Houghton-le-Spring, holy well

Nothing is known about how or when the name 'holy well' came to be attached to the well in Newbottle Lane appearing under that name on the first edition Ordnance Survey plan (c. 1860).The name is said to have been imposed upon it in the year 700, when the Venerable Bede and his attendants passed through Houghton and drank rom the well (other sources refer to it as 'Bede's Well'). By 1958 it had disappeared, presumably filed-in or covered over.