Drinking Fountain

This drinking fountain, built in 1880, is located in South End Green and was designed by JH Evins. It was commissioned by Miss Crump of Hereford House, Hampstead, in memory of William Warburton Pearce and her uncle JB Chamberlain. The fountain was constructed by J Holland from Northwich, Cheshire, using grey Cornish and Rubislaw granite, pink Peterhead granite, and Mansfield sandstone.

It is designed in the Early English Gothic Revival style and resembles a baptismal font. The structure features a stepped octagonal base leading to an octagonal plinth, with each side alternating between a block step and a round-arched niche for animal drinking bowls. Above these niches are round-arched openings with lion masks and foliate spouts, from which bowls project in a V-shape onto the plinth.

Columns with enriched capitals rise from the arches, supporting a gabled arcading that is decorated with crockets and finials, along with date and religious inscriptions that form a canopy over the fountain. The fountain itself has a cast-iron mask and a bowl with a foliar pattern. At the center of the canopy, there is an octagonal drum with battered sides and a small gabled canopy, supported by columns and topped with a patterned wrought-iron finial. The facets and gables of the drum are adorned with roundels containing quatrefoils.