Virgin Mary's Spring, Petworth

Few things give me greater delight than visiting a holy well which is new to me and not, as far as I know, recorded in any secondary source (apart, in this case, from a couple of places online). We took advantage of the nice weather on Sunday afternoon to pop down the road to Petworth where, entirely by accident a few days ago, the Virgin Mary's Spring had come to my attention. It was very easy to find, too - you just follow a footpath down the hill just north of the Black Horse pub in Byworth, over a footbridge, and it's a few yards down the stream on the Petworth side. Clear water pours from a pipe over a flagstone-lined basin built up at the sides with brick and reinforced with a bit of concrete.

The well is marked on the first edition Ordnance Survey (which means 1877-80 in these parts) but apart from that nothing at all seems to be known about it. The footpaths lead to it from both Petworth and Byworth but it's rather more convenient as a water-supply for the latter than the former. The parish church of Petworth is dedicated after the Virgin Mary, but this actual title applied to a well is quite unusual. The hydrolatrically-underexplored landscape of Sussex produces something nice again.