Tag: healing wells

Heugh Well, Blairgowrie, Perthshire

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Healing Well:  OS Grid Reference – NO 17103 46984

Also Known as:

  1. Mineral Well

Archaeology & History

This little-known iron-bearing spring can still be found in the woodland known today as the Heugh of Mawse, a mile north of Blairgowrie.  It was included in the Object Name Book of 1863, where they referred to an earlier account in the New Statistical Account, which told that,

“On the south end of it is a chalybeate spring much resorted to by the people of the locality. “There are one or two chalybeate springs in the parish; but they have never been chemically analyzed. There is one very fine spring called the “Heugh Well” It springs from the face of the “Heughs of Mause” (a mortar cliff of singular appearance; which descends abruptly into the bed of the river with an almost perpendicular declivity of about 200 feet) and judging from its colour, contains a considerable quantity of ferruginous matter. The use of its water has been found to be very beneficial in cutaneous eruptions, & affections of the Stomach.””

Heugh Well on 1867 map

Subsequently highlighted on the 1867 OS-map, a singular footpath led to the site and no further.  It was mentioned by the regional historians J.G. McPherson (1885) and John MacDonald (1899), albeit briefly, where they respectively told that its waters were “formerly much resorted to by persons in the neighbourhood.”  It possessed considerable medicinal properties which, according to tradition, were “found very beneficial for skin diseases and derangement of the stomach”!  Doubtless such attributes will still be effective.

References:

  1. MacDonald, John A.R., The History of Blairgowrie, Advertiser Office: Blairgowrie 1899.
  2. McPherson, J.G., Strathmore: Past and Present, S. Cowan: Perth 1885.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

St. Ninian’s Well, Blairgowrie, Perthshire

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Holy Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NO 180 452

Archaeology & History

The Well Meadow in the middle of Blairgowrie was once the place where the 5th century Apostle of the Southern Picts, or St Ninian, baptised local folk into the so-called “new faith”.  It’s long since gone.  The local historian John MacDonald (1899) told that it was located opposite the buildings on the north-side of the square, adding:

“St Ninian, one of the earliest Christian Celtic missionaries, on his tour through Scotland, pitched his camp where the Wellmeadow now is, and quenched his thirst at an old well or spring which ever afterwards bore the name of “St Ninian’s Well,” until it was covered in and the water led into the town drains.”

Old Ninian’s saint’s day is September 16.

References:

  1. MacDonald, John A.R., The History of Blairgowrie, Advertiser Office: Blairgowrie 1899.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Holy Well, Trelawne, Cornwall

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Holy Well (lost?):  OS Grid reference – SX 2258 5311

Archaeology & History

This spot is where an old field-name has preserved the memory of an all-but-forgotten holy well, known as the “Holywell Ground.”  Although it may have fallen back to Earth, there are two possible spots regarding its position: i) a spring that was marked on the 1882 OS-map at SX 2258 5315, and ii) a “Well” that’s shown on the recent OS-maps (SX 2257 5306).  Hence, the grid-reference I’ve given to this place is the halfway spot between them both. (it has to be pointed out that the “well” on recent maps occurs right next to an old quarry, which are well known to bring forth water sources that were previously deep underground)  Whether or not Sclerder Abbey—about 400 yards west of here and only built in 1843—had anything to do with the sanctifying this well, I do not know.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Small Wells, Louth, Lincolnshire

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Sacred Wells (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – TF 32603 87555

Also Known as:

  1. Little Wells

Archaeology & History

Small Well on 1834 map

Of the three wells in old Louth around which local ceremonies occurred, the Small Wells were apparently the least impressive.  Its ritualised compatriots south of the River Lud in St. Helen’s Well and the Ash Well (the Aswell in modern Louth place-names) were reportedly the much better water supplies in bygone times.  The site was highlighted on a map of the town in Robert Bayley’s (1834) history of the area, showing it as a small pool just below the Cistern Gate road; but when the Ordnance Survey lads came here later in the 19th century it had already gone.

It’s category here as a “sacred” well is due to it being annually decorated with garlands of flowers, commonly known today as well-dressing.  Such wells tend to be places of pre-christian rites, attended by local people at dawn usually at Beltane or at Midsummer (St John’s Eve); but I’ve been unable to find out which was the sacred day when the waters here were honoured.  All that we have left to tell us of the rites is from old township notes that said how,

““The small wells,” a cluster of little springs on the north of the town, shared in the honours of green boughs and popular huzzahs” the traditions held at the wells of St. Helen and Aswell a half-mile to the south.

A brief 16th century account told of a local man being paid for the adornment of the Small Wells: one “Henery Forman received for dressing small wells for a yeare – xiid” – or 12 pennies in old money.  Not bad at all in them days!

References:

  1. Bayley, Robert S., Notitiae Ludae; or Notices of Louth, W. Edwards 1834.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian 

Cross Well, Dundee, Angus

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Healing Well (destroyed):  OS Grid Reference – NO 4032 3025

Archaeology & History

This old water supply had no direct ‘holy’ nature, despite its proximity to the cathedral, the old market cross and St Clement’s Well some fifty yards away!  Most odd.  A much more mundane story lies behind this long lost water source.  The Dundee historian William Kidd (1901) told us,

“When the public wells were erected, about the year 1749, to supply the town with water from the Lady-well reservoir at foot of Hilltown, one was placed on the High Street, on the east side of the Cross, and was called the Cross Well.”

It didn’t have too long a life either—much like the old Market Cross, for,

“In the year 1777 that quaint structure was demolished.  The platform and octagonal tower were carted away as rubbish, the least decayed stones being selected to be used in other buildings.  The stone shaft, also, was preserved, and placed beside the Old Steeple. With the demolition of the Cross, the Cross Well was cleared away from the High Street, but, as water was an essential to the people, the well was re-erected behind the Town House in St. Clement’s Lane.  In that situation it remained for nearly one hundred years, when, being rendered unnecessary by the introduction of the Lintrathen water supply, it was also demolished, along with the old buildings in the Vault and St. Clement’s Lane, to make room for the additions to the Town House.”

References:

  1. Colville, A., Dundee Delineated, A. Colville: Dundee 1822.
  2. Kidd, William, Dundee Market Crosses and Tolbooths, W. Kidd: Dundee 1901.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Wishing Well, Bone Valley, Madron, Cornwall

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Sacred Well (lost):  OS Grid reference – SW 4614 3259

Archaeology & History

It’s difficult to know what to make of this site: whether it was merely a healing well or whether it possessed greater esoteric functions.  In all likelihood it was the latter as many so-called “wishing wells” in earlier centuries possessed oracular attributes.  It’s also difficult to work out precisely where this well happened to be, as we know little about it apart from the singular reference of Quiller-Couch (1894), who told simply that,

“There was also a wishing-well in the Bone Valley; it is now only a small stream, and is not used for purposes of divination.”

Hidden spring on 1878 map
Line of wells on 1908 map

There were a number of wells along the Bone Valley road highlighted on the early OS-map, all of which may have been known to Quiller-Couch at the time, three of which appeared to have streams emerging from them back then: one just above Bosoljack (SW 4556 3319) and one below it (SW 4571 3292), each just off the roadside; but then a slightly more enticing one is hidden a little further down the lane and up the tinier lane to Higher Boskinning, in the trees on the right (east).  Shown on the first OS-map as a simple “spring”, a small stream runs from it and then into the larger Bone Valley Brook which runs towards Penzance.  The solace and quietude of this spot would seem much more favourable than the other two…. but my impressions may be wrong.  It would be good if someone could find this old place…

References:

  1. Quiller-Couch, M. & L., The Holy Wells of Cornwall, C.J. Clark: London 1894.
  2. Russell, Vivien, West Penwith Survey, Cornwall Archaeological Society 1971.

Acknowledgements:  Big thanks for use of the early edition OS-map in this site profile, Reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland. 

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Chapel Well, Botrea, Sancreed, Cornwall

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Holy Well (lost):  OS Grid reference – SW 4025 3062

Archaeology & History

Just over a mile northwest of the superb Sancreed Well, we find documentary evidence from 1778 recording the field-name of Chapel Well Close here, although there seems to be no remaining spring or well and nothing is shown on the early OS-maps.  Official records define it as a “medieval well” and speculate that it may have been associated with the nearby Boscence Chapel and possibly dedicated to St. Winwaloe.

References:

  1. Anon., The Church and Parish of Sancreed in the County of Cornwall, Brewer: Sancreed c.1960.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Balsamic Well, Hoxton, London

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Healing Well (destroyed):  OS Grid reference – TQ 330 827

Also Known as:

  1. Balsamick Well

Archaeology & History

In that typically rambling style beloved of early writers on medicinal springs, Timothy Byfield (1687) narrated the tale of uncovering this well in an almost alchemical discourse.  It was located when digging out the cellar of a house near Charles Square in the 1680s.  Upon investigation, the waters were found to possess a good quantity of sulphur and a small amount of iron, leading Byfield to proclaim it could cure a whole army of medical disorders, from cleaning out blockages in the alimentary canal, to treating kidney stones, scurvy, ulcers, headaches, migraines and more.  If used correctly and in the right amount,

” There is,” he says, “no unwholesome glebe (concretion) or any dangerous mineral or metal (in them) that casts one unhappy ray into this healing fountain.” On the contrary, they set up ‘* such a pretty bustle or ferment in nature that makes gay a well-temper’d Healthy Body.”

In the early days when Spa Wells were in vogue, the Balsamic Well became a competitor to the nearby St Agnes le Clear Well, which is probably the reason why one doctor dissuaded the toffs of the time to avoid it!

The waters possessed a slight vinegar-esque flavour—hence the name.  In John MacPherson’s (1871) work, he described it as a “chalybeate well” and despite it having that typical “bituminous scum on it, strange to say,” it yielded “a pleasant aromatic flavour.”  The site has long since been covered over.

References:

  1. Byfield, Timothy, A Short and Plain Account of the late-found Balsamick Wells at Hoxdon, London 1687.
  2. Foord, Alfred Stanley, Springs, Streams and Spas of London: History and Association, T. Fisher Unwin: London 1910.
  3. Hembry, Phyllis, The English Spa 1560-1815, Athlone Press: London 1990.
  4. MacPherson, John, Our Baths and Wells, MacMillan: London 1871.
  5. Sunderland, Septimus, Old London Spas, Baths and Wells, John Bale: London 1915.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Trows Well, Birsay, Orkney Isles

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Sacred Well:  OS Grid Reference – HY 26157 26838

Archaeology & History

On the northwest side of the Loch of Boardhouse can still be found a spring of water which was, in bygone times, the abode of the supernatural creature known as the troll or trow.  The site is described in local place-name records and is located near the foot of a slope near Westerhouse, from where a small channel of water runs down into the Loch of Boardhouse about forty yards away. When it was last described in the 1960s, all folk memory of its heathen inhabitants had seemingly been forgotten and no folk-tales seem to have been recorded.  Thankfully, the Well itself is still shown to exist on modern OS-maps.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian

Moses’ Well, Morton, Thornhill, Dumfriesshire

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Holy Well:  OS Grid Reference – NX 8799 9431

Archaeology & History

Moses Well on 1861 map

This little-known Biblical-sounding spring has apparently long since fallen back to Earth (perhaps there might be some local folk who could find out for certain).  Shown on the 1861 Ordnance Survey map as being at the side of the wall in the small copse of trees—immediately east of kirk- place-names and a half-mile north of St Ninian’s Well—it was briefly described by T.C. Ramage’s (1876), who seemed to know nothing of its lore, merely telling us that,

“on Templand farm, close to the wooden bridge over the Cample, there is Moses’ Well, an unusual designation, but which some Knight Templar may have given in remembrance of his toils in Palestine.”

The Templar designation was deemed by Ramage to come from the name of the farm.  However, a few years prior to this, the early Scottish place-name surveyors were traversing the area and found from local people how it derived “its name from a Tinker named Moses Marshall who with his family lived near it in a Camp during the time they had the small pox.”  The Well was also included in the Morris survey (1982), but without comment.  Another Moses Well can be found 44½ miles to the northeast, near Galashiels at NT 4046 4306.

References:

  1. Morris, Ruth & Frank, Scottish Healing Wells, Alethea: Sandy 1982.
  2. Ramage, Craufurd T., Drumlanrig Castle and the Douglases, J. Anderson: Dumfries 1876.

© Paul Bennett, The Northern Antiquarian