Oxford Inscriptions: Drinking fountain, Walton Well Road
This plaque is on the back wall of the drinking fountain on the site of the former Walton Well at the junction of Walton Well Road and Southmoor Road. The text reads as follows:
1885
[Up left side]: DRINK AND [along the top] THINK OF HIM
WHO IS THE FOUNTAIN OF [down right side] LIFE
WITH THE CONSENT OF THE LORDS OF THE MANOR [St John's College]
THIS DRINKING FOUNTAIN IS ERECTED BY
MR. WILLIAM WARD
TO MARK THE SITE OF A CELEBRATED SPRING
KNOWN AS WALTON WELL
ADJACENT TO THE ANCIENT FORDWAY INTO
PORT MEADOW CALLED WALTON FORD
The drinking fountain was designed in the Graeco-Renaissance style by Harry Wilkinson Moore and given to the City of Oxford in 1885 by William Ward, a prosperous coal merchant who lived at 41 St Giles' and had served as Mayor of Oxford in 1851/2 and again in 1861/2. It was built by James Clifford, a stonemason who in 1881 lived at 5 Rose Place in St Aldate's parish but by 1891 had moved to North Hinksey House (also known as Caudwell's Castle) at Folly Bridge.
The fountain is a Grade II listed structure (list entry 1047105).
This photograph and the one of the inscription above were taken on 5 March 2025 before restoration
There is a full description of the opening ceremony for this fountain, which took place in terrible weather on 3 September 1885, in Jackson's Oxford Journal on 5 September 1885. Those present included William Ward (the donor); the Provost of Queen's John Richard Magrath (who was currently Chairman of the Oxford Local Board); Walter Gray (Sheriff of Oxford); Harry Wilkinson Moore (the architect); and W. H. White (the Local Board Engineer). Ward, who was now blind, was unable to see his fountain, but was told it was “well worth looking at”, and said that the Water Works had promised to supply it with “good and wholesome water”.
This description of the fountain itself was published in Jackson's Oxford Journal on 17 October 1885:
A new drinking fountain has lately been erected at the sole cost of Mr. William Ward, at the angle of Walton Well Road and Southmoor Road, and handed over to the Local Board, as announced in these columns a few weeks ago. The fountain is designed in the classic Rennaissance [sic] style, with a circular outline, the top being finished in the form of a dome, and capped with an ornamental vase. At the sides small flanking pilasters are placed, partly fluted and decorated with a quasi-Ionic capital, and tetminated [sic] with a ball ornament. The projecting portion of the basin, which follows an octagonal outline, springs from a well-shaped console, and is enriched with a band of carved ornament. The water is delivered through a grotesque head cast in bronze, which is fixed in connection with an inscription plate, formed of hard hammered copper, with raised lettering and ornamental scrolls. The stone used is Portland, Mr. Clifford, of St. Aldate's, who carried out the work, being most careful in the selection of the blocks, the top, the body, and the basin being each formed out of a single stone. Messrs H. Wilkinson and Moore, of Beaumont-street, are the architects, and the elegant design has been the subject of many encomiums.
In September 2026 the Oxford Preservation Trust submitted a planning application to restore this fountain and to reconnect it to the water supply:
- Current planning application 26/02154/LBC:
“Repair works including metalwork and masonry to the drinking fountain” - BBC Oxfordshire: “Victorian drinking fountain to be fully restored”
See also John Sutton, Walton Well: the Ford, the Fountain, the Foundry and the prophet Elijah (Robert Boyd Publications, 2018)
The original Walton Well
The photograph below (Historic England HT11453) shows the simple stone trough that surrounded the water of Walton Well prior to 1885: