but we don't know what form they took at that time.  Over the years, it was developed by enterprising farmers from a simple pond fed by a stream coming across the fields from Vilner Lane to a proper open air swimming pool with changing rooms and refreshments.  We understand that  for a short time it was even licensed to sell alcoholic drinks under the name of 'The Bathin Place', but this ceased trading in 1874.  In the twentieth century it was used by the Grammar School for their school swimming sports gala until the school began to use the Blue Lagoon at Severn Beach.  Some older locals also remember that as members of large families with limited washing facilities at home they were encouraged to go to the Baths to use their washing facilities which comprised of private cubicles in addition to the swimming pool.

The history of the name and the other names by which 'Bath Road' was known is very confusing.  In the 1800's the road was merely a lane and it was called Bullseys Lane or any one of several variations on this name including Bulls Eyes Lane or Bulls Lane.  We have no idea where these names originated.  The street plan shown above was dated 1880 and this shows the road then called 'Bath Lane'.  We have superimposed on this plan the house numbers which were adopted in the 1950's to identify each house.  The very poor quality aerial photo is only one we have of these houses. 

Whilst the name of Bullseys Lane was  used for what we now know as 'Bath Road', the name of Bath Road  referred to what we now know as Rock Street.  'Upper Bath Road' was used for the section of road leading from the junction with Chapel Street and the Stationmaster's House.  'Lower Bath Road' was that section of road between Chapel Street and Horseshoe Lane.  Later 'Lower Bath Road' was used to refer to what we now know as 'Bath Road'.  We said it was confusing!

Now, as the picture on the right shows, all the old houses are gone.  Unfortunately we don't have any pictures of the road showing the houses as they were.  If you know Bath Road or visit it, you will of course find houses there.  These are the 24 Council Houses built in the 30's on what was called 'Market Site' and the new housing being built in 2008.

We have not found any deeds for the houses in this section of the town and it is difficult in some of the early census records to identify which family is in which house.  Our 'history' of the houses and families is therefore less detailed than we would like.  It based largely on the memories of some of the older locals, supplemented where possible with census, church and school records.

This page was last updated: 25/11/2008