George Fox’s vision and well, Pendle Hill

The footsteps of the great traveling preacher George Fox guide pilgrims

‍Highlights

• ‍‍Well used by George Fox
• Inspirational vision of Quaker church

It is easy to get carried away by the view from the top of Pendle Hill. George Fox walked up here in 1652 and decided to develop his new movement, the Quakers. He climbed the hill one afternoon in early summer, as he later recounted in his autobiography. On the way down, he stopped to drink from a little spring he encountered. The well has since been identified on the northern slope of Pendle Hill, hidden away at the end of a little-used footpath.

Most walkers head straight for the summit, missing Fox’s unassuming little spring. It is unmarked on the OS map, and some books refer to it as Robin Hood’s Well. The hill is visited by the Friends Way 1 pilgrimage, and the well is a short detour from the route.

Though Quakers are fairly unlikely to celebrate a holy well, George Fox clearly remembered his encounter with the spring during his momentous walk on this hillside. “As I went down, I found a spring of water in the hill with which I refreshed myself, having had very little to eat or drink over the last several days. At night, we came to an inn and declared the truth to the man of the house.”

I visited the well early on a bright Sunday morning. As I climbed higher, the patchwork of green fields below became muted by a light mist, fading to white at the horizon.

George Fox unsurprisingly enjoyed a clearer view than me: “As we traveled, we came near a very great hill, called Pendle Hill, and I was moved of the Lord to go up to the top of it; which I did with difficulty, it was so very steep and high. When I was come to the top, I saw the sea bordering upon Lancashire. From the top of this hill, the Lord let me see in what places he had a great people to be gathered.” He saw the fields as representing a glorious harvest, waiting to be called in, and decided the time was right to launch a new denomination.

My first thought, looking at the hedges and boundaries of the many fields, was that Britain has quite a lot of divisions already. But George Fox was a visionary. Some people relate that he met God during his ascent of Pendle Hill, but he only describes seeing human souls.

Directions‍

Footpath starts at:‍

Pendle House Farm, Barley Lane, Barley, Nelson BB9 6LG

W3W: mend.trackers.puns

GPS: 53.8739N 2.2982W (well)

W3W: grit.vies.debt

GPS: 53.8704N 2.2836W (path start)‍

The footpath starts along the drive to Pendle House and Pendleside Farm, half a mile north of Barley village, signposted on the left. The postcode might not take you all the way as there are other turnings along here. You need to park on the main road, because the drive is private.

You can clearly see the route of the footpath from here, cutting diagonally up the slope towards the right-hand end of this massive hill. Walk down the farm drive and follow the signed footpath uphill. Near the summit, the path turns left in front of a drystone wall. Directly ahead is a stone stile, in a short section of wall set with mortar. Cross the stile and follow the path for 200m along the side of the hill. After a minute or two, it starts to slope down, then becomes quite steep, at which point you can hear the trickle of water from the well ahead of you. The walk from the road is 1.5km, but will take 30 minutes up the very steep slope.