page_title: Nude swimming
section_title: England
hierarchical_section_title: Nude swimming / History / 1800s / England
caption_attribution_description: English: "Mermaids at Brighton" by William Heath (1795 - 1840), c. 1829. Depicts women sea-bathing with bathing machines at Brighton.
context_page_description: Nude swimming, or skinny dipping, is the practice of bathing naked, whether in natural bodies of water, in swimming pools, or in hot tubs.
  The term skinny-dip was first recorded in English in 1947.
context_section_description: At the beginning of the Victorian period in England, men and boys typically swam naked in the sea near bathing machines that were used by women. There were some efforts to designate separate beach sections for males and females. On the River Cherwell near the University of Oxford, an area for male nude bathing was known as Parson's Pleasure; a nearby area for female nude bathing which closed in 1970 was known as Dame's Delight.
  In the latter half of the 19th century, the rise of the influence of Christian Evangelicals caused arrangements for mixed bathing to be reassessed. Moral pressures led some town councils to establish zones for the women and men to bathe separately. These areas were not policed; mixed bathing was a popular activity. Resorts attempted to placate the Evangelicals without upsetting traditional bathers. There are very few records of magistrates enforcing the bylaws. In 1895 Cosmopolitan reported: "At most English resorts, buff bathing is available before eight o'clock in the morning" while Brighton, Worthing, Hastings, Bexhill, Bognor and Folkestone still tolerated nude bathing at any time of the day, in areas away from the central bathing areas.
  Drawers, or caleçons as they were called (fr:caleçon de bain), came into use in the 1860s. Even then there were many who protested against them and wanted to remain in the nude. Rev. Francis Kilvert, an English nude swimmer, described men's bathing suits coming into use in the 1870s as "a pair of very short red and white striped drawers". Excerpts from Kilvert's diary show the transition in the England of the 1870s from an acceptance of nude bathing to the acceptance of bathing suits. Kilvert describes "a delicious feeling of freedom in stripping in the open air and running down naked to the sea."
  In 1895, The Daily Telegraph, Standard, Daily Graphic and Daily Mail newspapers ran a campaign to reintroduce mixed bathing in all resorts, pointing out that its prohibition split up families and encouraged them to take their holidays abroad. Commercial pressure defeated the moral pressures. Sea bathing had ceased to be done for health reasons, and was done overwhelmingly for pleasure. As the segregated beaches in town disappeared, bathing costumes for men became part of the commercial package, and nude bathing ceased. 
  The introduction of mixed bathing throughout Europe and elsewhere certainly created pressure towards bathing costumes being worn by both genders. However, well into the latter days of the Victorian Era, whereas all females were routinely wearing modest bathing attire, many boys well into their teens in Victorian England, even when in a mixed gender setting, were still swimming and playing at the beach resorts completely naked. An article published on August 23, 1891 in the Syracuse Sunday Herald suggests naked boys of up to 15 years in age were problematic for American parents with daughters, and read:
  A 'Bewildered American' writes to the London Standard that he can't take his little girl to play in the sand at a British seaside resort without her being surrounded by crowds of naked boys. An English friend told him that they let their daughters play with naked boys of ten years of age, but draw the line at fifteen.
caption: "Mermaids at Brighton" by William Heath, c. 1829. Depicts women sea-bathing with bathing machines.
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