Fountain Horse Trough To North Of White Hart Inn

The Fountain Horse Trough, located to the north of the White Hart Inn on Heywood Old Road, is a drinking fountain and horse and dog drinking trough built in 1888. It was designed by architect Edgar Wood for Messrs W.C. Wood and Bros, textile manufacturers. The structure is made of ashlar gritstone and red brick, featuring a depressed semi-circular arch that rises from shallow gabled buttresses. The arch is supported by a square pier, which extends through the center of the arch and has a red brick base. The arch head is adorned with gablets on either side of the pier, and the pier itself has a moulded flat cap with small dome finials at the corners. Between the central pier and the outer buttresses, there are two stone troughs. This trough was created to commemorate the completion of a new weaving shed at the textile factory and was donated to the people of Birch. It was relocated and repaired near its original site following a road widening scheme.