First public toilets for men in Britain... oh yes, and eventually for women

Jennings installed his closets in Crystal Palace’s Retiring Rooms. They caused great excite­ment as they were the first public toilets on display, and during the exhibition 827,280 visitors paid one penny each to use toilets, a tow­el, comb and shoe shine. When Crystal Palace moved to Sydenham, Jennings persuaded the organ­is­ers to keep the toilets open and to thus generate more revenue.

Soon public toilets started to appear in London streets, the first at 95 Fleet St in Feb 1852, with one for women opening a little lat­er at 51 Bedford St Strand. These Public Waiting Rooms contained water closets in wooden surrounds. The charge was 2 pence entrance fee and extra for clothes brushes. These new facil­ities were advert­ised in The Times and on handbills, distributed around the city. But the Public Waiting Rooms did not become successful.

Two famous men responsible for building and promoting Jennings’ pub­lic toilets Sir Samuel Morton Peto (building contract­or) and Sir Henry Cole (Great Exhib­ition’s principal promoter). But pub­lic toi­l­ets real­ly became popular only after Th­omas Crapper de­vel­op­ed some imp­rove­ments to Jennings’ first flush­ing device.

In Victorian Britain sanitary science, ie the study of public health and disease, became very important for all cit­izens. But be­cause most public toilets were designed for men, women planning to travel had to plan their route to in­clude areas where they could urinate. Lack of access to toilets effective­ly tied women to their homes, put­ting them on a short Urinary Leash.

Sanitation legislation was passed by Parliament in the form of two public health acts, the 1st Public Health Act of 1848 and the 2nd Public Health Act of 1875. The 1848 Act was passed in the wake of a cholera out­break that killed 52,000 people and provided a framework for local authorities. The 1875 Act gave local author­ities new pow­ers such as being able to purchase and repair sewers, and to control water supplies. So the later C19th saw pub­lic conveniences boom across Britain: high streets, railway stations, workplaces. 

The lack of access to toilets impeded women’s acc­ess to public sp­aces as there were few women’s toilets in the work place, or outside. This led to the formation of the Ladies Sanitary Ass­ociation, organ­ised shortly after the first pub­lic flushing toilet appeared. The Assoc­iation campaigned from the 1850s on­, via lec­tures and pamphlet dist­ribution. How ir­onic was that strict segr­eg­ation arrived only in this very era, ush­er­ed in with growing anxiet­ies over bodily disp­l­ay, privacy and rigid gender roles. This was part of a broader Vic­torian pattern of div­id­ing C19th cities into a male-oriented public sphere and a female-oriented private one. 

More women were working, familiarising society with the sight of decent women outside the home. But the real change occurred when women began to enjoy shopping. A new group emerged called the Union of Women’s Liberal and Radical Associations, campaigning for working class women to have public toilets. In 1898 the Union wrote to The Ves­t­ry in Camden for toilet access for women in the already exist­ing men’s toilets. But the plans for Camden’s women’s toilet were set back by years when men opposed the toilets being close together. Some models for women’s toilets were deliberately sabo­t­ag­ed and women were again limited by the 'urinary leash".

The population of Berwick-upon-Tweed welcomed the opening of the town’s first public toilets for female (photo). The tak­ings on the first day in 1899 showed that 62 women had sp­ent a penny, reject­ing the common Victorian view that women wouldn’t use public con­veniences. In fact it was made to look like a feminine country cott­age. The second public wom­en’s toi­let was in Seaburn Sunderland soon after (1901-4), loc­ated next to and below a tram stop  (photo). Both these buildings were restored recently and the sig­nific­ance of both sites have been recognised with Grade II Listed Status. Then more sites were added eg Nelson St, Hull. 

Whilst the use of urinals in male toilets was predominantly free, sit-down WCs had to be paid for, proving an additional barrier for female users. Even when a few women’s toilets were built, they were hidden deeply in the plan and accessed via a series of rooms. And they were often much smaller and with fewer cubicles than men’s.

Factories were producing more leisure goods which drew many women out of their homes. They wanted to shop, stroll and vis­it the new parks and galleries that were opening. The outside world had been a men-only space and now was a place for ladies. So without overstat­ing the issue, the toilets in Berwick and Seaburn ref­lected some­thing of the changing women’s social status in late C19th-early C20th; the gradual opening up of a world of new leis­ure and work prospects.