Let's get to the bottom of this

Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply

- Deborah Nicholls-Lee

THE map on the deeds to 400-year old Moat House in Wattisfield, Suffolk, features a tiny italicised w, small enough that Olivia Munro and her husband, Jack, missed it when they purchased the property in May 2023. It was only when they began digging trenches in the garden to manage tree roots that a concrete pad revealed itself beneath the scuffed grass. After some determined drilling and with the aid of a powerful torch, they learnt that they were in possession of a 4ft-wide well.

It was the latest surprise in the renovation of a dilapidated property documented by Mrs Munro on her Instagram page, @lifeat moathouse. ‘It’s really bizarre, because we had no idea that there was this 70ft hole beneath where the children were playing,’ she remembers, clearly still shocked.

Wells get a mixed reception from modernday owners. Whereas some people fill them in or lock them away in an outbuilding, others welcome the additional source of water or make a charming feature of them. As for the Munros, the discovery initially unsettled the couple, who, having watched the 2002 horror film The Ring in their youth, associated wells with disturbing happenings. ‘We slept with the light on for a week,’ Mrs Munro confides. In time, however, they saw it as a positive development —particularly when a jam jar sent down the well emerged with crystal-clear water. They have since acquired reclaimed bricks to build the well up and make it a focal point and are planning to get the water tested, in the hope that it can be used on the garden and as drinking water for their dogs and ponies.

Before the Public Health Act of 1848 expanded the supply of mains water, any sizeable property was served by a well. Fordham Abbey, a Georgian mansion in nearby Cambridgeshire, where Mrs Munro is the assistant manager, is home to at least four, she says.