Holy Well, Ratby

Dedication: none

Location: Holywell Farm

Coordinates: 52.64595N, -1.26038W

Grid reference: SK501056

Heritage designation: none

The earliest reference that I have been able to find to Ratby's holy well dates from 1790; it appears in John Throsby's Supplementary Volume to the Leicestershire Views, in which he noted that there "is a place called Holywell" near the village, and that its "water is antiſcorbutic". Reportedly, sick children (likely ones with scurvy) were once dipped in the well in the hope that it would cure them. It is possible but quite unlikely that water from the Holy Well was brought to the church for baptisms, simply because of the distance between the well and the church.

It seems, in fact, that this well may have originally been sacred to the pagans, or even to the Romans. The well is located incredibly close to the site of Bury Camp, a fort of some kind that was once believed to have been a Roman camp, but which is now thought to have more probably been an Iron Age hillfort. Either way, the Holy Well almost certainly constituted the main water supply for this community. It is also rumoured that a Roman mosaic is hidden beneath the waters of the Holy Well, which is quite possible, given the proximity of the well to the supposed location of a Roman road. It is plausible that Holywell Farm may occupy the site of a Roman villa.

Today, the Holy Well survives as a relatively large pond in the garden of Holywell Farm. When I visited in the March of 2025, the remains of dry-stone walling surrounding the spring was visible, and a dilapidated brick dam that had been constructed across the south edge of the pond by the previous farmer was still mostly extant. A larger ornamental pond, a few metres south of the original pool but fed by its outflow, had been created around five years previously.

The dilapidated brick dam that was built across the pool to deepen it

The large pool that has recently been created a few metres south of the Holy Well

Access:

The well is located on private land in the garden of Holywell Farm; permission is to be obtained from there.