Minster Pool

The pool has a capacity of 28,000m³ (6.5 million gallons) and a surface area of 8,700m² (2.1 acres) with an average depth of 3.2 m (10 ft).

[4] At this time Langton paved the streets and improved the fortifications to the Close with high stone walls and towers built on the north bank of the pool.

Langton is thought to have improved and enlarged the dam at the east end of the pool at this time.

The south entrance to the Close was located at the east end of Minster Pool on Dam Street and consisted of a portcullis and drawbridge.

[4] By 1731 it was a wheat, rye and malt mill and remained in use as corn mill until 1856 when it was demolished by South Staffordshire Waterworks Co.[3] The slow flowing nature of the streams caused a lot of siltation in the pool, this combined with it being used as a sewer for the Close caused it to become dirty.

Poet Anna Seward was instrumental in landscaping the pool into a serpentine shape and developing a 'New Walk' along its southern bank.

The 14th-century bridge was very narrow and could not take coaches across it, causing them to be diverted around Stowe Pool and back onto Beacon Street.

[7] In 1857 the South Staffordshire Waterworks Co. proposed to fill in the pool and replace it with a public gardens.

The Garden of Remembrance was laid out on the north bank in 1920 to commemorate World War I and the small memorial gardens that lie alongside Minster Walk were opened in 1955 in memory of Lichfield citizens that lost their lives in World War II.

Minster Pool c.1890
View from Dam Street