Overview
People come to St John’s Well to be rid of warts. The spring sits on the north-facing slopes of Mushera, above the Millstreet valley in north Cork, and its Irish name says what it is known for: Tobar na bhFaithní, the Well of the Warts. Pilgrims dip their hands in the water – there is a smaller side basin kept for the cure so the main spring stays clean – or take a bottle home, and by long tradition the warts and facial lumps fade. Believe that or not, this is the most accessible of three wells dedicated to St John of Mushera, and the only one you can reach without a hard hill climb.
History and development
The devotion moved downhill. The principal well originally sat at the top of Mushera Mór, and pilgrims faced a gruelling clamber to reach it. In the late 1940s, Robert Kelleher of Ballinagree built a timber platform lower on the slope so more people could attend the pattern; the wood eventually rotted and was replaced in concrete.
The site took its modern shape from 1954, when Michael Buckley of Aubane carried a picture of St John up to the hillside spring. By 1958 a committee of local people had built the permanent central shrine by voluntary labour, with a statue of St John in red robes blessed that year by Canon Costello of Millstreet. Two smaller grottos flank it, one holding the original picture, the other a headless Infant of Prague beside a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Stations of the Cross came much later. They were funded by a bequest from Sonny Buckley, who died in 1979, and erected through the 1980s – designed by the Cork sculptor Liam Cosgrave of Cosgrave & Sons and built by volunteers John and Brendan Kelleher, using limestone from Ballygiblin.
The rounds and the cure
The pilgrim ‘rounds’ here are plain enough: dip your hands in the water, circle the well three times, and say the prayers as you go. Small flat stones scored with crosses are left along the path as markers, and a petition box by the statue takes written prayers.
The well’s reputation rests on that wart cure. People dip their hands or fill a bottle to take home, and the smaller secondary basin is set aside for the purpose. Local folklore collections record the tradition, and the odd story of a wart gone overnight after rounds paid on St John’s Day.
St John’s Day
If you come only once, come on 24 June, St John’s Day, near midsummer. The grotto Mass has been said here every year since 1974. Within living memory the day was a fair as much as a devotion: stalls went up in the townland of Moulnahourna selling sweets, porter and lemonade, there were games of three-card-trick, the singer Bill O’Dea and the white-bearded ‘St Joseph’ Lucey worked the crowd, and the sisters Han and Judy Murphy sold well water from a saucepan. The stalls are gone. The Mass, the rounds and the crowd are not, with priests from Millstreet parish usually presiding.
Folklore and older roots
Like many Irish holy wells, this one probably began as a pagan spring later taken over and blessed by the church. Local legend ties St John of Mushera to three sisters – Lasair, Ingean Bhuide and Latiaran – whose feast days fall on old Celtic seasonal festivals, and the 24 June date sits on the old midsummer, when bonfires were lit across Ireland on St John’s Eve. What you get on the ground is three layers at once: older ritual, an early Christian dedication, and a shrine built by a 1950s parish committee.
Visiting and practical information
- Entry: Free, open all year, with no set hours.
- Getting there and parking: A small gravel lay-by and car park sit at the base of the shrine. From there an unpaved path of about five minutes, with steps and uneven ground, climbs to the well – not suitable for wheelchairs or pushchairs.
- Facilities: Benches donated by local families, and little else. There are no toilets and no drinking water on site.
- What to bring: Sturdy shoes, and a reusable bottle if you want to collect water.
- Etiquette: A volunteer committee keeps the site. Stay on the marked paths and leave the votive stones where they lie.
Nearby
This is the easiest of the three Mushera wells to reach. The original summit well on Mushera Mór is a hillwalk in its own right, and there is a third on the Kilcorney side of the mountain. The surrounding Boggeragh Mountains carry marked trails past wedge-tombs and standing stones, and Millstreet, a few miles off, has the nearest shops and refreshments.
If you are timing a visit for 24 June, get there early, as the car park is small, and leave time for the rounds before Mass.