Healing Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 1286 4007
Also Known as:
Loadpit Well
Archaeology & History
Sore Eye Well on 1852 map
Descriptions of this site are few and far between, despite it having a meaningful name. First recorded on the 1852 OS-map, in the folklore of our ancestors this was a well that local people frequented to wash their face and it was said that the waters would take away the ills of those suffering poor eyesight or other ocular problems. Rags were left hanging over an old rowan tree as offerings to the spirit of the water, in return for curing the afflicted eyes.
When I first came looking for this as a boy, I was frustrated to encounter the water authority’s metal cover ruining the site completely, leaving nothing of the old well as it once was. Around the metal-cover was evidence of a small rock enclave that would have defined the spring as it emerged from the earth—although it was barely noticeable. The remnants of a small path just to the right of the main footpath that reaches up the hillside is apparent, leading to the well. Below it were the remains of a large, water-worn flat rock, with other stones set to its sides, where the water used to flow and be collected, but today everything’s dried up and there’s little evidence of it ever being here.
References:
Shepherd, V., Historic Wells in and Around Bradford, Heart of Albion: Wymeswold 1994.
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:
Bonser, K.J., “Spas, Wells and Springs of Leeds,” in The Thoresby Miscellany – volume 16, Leeds 1979.
Hope, Robert Charles, Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliott Stock: London 1893.
Parsons, Edward, The Civil, Ecclesiastical, Literary, Commercial and Miscellaneous History of Leeds, Halifax, Huddersfield, Bradford, Wakefield, Dewsbury, Otley – volume 1, Frederick Hobson: Leeds 1834.
Holy Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – TL 10302 30328
Also Known as:
Hertfordshire Historic Environment Record No. 1926
Archaeology & History
The site of the well is now in the garden of a house on the south side of the B655 Barton Road in Hexton, south west of St Faith’s church. Prior to the Reformation, there was a small chapel of St Faith adjacent to the well containing a shrine to the saint, which was, with the well a place of pilgrimage.
N. Salmon, writing in 1728, told us:
St Faiths Well on 1882 map
“At Ravensborough, within a Quarter of a Mile, is a fine Spring, which runs down to Hexton, and meets there another Stream rising at the Berystede near the church, which is indeed a very remarkable one. It comes pouring out of the Earth in such plenty, that it would turn a Mill in a very little Way; and hath been since the Roman Times thought worthy of a Saint’s Name. It was called St Faith’s Well, to which the church also is dedicated, and the Image of St Faith was placed over it.”
The well is just to the north of the iron age hill fort of Ravensburgh and near the ancient prehistoric roadway of Icknield Way, so would certainly have been a welcome stopping point for prehistoric travellers in these chalk uplands. In line with Salmon’s contention of its having been known since Roman times, Francis Taverner, the 17th century Lord of the Manor of Hexton wrote of the well having been used for oracular purposes by people who would throw an object onto the surface of the water:
“which if swamme above they were accepted and there petition granted, but if it sinke, then rejected which the experienced Prieste had arts enove to cause to swymme or sinke according as himselfe was pleased with the partye, or rather with the offering made by the partye.”
St Faith who was a third century martyr who was beheaded at Agen in Gaul. Her saint’s day is 6th October, and her patronage was invoked inter alia by pilgrims, so the dedication of the well and nearby church may have been to ‘christianise’ a pre-existing oracular place resorted to by travellers on the Icknield Way.
Taverner again:
“There is a small parcel of ground adjoining the churchyard called “St. Ffaith’s Wick Court,” about a pole in measurement, anciently divided from Malewick by a ditch in the same place where now a large moat is made. The greatest parte of this Wick lying upon a bedde of springs, and undrained, was very boggye towards the churchyard; but the west side being higher, the ground was well planted with oaks, willows, and bushes, near adjoyning unto which, the craftye Priests had made a well about a yard deepe, and very cleere in the bottome, and curbed about, which they called St. Faith’s Well.
“Now over this well they built an howse, and in the howse they placed the image or statue of St. Faith, and a cawsey they had mad (which I found when I digged and levelled the ground) for the people to passe who resorted thither from farr and neere to visitt our Lady, and to performe their devotions reverently, kissing a fine-colloured stone placed in her toe. This Lady was trimly apparelled, and I find in an old book of churchwarden’s accounts, in the reign of Henry VIII, that they had delivered unto the St. Ffaith a cote and a velvet tippet. The Lady had no land to maintain her, that I know of, more than i acre lying in Mill Field, called at this day St. Ffaith’s acre, which, as being given to superstitious uses, came to the King’s hands at the dissolution, and is now parcel of the demesnes. The house being pulled down, and the idol cast away, the well was filled up, yet an apparent mention of the place remained till my time, and St. Ffaith’s Well continued as a waste and unprofitable and neglected piece of land till such time as the footpath was turned through the midst of it to the outside on the south by the highway, and their clearing and levelling the ground, having been drained, and sunk the spring, I converted the same, in the year of our Lord 1624, into a little orchard. The Lady Ffaith was a Virgin and Martyr of Agenne, in France, a.d. 1290.”
The well may have had healing properties too. Herbert Tompkins (1902) informed us how,
“…to folk who have never stepped out of Hertfordshire (I have known several such) the well of St. Faith is indeed the “Well at the World’s End.” The waters of that well were of miraculous efficacy, and an image of its saint was long preserved in the chapel of St. Faith Virgin, of which no stone remains.”
The parish church of Hexton remains dedicated to St Faith , as does the parish church of nearby Kelshall. There was another St Faith’s Well at Leven in East Yorkshire.
References:
Clutterbuck, Robert, History & Antiquities of the County of Hertford – volume 3, Nichols Son & Bentley: London 1827.
Farmer, David Hugh, Oxford Dictionary of Saints, Oxford University Press 1987.
Hippisley-cox, R., The Green Roads of England, 6th Edition, Methuen: London 1948.
Hope, Robert c., Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliot Stock: London 1893.
Johnson, Walter, Folk Memory or the Continuity of British Archaeology, Clarendon Press: Oxford 1908.
Jones-Baker, Doris, Old Hertfordshire Calendar, Phillimore: Chichester 1974.
Salmon, N., History of Hertfordshire, London, 1728.
Tompkins, Herbert W., Highways & Byways of Hertfordshire, Macmillan: London 1902.
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:
Cox, J.Charles, The Sanctuaries & Sanctuary Seekers of Mediæval England, George Allen: London 1911.
Farmer, David H., Oxford Dictionary of Saints, Oxford University Press: Oxford 1987.
Smith, Rev. William, Ancient Springs & Streams of the East Riding of Yorkshire, A. Brown: Hull 1923.
The earliest OS-map of this area shows this well a hundred yards or so northwest of an old church and just a few yards east of the stream that is now in woodland; but unlike today, when the early survey was done there were no trees, enabling a clear view of the waters. When Myles Ronan (1927) wrote of the place, he told that it was still visible. The site was added to the Grogan & Kilfeather (1997) county inventory where they suggested it’s probable relationship with the legendary St Brigid. This seems highly probable. Does anyone know if the Well is still there?
References:
Grogan, Eion & Kilfeather, Annaba, Archaeological Inventory of County Wicklow, Stationery Office: Dublin 1997.
Ronan, Myles V., “The Ancient Churches of the Deanery of Arklow”, in Journal Royal Society Antiquaries, Ireland, December 1927.
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:
Arrowsmith, Nancy & Moorse, George, A Field Guide to the Little People, Macmillan: London 1977.
Hope, Robert, Legendary Lore of the Holy Wells of England, Elliot Stock: London 1893.
Poulson, George, History and Antiquities of the Seigniory of Holderness, Thomas Topping: Hull 1841.
Smith, Rev. William, Ancient Springs & Streams of the East Riding of Yorkshire, A.Brown: Hull 1923.
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:
Atkinson, J.C., Memorials of Old Whitby, MacMillan: London 1894.
This little-known tree, said to have been planted in memory of Sir William Wallace’s mother, is long gone. The only notice I can find of it, is in the writings of Pete Chalmers (1844), who told us:
“There is a tradition that the mother of Sir William Wallace was buried in the old church-yard, on the spot where the present thorn-tree is growing, but how she came to die here history seems to be silent. It is added that her son wished afterwards to erect a monument to her memory, but being in pursuit of, or flight from, his enemies, had not time to do so, and, as a substitute, planted a thorn-tree.”
Much of what constitutes “the old church-yard” has long been covered by the new cathedral and so the precise location of this old thorn tree will never be known, which is a pity, for as Chalmers told,
“This tree had reached an immense size, and was seemingly of great age about 60 years ago (c.1784), when it was blown down by a storm and replaced by a stem from the old tree, now advanced to a considerable height and magnitude—the only living and remaining memorial of the filial affection of the Scottish Patriot.”
Due to a lack of writings from the viewpoint of Wallace and the Scottish people, we are only left with fragments regarding the why’s and wherefores of Wallace and his mum being in Dunfermline. Chalmers thought,
“Possibly the occasion of their being here is referred to in the following lines of the poet, an account of a pretended pilgrimage of Wallace and his mother to St Margaret’s shrine.”
He then cites a more assured account of Sir William being in the area, saying:
“It is recorded of this renowned person, that, on one occasion, in 1808, when he was surrounded by his enemies, he came from the fastnesses where he had taken refuge, to the Forest of Dunfermline, and by the mediation of his friends, proposed, on certain conditions, yiz., the assurance of safety in life, limbs, sad estate, to surrender himself. These conditions were indignantly refused by the haughty and infuriated Edward (the Tosser), who cursed him, by the fiend, for a traitor, and even set a price on his head. On hearing this, the Patriot ” betook himself again to the wilds and mountains, and subsisted on plunder.”
In Pete Chalmers (1844) historical brief about the long lost chapel and hospital of St. Leonard (and its associated holy well), mention is made of this long forgotten relic. Its memory was preserved in an old place-name, and was to be found less than half-a-mile southeast of St. Leonard’s sites on,
“the high part of the road, about a quarter of a mile to the south, the Spital-Crosshead, (named) from a pillar which, according to tradition, was erected there, decorated on the top by a St Andrew’s Cross, and removed probably towards the close of the 16th or 17th century.”
The cross is believed to have been erected in the 15th century.
Holy Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 0976 8666
Archaeology & History
Site shown on 1856 map
There seems to be very little information available about this holy well, lost long ago and now hidden beneath the foundations of a food superstore! It was found in close association with both a chapel and a hospital in St. Leonard’s name—both of which have also been destroyed. The water from here may have been used by the monks for patients in the hospital, but that’s purely speculative. St. Leonard was known to be connected with lepers, which may be something that the waters here were used to treat. But again, I’m speculating…
When the Ordnance Survey lads came here in 1853, the waters were still running and they subsequently added it to their map a few years later. The site was still visible when Erskine Beveridge (1917) came here, telling us briefly that,
“St. Leonard’s Well still remains a little to the south-east, and, though now built up, is recognisable.”
But a few years later it had been destroyed and its position was shown on the updated OS-map of 1926 as “Site of.” The old well had gone…
Simpkins, John Ewart, Examples of Printed Folk-lore Concerning Fife, with some Notes on Clackmannan and Kinross-shires, Sidgwick & Jackson: London 1914.
Walker, J. Russel, “‘Holy Wells’ in Scotland,” in Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol.17 (New Series, volume 5), 1883.
Acknowledgements: Big thanks for use of the 1st edition OS-map in this site profile, Reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
