as a de facto sewer and drainage sump. This led to a range of health issues until finally, in 1839, when a dysentery outbreak killed five children in one day, Governor Gawler forbid bathing, clothes washing and the disposal of animal carcases in the Torrens within of town. The quality of the river's water was not helped by water supply methods. Carters used to drive water carts into the Torrens to refill. To prevent this the State Government built a facility with steam powered pumps and water storage in 1852, from which the carters then filled. The "Waterworks Act" of 1856 was passed to enable damming of the upstream Torrens for water supply purposes. The resulting "Water Commission" arranged the following year for foundations to be laid for a water supply weir from Adelaide near Campbelltown. Unsuitable geology and shoddy work by contractors Frost & Watson led to it being washed away in July 1858 and the site abandoned. Engineer Hamilton was replaced by John England. Government then created a Waterworks Department, which started construction of a weir from the city and reservoir at Thorndon Park in 1859. The weir was completed on 4 June 1860 and the reservoir began supplying piped water in December. Engineer England was found by a Select Committee to have overpaid the contractors and forced to resign. The water was captured at the weir, piped for storage to the Thorndon Park Reservoir then to a water tower at Kent Town. Water from Kent Town storage was distributed via a manually controlled water system, unmetered for its first six years. Within six years 20,000 citizens in Adelaide and Port Adelaide were connected to reticulated water from the Torrens. By 1872, the Hope Valley Reservoir in the foothills of the Adelaide Hills was completed as a storage reservoir, supplied via an aqueduct and tunnel. Public baths were built in 1861 just north of the current Parliament House. They were supplied with reticulated water from the Torrens and progressively upgraded with the last change a 1940 remodelling including an Olympic-size swimming pool and diving tower. The baths were demolished in 1970 to make way for the Adelaide Festival Centre. The Millbrook Reservoir was constructed high in the Adelaide Hills from 1913 to 1918 submerging the town of Millbrook. An earth bank dam fed by mile long tunnel from a weir on the river at Gumeracha, its elevation allows