Description of Charing Cross floating swimming baths, Hungerford Bridge, London

NOTES: With the completion of Sir Joseph Bazalgette's London sewer, the water in the River Thames was much improved and a floating swimming bath with iron superstructure was built, moored just above Charing Cross railway bridge, and opened in early July 1875. The engineers for the Floating Swimming Baths Company were Whitaker & Perrett and the architects of the superstructure were Driver & Rew. In October of 1876 machinery for freezing the river water was added so that the floating baths could become the Floating Glaciarium ice skating rink during the winter months. In 1885 the floating baths were purchased by the South Eastern Railway Company and scrapped.