Authentic documents relative to the miraculous cure of Winefrid White, of Wolverhampton, at St. Winefrid's Well, alias Holywell, in Flintshire, on the 28th of June 1805 : with observations thereon / by the R.R. J--- M-----.

  • Milner, John, 1752-1826.
Date:
1806
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Authentic documents relative to the miraculous cure of Winefrid White, of Wolverhampton, at St. Winefrid's Well, alias Holywell, in Flintshire, on the 28th of June 1805 : with observations thereon / by the R.R. J--- M-----. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    in company with a Mrs. Midghall and the two Mrs. Bromleys, ladies who had arrived from Liverpool at Holy- well the same day that she did. One of the latter, she ner as the Jews did, in the time of our Saviour, at the pool in Jerusalem, called Bethsaida, John v. 4. j likewise that the stones in this well were many of them streaked with red, like blood, and that the moss growing round it exhaled a remarkable odoriferous scent, as is still the case.— See an abridgement of the Legend in Cressy’s Chinch History, Book xvi.—Independantly of these circumstances, St. Winefrid’s Well is re- markable for the astonishing force and quantity of water which it con- stantly and invariably shoots forth ; some writers say at the rate of 26, some of more than 100 tuns every minute. It is surrounded and co- vered in by an edifice in the richest style of the pointed order; such as prevailed in the reign of Henry VII., by whose mother, the pious Countess of Richmond, it was built. It consists of light cluster-pillars and mouldings, which support the most gorgeous tracery work and groining; the whole being ornamented with sculptured bosses, pen- dant capitals, fret-work niches and tabernacles. The form of the edi- fice is quadrangular, but, round the bason of the fountain, it diverges into an octagon. Over the well is a chapel of the same date and style with it, which is now turned into a school. Upon the neighbouring cliffs stand the beautiful ruins of Basingwerk, now called Greenfield Abbey. The whole scenery of this interesting spot must have been at once begutiful and sublime in the extreme, before it was broken and polluted by modern manufactories, dwelling-houses, and wash-houses. Ranulphus Higden, a monk of St. Werburg’s Abbey, now the cathe- dral at Chester, who flourished in the middle of the 14th century, finishes his account of the Wonderful Things of Wales, Be Mirabilibus Terra Wallia, with the following description of St. Winefrid’s Well: Ad Basingwerk fons oritur, Qui satis vulgo dicitur, Et tantis bullis scaturit Quod mox injecta rejicit. l am magnum flumen procreat Ut Cambnse sufficiat. Mgri qui dant rogamina, Reportant medicamina. Rubro guttatos lapides In scatebris reperios;