Pool Meadow to Priory Street

February 1937

At the north end of the Chapel the excavators found it was built on a large brick archway over a manure heap of six or seven hundred years ago; it is about ten feet deep and nearly as wide as the Chapel. Even a well dating from the 16-17th cent. was sunk through it close by the river. Large oak piles were found still in position belonging to the sheds, numerous boots were found and the leather in good condition. Only a few small pieces of medieval pottery were found and three pieces of black unglazed pottery which may be Saxon to 12th century. One can only realise by such excavations as have taken place during the last five years from Cox Street and Pool Meadow, Priors' Pool, Corporation Showroom site, New cinema in Corporation Street, and the other parts I have mentioned to Smithford Street bridge, or Ram bridge, the extensive lake Bablake was.

Excavations have been proceeding with the last part of the river bed, and only digging can reveal what has been hidden for a thousand years or more. Many readers will recall my article on the discovery of the foundations of a square tower at New Buildings end, and also the finding of the floodgates of the Prior's Mill, which were revealed when the stream was lowered by a temporary channel about a yard deep; since then many other things have come to light at a much greater depth.

One interesting find was a wooden conduit, and the foundations of a mill were found at a depth of about five feet below the temporary channel in Pool Meadow. Somewhere beneath the hill between the Meadow and Priory Row is a spring of clear and swift-flowing water which supplied the power for driving the mill wheel.

Near to the wood conduit were large oak beam foundations, morticed out, with oak pegs, while another large piece was keyed to support another beam about three feet wide; near by many piles were yet standing, on which the City Wall had been built in 1404 over the mill foundations - one pile was eight feet in length. At this spot the excavators were handicapped by water to a great extent.

The conduit channel was covered over with a large plank about three inches thick, and fastened with pegs to the bottom part. This channel was cut out of a solid piece of oak about 18-ins wide, leaving the sides about 3-ins. in width for peg holes. When the top plank was removed the swift flowing water from the spring in the hill was revealed.

My readers may wonder what Mill this could be. My surmise is that it was a Mill belonging to St. Osburg's Nunnery, founded about the middle of the 9th century, and destroyed by Edric the Traitor in 1016. It is very probable this Mill would be used by the monks of the Benedictines, founded 27 years later, as Dugdale states they had three Mills, which I shall write about later. You may wonder in what condition the wood was found; the oak is nearly as sound to-day as it was a thousand years ago, and it can be seen on my premises. It is black with age. Scores of piles were found all down the course of the river, and in some cases large stones resting on them - showing that the City Wall, built in 1404, (and demolished at the request of Prior Deram in 1461, when he asked that St. Osburg's Pool should be included in the Wall), ran along this portion of the river course by the side of St. Osburg's Pool. I will write more about this next month.