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BALLOONS | IN | BATH
Up, up, and away! As a city with no shortage of them, we are still captivated by the uplifting sight of a ballooned-filled sky. Catherine Pitt investigates the history of hot air ballooning in Bath, taking us back to the very beginning...
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60 TheBATHMagazine
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ocToBeR 2020
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issue 214
Hot air balloons fill the skies of Bath
Aeronauts without deep pockets or a wealthy patron had to rely on the good will of the public to fund their ballooning. Before Dinwiddie’s launch in 1784, he had exhibited the balloon in the Lower Assembly Rooms charging two shillings per person. The aeronaut Joseph Deeter’s balloon cost him an estimated £200 – £18,000 today – and en route to the launch in Bristol he tried to cover its costs through exhibitions. At the Upper Assembly Rooms, Deeter charged one shilling admittance. It would take several hours to inflate the balloon’s envelope and crowds would gather to witness this as part of the ‘show’. While
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Landing in a field of cows, local farmers attacked the ‘strange creature’ thinking it was a monster
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oaring gracefully above the rooftops, the countryside stretching for what appears like forever, what thrill and what terror the first balloonists must have felt when first ascending into the ‘great unknown’? The first unmanned demonstration of ballooning was in Portugal in 1709, but it is the Montgolfier brothers, Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Etienne, who are remembered as the innovators. The brothers launched their first balloon in Paris in September 1783, but it was two months later on 21 November 1783, in front of a vast crowd, that a Montgolfier-built balloon first ascended with pilots. Jean-François Pilatre de Rozier and François Laurent le Vieux d'Arlandes became the first humans to travel untethered in a hot air balloon. In the UK, the first manned balloon flight was by Scottish aeronaut James Tytler in August 1784, but this achievement was quickly overshadowed by the flamboyant Vincenzo Lunardi’s success in London a month later. Lunardi’s ascent was well promoted and witnessed by thousands. The craze for ballooning had begun. Bath and flight were no strangers. According to the legend of King Bladud – the alleged founder of the city – it was he who flew from Bath to London wearing a pair of wings that he had built himself. However, the first attempts at ballooning in Bath began a few months after de Rozier and Laurent’s success in Paris. At midday on 10 January 1784, Caleb Hiller-Parry, local doctor and the son of Arctic explorer Admiral Sir Edward Parry, launched a small hydrogen-filled balloon from Crescent Park – now Royal Victoria Park. A few hours later, James Dinwiddie launched his own balloon from Mrs Scarce’s Riding School on Julian Road – or The Museum of Bath at Work as we know it today. Hillier-Parry’s attempt was to be a one-off experiment, but Dinwiddie persevered and 10 days later he launched another unmanned balloon from Bath. On descent into Dorset, his balloon caused a sensation. Landing in a field of cows, local farmers attacked the ‘strange creature’, thinking it was a monster. The first manned balloon flight in the city was made in Sydney Gardens on 8 September 1802, piloted by the Frenchman André Jacques Garnerin (1769–1825). In his memoirs, Garnerin recalled the throngs of people in the garden, streets, and even clambering onto rooftops. It was described in a local paper as ‘the most sublime spectacle ever exhibited here’.
this was happening, the pilot would talk to the enthralled public. Ticketed green spaces such as Sydney Gardens were perfect for launches as both park owner and aviator benefitted from the gate fees. In addition, Sydney Gardens had great facilities – food, drink, music and amusements – which would draw in a crowd. The cost of witnessing these spectacles varied. Garnerin’s 1802 ascent was advertised at five shillings with another five shillings for seating on a specially built viewing platform. A few weeks later, Garnerin launched a Night Balloon Gala at a cost of three shillings per ticket that included illuminations, a concert, and a balloon that “would rise majestically (like)…a luminous meteor”. By the mid-19th century ticket prices had reduced. An ascent by Mr Green in Sydney Gardens in July 1846 was advertised for onee shilling per person. At the height of the obsession with ballooning, ‘Balloon Coaches’ ran between London, Bristol and Bath bringing in enthusiastic spectators. Alongside the launches came songs, books, and souvenirs. Trinkets such as snuff boxes were adorned with ballooning images, and even clothing was embellished with aeronautical prints.
