THE PEOPLE & HISTORY OF BATH VILLAGE
BREIF HITORY GOES HERE....The Bath Hotel, an imposing cut stone structure, is located just south of Charlestown, Nevis’ capital, and was built around 1800. In its heyday, it was an elegant hotel that served as a playground for the wealthy planters of Nevis and the entire Caribbean, who flocked to its therapeutic hot spring waters. The Bath Hotel is among the December 2022 Historic preservation is back in focus with our recent grant from the U.S. Department of State's global Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP) programme for the urgent conservation and stabilisation of Nevis’ iconic Bath Hotel Prestigious Grant for the Conservation of Bath Hotel 2 few non-military, non-estate, and non-government structures in the Caribbean, noted for its remarkable scale, design, and setting. The hotel was constructed over the site of the island’s largest volcanic hot springs, which contain minerals of medicinal value. The thermal springs are unique in that they have been continuously used from Amerindian times to the present, and even more so in that they are a place of memory associated with the adaption and survival of enslaved Africans. The urgent conservation and eventual rehabilitation of the site will expand the use of the Bath Hotel and hot springs so that they may continue to be used and enjoyed by the community and visitors alike.
ORAL HISTORIES
Many Names...
S. Patricia Claxton
Resident, Bath Village
We could well remember the different baths namely Man Bath, Boys Bath,Deep Hole, Myra Bath (named after the person whose house the bath was in front of), Hot Hole, Women Bath and the list continues. These Baths stretched from behind Mrs Hanley to almost at the bogs.
Dem Say Hole...
Miss Ella
Resident, Bath Village
Dem Say hole. Locals used to wash, bathe, hang clothes on the surrounding trees and gossip. Relating stories of the day, they all started with “yuh hear what dem say” hence the name of the hole.
NOTABLE CITIZENS
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Dr. Daniel Reynold Walwyn
Born Nov 27 1892 to Ernest and Rhoda Walwyn in Bath Village.
He was a teacher at Brown Pasture, Nevis and in 1913 he left Nevis to teach at Rosseau Boys School in Dominica until 1915 when he then worked in the Treasury in Portsmouth, Dominica until he returned to Nevis in 1920. From 1930 to 1937, he lived in Antigua with his family where he was appointed an audit clerk in the Treasury in Antigua, He then became the Post Master for St Kitts, Nevis and Anguilla. And in 1947 he became the postmaster to Montserrat. In 1953, when he retired as a civil servant, a small group of prominent residents of Charlestown and Bath Village, to start a cooperative bank. The goal of the bank was to provide financial assistance to marginal individuals. The Nevis Cooperative Bank started in 1954, with DR as its executive chairman, a position he would hold until 1990. He was very active in the Nevisian society and received an honorary doctorate from UWI Cave Hill in 1991. THE D.R. Walwyn Plaza is named in his honor.
Sir Thomas Graham Briggs
owned the Bath House Hotel. He had come to Nevis from Barbados in the 1850s, where his family made significant wealth from the sugar trade. In the 1850w he acquired the Bath Hotel and held political position in the Executive Council of Nevis.
William Todd
On August 1st, 1834 Britain passes the Slavery Abolition Act, outlawing owning, buying, and selling humans as property throughout its colonies around the world.
Walter Edston Wade
Wally Wade, a brilliant Montserratian, bought Barbour's interest in the Leeward Island Development Co from him. Wade later sold some of his interest to Pinney's Development company controlled by Max Fischer. This interest sold included the Bath House Estate.
James Spencer Hollings
, a British civil engineer who had lived on Montserrat where his wife’s family had an estate. Around 1900, Hollings worked on restoring the Bath House Hotel. It was he who added two galleries to the building.
Grace Jane Branch (Kerr)
Norman Fowler was a socialite that moved to Nevis in 1968, where he purchased the Bath Hotel and lived onsite in one of its suites. Unfortunately in March 23 1977, he lost consciousness while bathing in the Hot Spring and drowned. ‘Who was Norman Fowler?’, appeared on April 12th 2013, in the local St Kitts and Nevis newspaper, SKN Choice Times.
HUGGINS FAMILY
There is no historical research done on Bath village, but records indicate that the village started as a "long run" or shelter built by the Anglican Church on glebe land purchased from Bath Estate (or Bath Plain) owned by the black Huggins family. The long run was to provide housing after the 1928 hurricane. The occupants never left and squatted and built houses in the area.
About 20 years ago, an Anglican cleric, Alison Percival, tried to get the people of Bath to pay rent. Defeated by long tenancy.
Mrs. Helene Lewis
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Christine Eickelmann
Norman Fowler was a socialite that moved to Nevis in 1968, where he purchased the Bath Hotel and lived onsite in one of its suites. Unfortunately in March 23 1977, he lost consciousness while bathing in the Hot Spring and drowned. ‘Who was Norman Fowler?’, appeared on April 12th 2013, in the local St Kitts and Nevis newspaper, SKN Choice Times.
ACCESS FOR EVERYONE
Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos himenaeos. Donec a justo quis sapien sollicitudin blandit. Suspendisse tristique turpis mi, eget sodales arcu molestie vel. Nam eu nisi dui. Vestibulum rutrum ultricies tellus a ultrices. Etiam maximus tellus iaculis lorem volutpat, at cursus odio rutrum. Fusce tristique lectus placerat tortor pulvinar elementum. Maecenas scelerisque rutrum molestie. Aenean imperdiet scelerisque porttitor. Etiam non nunc id odio interdum accumsan.
Do You Know
This Woman?
We could well remember the different baths namely Man Bath, Boys Bath,Deep Hole, Myra Bath (named after the person whose house the bath was in front of), Hot Hole, Women Bath and the list continues. These Baths stretched from behind Mrs Hanley to almost at the bogs.
TBD
Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos himenaeos. Donec a justo quis sapien sollicitudin blandit. Suspendisse tristique turpis mi, eget sodales arcu molestie vel. Nam eu nisi dui. Vestibulum rutrum ultricies tellus a ultrices. Etiam maximus tellus iaculis lorem volutpat, at cursus odio rutrum. Fusce tristique lectus placerat tortor pulvinar elementum. Maecenas scelerisque rutrum molestie. Aenean imperdiet scelerisque porttitor. Etiam non nunc id odio interdum accumsan.
James Spencer
owned the Bath House Hotel. He had come to Nevis from Barbados in the 1850s, where his family made significant wealth from the sugar trade. In the 1850w he acquired the Bath Hotel and held political position in the Executive Council of Nevis.
Norman Fowler
Was a socialite that moved to Nevis in 1968, where he purchased the Bath Hotel and lived onsite in one of its suites. Unfortunately in March 23 1977, he lost consciousness while bathing in the Hot Spring and drowned. ‘Who was Norman Fowler?’, appeared on April 12th 2013, in the local St Kitts and Nevis newspaper, SKN Choice Times.