Category: England (north)

To search for any sites in the northern counties of England (previously known as Brigantia), click on the list of relevant counties, below. Please note that not all these english counties were truly in Brigantia, but they came close to its southern edges; and as parts of them tickle the edges of the southern Pennines, I thought they should be included. Hope that’s OK with everyone!

Eyebright Well, Leeds, West Yorkshire

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Healing Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 2986 3331

Archaeology & History

First mentioned in the 1715 magnum opus of Ralph Thoresby, this old healing well has long since fallen victim to the careless Industrialists.  In his day, the well was there for all to use, saying:

“Eye-bright Well on a declining Ground, near the Monk-Pits, discovers its Virtues in the Name, being, long-ago, esteemed a Sovereign Remedy against Sore-Eyes.”

This note was subsequently copied in in Hope’s (1893) classic survey, with no additional comment.  In all probability, the name of the well derived from the presence of the herb Eyebright (Euphrasia officinalis) which, as is well known, is the best herb for ailments of the eye.  The water from the well, in combination with the herb that grew around it, no doubt increased its ocular healing abilities.

By the middle of the 19th century, the rise of Leeds city brought an end to its ancient flow and its location was eventually forgotten.  In Bonser’s (1979) survey of Leeds’ wells, he told how,

“the position of this well can be accurately determined: it was situated on sloping ground between Wellington Street and Aire Street, as clearly indicated on the 1847 (1850) OS 5ft to 1 mile (map).”

Location of Eyebright Well on 1852 map

However, in the much earlier survey of Leeds, Edward Parsons (1834) told us that this well was a hundred yards to the south, “near the line of the new road to the iron bridge across the Aire at the Monk Pits.”  And although it isn’t named, it should be noted that immediately across the River Aire, where Parsons stated, the 1852 OS-maps showed the “Site of an Ancient Well.”  This is very likely to be where it was.  Parson’s also echoed the local lore of the time, telling us that the Well was “a sovereign remedy for soreness of the eyes.”

References:

  1. Bonser, K.J., “Spas, Wells and Springs of Leeds,” in The Thoresby Miscellany – volume 16, Leeds 1979.
  2. Hope, Robert Charles, Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliott Stock: London 1893.
  3. Parsons, Edward, The Civil, Ecclesiastical, Literary, Commercial and Miscellaneous History of Leeds, Halifax, Huddersfield, Bradford, Wakefield, Dewsbury, Otley – volume 1, Frederick Hobson: Leeds 1834.
  4. Thoresby, Ralph, Ducatus Leodiensis, Maurice Atkins: London 1715.
  5. Whelan, Edna & Taylor, Ian, Yorkshire Holy Wells and Sacred Springs, Northern Lights: Dunnington 1989.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

St Faith’s Well, Leven, East Yorkshire

Paul Hornby

Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TA 09126 45628

Also Known as: 

  1. Humber Historic Environment Record HER 3714

Archaeology & History

The site of the well is on the Carrs to the west of Leven village, immediately north of the old cemetery adjoining Hall Garth house.  Reverend William Smith, writing in 1923, told us:

St Faiths Well on 1855 map

“St Faith’s Well lay on the left of the road known as St Faith’s Lane, which leads to the old churchyard to which the spring was near.  St Faith belonged to France, and when quite a young maiden, was martyred because of her christianity.  She lived and died in the third century….

“St Faith’s Well was filled in about a hundred years ago and the site lost.  This, however, has lately been approximately fixed by the aid of water divining.  A Leven man, who can wield the hazel wand, went over the ground near to which the well was thought to have been, and the wand indicated a spot under which, on digging to the depth of about three feet, “the water fairly bubbled up”, and it was judged this was the place where the well lay.  St Faith’s Well is said to have given water both pure and abundant, and to have been in the old days the only supply of drinking water to the people of the Carrs.”

St Faith’s Saint’s day is the 6th October and she was a saint whose patronage was invoked by pilgrims, prisoners and soldiers.  From this, is it perhaps reasonable to infer that St Faith’s Well may have been a station for pilgrims to the local shrines of St John of Beverley and St Philip Ingleberd at Keyingham?  Also a stopping point for fugitives seeking sanctuary at Beverley?

There was another holy well dedicated to St Faith at Hexton in north Hertfordshire.

References:

  1. Cox, J.Charles, The Sanctuaries & Sanctuary Seekers of Mediæval England, George Allen: London 1911.
  2. Farmer, David H., Oxford Dictionary of Saints, Oxford University Press: Oxford 1987.
  3. Smith, Rev. William, Ancient Springs & Streams of the East Riding of Yorkshire, A. Brown: Hull 1923.

© Paul T Hornby 2021

St. Philip’s Well, Keyingham, East Yorkshire

Paul Hornby

Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TA 23584 25549

Archaeology & History

The Well shown on the 1855 6″ OS map

This holy well was formerly on the northern boundary of a field adjoining the north side of the A1033 west of Keyingham.

In view of the surviving folklore relating to the well it seems that its dedication to St. Philip may have been an effort by the Church to ‘Christianise’ it; and the St Philip here is not the Biblical Apostle, but a local saint – Philip Ingleberd (died c.1325 and also known as Philip Inglebred), whose memory was celebrated by a nearby Cross and a shrine at St Nicholas Church in the village.  The well and the cross may have been dedicated some time after 1392 following a ‘miracle’ relating to Philip’s tomb.  These were destroyed by the mob in the Reformation, although the cross-base survives.  It seems the well may have been restored in the late seventeenth century.  By the early twentieth century the well was described as laying on the Common to the west of the village, by then filled in, only showing signs it ever existed by making the ground near its site wet and boggy in a rainy season.

Folklore

George Poulson writing in 1841 told that,

“…a few fields more to the west is a well, called St. Philip’s Well; on a small stone are inscribed W. H. W. D. IG67. W. K.  It is called the wishing well; and the country lasses were in the habit of dropping pins, or even a sixpence into it, for the purpose of ensuring to themselves either particular or general good luck.”

William Smith (1923) described the well as one of six wishing wells or pin wells in Yorkshire and, moreover, the only ‘Cross Well’ in the East Riding.  At none of these wells was evil allowed to be foreshadowed, and the wells were only to show to a girl the portrait of her future husband.  He told us that,

“In every case the wish had to be with truthful devotion, and not divulged to any living person, or the desired consummation would not be gained…. Tradition adds that the well was much visited by maidens, who, on dropping their pins or coins, expressed the wish to see their lovers mirrored on its waters. Thus they kept a custom, dating to the time when the well was counted to be under the control of the fairies.”

And as Keyingham Common was once the abode of the fairies, it is worth noting that some 700 yards west of the site of the well a ‘Pans Hill’ is shown on the old maps, although whether this rural spirit of classical myth ever made it up to the East Riding is altogether another matter….

References:

  1. Arrowsmith, Nancy & Moorse, George, A Field Guide to the Little People, Macmillan: London 1977.
  2. Hope, Robert, Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliot Stock: London 1893.
  3. Poulson, George, History and Antiquities of the Seigniory of Holderness, Thomas Topping: Hull 1841.
  4. Smith, Rev. William, Ancient Springs & Streams of the East Riding of Yorkshire, A.Brown: Hull 1923.

© Paul T Hornby 2021

St. Hilda’s Well, Whitby, North Yorkshire

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Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NZ 9006 1102

Archaeology & History

Virgin’s Pump, c.1890

This is one of at least five wells dedicated to St. Hilda in North Yorkshire that my old colleague Graeme Chappell has uncovered over his many years of research.  It’s sadly been destroyed, and accounts of it seem to be few and far between; but from the short description of it by Mr J.C. Atkinson (1894)—and helped out by its later title—we at least know where it once was.

In his account of the old roads in the village, Grape Lane was mentioned as far back as 1396, and close by, he wrote,

“is a spring called Seynt-Hild-keld, possibly where the so-called “Virgin pump” stands, or stood, not so very long since.”

This ‘ere “virgin pump” is shown in an old photo taken about 1890, just round the corner from Grape Lane where, today, is the car park on Church Street, opposite The Endeavour.

Folklore

St Hilda was a 7th century saint who was reputed to have founded Whitby Abbey.  Her festival date was November 17.

References:

  1. Atkinson, J.C., Memorials of Old Whitby, MacMillan: London 1894.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Cow and Calf Stones, East Bierley, West Yorkshire

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Crosses / Legendary Rocks (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 1975 2909

Archaeology & History

Site location at Cross House

Not to be confused with a much more renowned namesake above Ilkley, this was the name given to two old stones that once existed in the middle of the East Bierley hamlet (as it was then) southeast of Bradford.  They were two large boulders next to each other, not far from the early farmstead of Cross House (see map, right) and were described in James Parker’s (1904) historic collage of the area, where he informed us that:

“On the village green (are) the primitive large stones locally called the “Cow and Calf stones,” which used to be in days gone by a Preaching Cross and Market Cross.”

When William Cudworth (1876) described the place nearly thirty years prior, he only mentioned a single cross, telling us:

“There is a lane which has long been called Kirkgate at Birkenshaw, leading up to an ancient cross on the hill.  The fact of this cross being on the hill must have given rise to the name Kirk (church) gate, as there was not, until a few years ago, any church at Birkenshaw.  In a previous paper we had occasion to notice the existence of the cross as an evidence of a pre-church period.”

The meaning behind the name Cow & Calf is unexplained by our respective authors, although Cudworth’s citation of “the cross as an evidence of a pre-church period” is probably not without merit here.  It seems very likely that the animal names of the two large stones—akin to the Cow & Calf Rocks at Ilkley and others of the same name elsewhere in the country—that sat near the top of the hill, probably possessed a creation myth similar to others of the same name.  From this, it seems logical that local folk held the rocks as important, which would have obviously attracted the regressive attention of Church; so they stuck a cross here to christianize the place and in doing so ensured that local people could continue using the place as a meeting place.  This practice (as if you didn’t already know) was widespread.

Although Mr Cudworth seems to give the first real account of the place, field-name records of 1567 listed a ‘Cowrosse’, which may have been the “cross on the Cow” stone.  A.H. Smith (1961) listed the site and suggested the element –rosse may derive from a local dialect word meaning a marsh, but a ‘cow’s marsh‘ seems a little odd.  It is perhaps just as likely that an error was made in the writing of rosse instead of crosse.

References:

  1. Cudworth, William, Round about Bradford, Thomas Brear: Bradford 1876.
  2. Parker, James, Illustrated History from Hipperholme to Tong, Percy Lund: Bradford 1904.
  3. Smith, A.H., The Place-Names of the West Riding of Yorkshire – volume 3, Cambridge University Press 1961.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 

Blind Well, Sutton-in-Holderness, East Yorkshire

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Healing Well:  OS Grid Reference – TA 1204 3306

Archaeology & History

Site of well on 1855 map

We don’t know for certain the precise whereabouts of this long lost healing well, but it would seem to be the one highlighted here (right) on the 1855 OS-map.  However, I think it equally possible that the small unnamed building, roughly halfway between the highlighted ‘Well’ and Spring Cottage, where the walling meets, could be the site in question.  It’s one or the other!

Folklore

When Thomas Blashill (1896) wrote of the Blind Well in his standard history work of the area, memory of it was already falling away.  In discussing where local people could wash and look after their health, he told that

“There was one place in the parish where washing seems to have been practised as a curative measure.  Down in the East Field, near to Spring Cottage Farm, was the Blindwell, to which the people had access. If they used its waters freely when suffering from sore eyes, their faith would probably be rewarded.”

References:

  1. Blashill, Thomas, Sutton-in-Holderness, William Andrews: Hull 1896.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

St Everilda’s Well, Everingham, East Yorkshire

Paul Hornby

Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 80528 42531

Also Known as:

  1. St Everildis Well

Archaeology & History

Shown on the 1855 Ordnance Survey map as a ‘pump’, in the grounds of Everingham Priory, the ‘seat’ of the lord of the manor, it was in an enclosure formerly open to the people of the village. It was filled in prior to 1923. The water was described as ‘abundant and excellent.’ Graeme Chapman, in his Yorkshire Holy Wells website states:

‘A few metres to the south of the site of the well the modern OS map marks the start of a stream (SE 8055 4250) which could be the original source of the Holy well’s water.’ 

The well shown on the 1855 6″ OS Map.

The present writer has not been able to verify this from the materials available to him.

Everilda, also known as Everild and Averil, is recorded in the York Breviary, printed in 1493. She was a mid Yorkshire Saint who died around 700 CE.  According to this source she was of a noble Wessex family who went to Yorkshire with companions Bega and Wulfreda, settling on land called Bishop’s Farm, an estate of the Bishop of York, St Wilfrid , which he gave to them, the place being then called Everildisham. There they established a nunnery, of which all trace is now lost. Her Saint’s day is July 9th. The name of St Everilda has been changed to ‘Emeldis’ in the dedication of the church at Everingham. Some historians claim the village is not named after her, but as a derivation of ‘ham of Eofor’s people’. The only other church known to be dedicated to her is at Nether Poppleton, some 17 miles north west of Everingham.

Folklore

The water of the village and the mothers of Everingham are said to have been blessed by St Everilda, and the Reverend Smith wrote that over a fifty year period, no mother had died in childbirth.

References:

  1. Farmer, David, The Oxford Dictionary of Saints, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1987
  2. Raine, James, The Dedications of the Yorkshire Churches, The Yorkshire Archaeological and Topographical Journal, Vol II, 1873
  3. Salisbury, Matthew Cheung, The Use of York: Characteristics of the Medieval Liturgical Office in York, Borthwick Institute, York, 2008
  4. Smith, Rev William, Ancient Springs & Streams of the East Riding of Yorkshire, A.Brown & Sons, London, Hull & York, 1923
  5. Stanton, Richard, A Menology of England & Wales.., Burns and Oates, London, 1887

Link:

  1. St Everilda’s Well on Yorkshire’s Holy Wells

© Paul T Hornby 2021

High Cross, Aberford, West Yorkshire

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Cross (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SE 433 390

Archaeology & History

Mentioned only in passing in the Becca and Aberford Enclosure Act of 1825, all remains of this site have gone.  It was subsequently referred to by Edmund Bogg (1904) in his journey through Elmet as previously standing where the Roman road veered off to the northeast from the “new road”, as it was then.  Bogg’s brief description told that from Nut Hill,

“A little distance south, where the old and new roads part, formerly stood a cross; Highcross Cottage keeps its memory green.”

References:

  1. Bogg, Edmund, The Old Kingdom of Elmet, James Miles: Leeds 1904.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 

Parsonage Well, Manchester, Lancashire

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Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – SJ 836 985

Archaeology & History

Long since lost beneath the metal and concrete of modern times, even references to this forgotten place are very faint indeed.  I expected to find something of it in Henry Taylor’s (1906) giganteum, but it even slipped through his considerable work; and, even where mention of it exists, it is only in passing.  In William Proctor’s (1874) survey of early Manchester, he found deeds relating to the land and its early owners wherein the one and only mention of this well appears.  It was located near the middle of the city centre, between the Law Courts and Manchester cathedral, in the area known today as the Parsonage Gardens on the east-side of the River Irwell.  In earlier centuries this was the abode of a Christian minister, or parson, and the water from this well supplied his religious abode.  Proctor wrote:

“Crossing over to the Parsonage, we find that, in 1780, one of its residents was Mr John Quincey, linen-draper, uncle to the English Opium-Eater.  In the previous year Mr Quincey was married to Miss Martha Goodyear, of Ardwick.  His residence was bounded, it seems, on the north and west by “a narrow street or passage called Black Fryars”; while on the other points of the vane his prospect is thus shown by an extract from a lease dated 1758: — “The orchard or garden plot adjoining the river; it is now fenced out with hedges and ditches.”  Some years earlier mention is made of a summer-house, fruit trees, and plants in abundance, with “free liberty of way to the spring or well called the Parsonage Well.”  In 1686, Thomas Heyrick of Manchester, gentleman, leased a “tenement and parcel of land abutting upon a messuage and garden heretofore in the possession of George Tipping, deceased, and now the dwelling-house of the warden [Richard Wroe] of the said College; bounded on the east part with the old Parsonage ditch adjoining to the tenement of Mr John Oldfield.  Close by are or were the residences of John Nield, Hugh Boardman, Richard Haworth, Esq., and lately Jane Haworth, his widow.”  A worn parchment proves the existence, in 1698, of “Parsonage Croft;” another of “Parsonage Pool;” and an order of the Court Leet, 1594, required the tenants to “go along the hedge-side, keeping the footway towards the Parsonage style, for their fetching of water from the river.”  In 1765, an advertisement in the Mercury mentions “the sign of the Grey Horse in or near Parsonage Brow.” St Mary’s Church covers the ground once known as the Parsonage Green.”

References:

  1. Proctor, Richard W., Memorials of Manchester Streets, T. Sutcliffe: Manchester 1874.
  2. Taylor, Henry, The Ancient Crosses and Holy Wells of Lancashire, Sherratt & Hughes: Manchester 1906.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Holy Well, Halifax, West Yorkshire

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Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid-Reference – SE 100 254

Archaeology & History

This sacred site seems to have been destroyed sometime at the end of the 19th century.  It was located on the great slopes heading up to Beacon Hill.  In 1787, a property survey showed six houses here called Holy Well Cottages and on the 1852 OS-map a “Well” is highlighted at the bend in the pathway of the Old Bank as you’re going uphill, which is the place in question.  On my last visit here about thirty years ago, its position was preserved under a large manhole. 

References:

  1. Heginbottom, J.A., “Early Christian Sites in Calderdale”, in Proceedings Halifax Antiquarian Society 1988.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian