When the Droitwich brine dried up sometime between 1247 and 1249 a call went out for some Divine intervention.

Droitwich-born Richard de Wyche, the Bishop of Chichester, returned to the place of his birth and blessed the springs. Miraculously, they start flowing again.

Richard died in 1252 and was canonised in 1262.

There’s a statue of him in Vines Park, close to where the old wells were, and the blessing is re-enacted every year during the town’s St Richard’s Canal Festival.