Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Well in a wetland - Concord

There is a water break-out zone to the left of Sudbury Rd on the far side of the river as you head south and start to go uphill. I went in there to have a look and found a well that was actively emptying from recent rain. The structure was a rectangle of dry stone without mortar several feet above ground level.
Let's get a bit of color into the photo [click it to enlarge]:I read somewhere in an Ernest Seton Thompson book about "Indian wells" where Indians would get water at the edge of a swamp by digging a hole into the moist soil. The hole would rapidly fill in with sludge which would get emptied out. It would again fill with sludge and again get emptied. Each time the sludge would come in a little clearer until it was clear drinkable water. When we were kids we found a rectangular stone lined hole in a swamp next to Rt 2 in Lexington (now the first office building east of the 128 exit North) and later I wondered if that was an Indian well. So now I wonder about this structure from Concord. It would be nice to know something about it.

2 comments :

DaveB said...

Hi, I found this site throught the boudilian site...anyway, I found a small (about a foot-and-a-half) diamter stone lined well in the woods behind my neighbor's house in Templeton when I was a kid. That one was circular, but, my nieghbor and I dug out all of the leaves a dirt for between two and three feet down and it remaind lines with stones the whole time. It also filled right up wth water in about ten minutes. I always thought that it was an old farmers well. There was no mortar or anything like that it as well. Any thoughts?

pwax said...

I guess my only thought is that if it was built at the edge of a wetland, that would suggest a native american usage.