Hanbury fountain

The Hanbury Fountain was originally erected in 1860 in the Strand, near the church of St Mary-le-Strand. It commemorates Robert Hanbury MP (1845-1903), MP for Tamworth and later for Preston, who served as President of the Board of Agriculture from 1900 to 1903. In the 1890s, Robert Hanbury lived in Wimbledon, and the fountain was moved to the south-east corner of Wimbledon Common in 1904 when the Strand was redeveloped to create Aldwych. Its inscriptions across four sides read: ‘The Gift of Robt Hanbury Esq MP, The Fear of the Lord is a Fountain of Life; ‘With thee is the fountain of life. In thy light shall we see light.’; ‘I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely’; ‘Jesus said whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst.’ There is a horse trough alongside, erected by the Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association.

The fountain is based on the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates near the Acropolis of Athens, which dates to 335/334 BC. Lysicrates was a wealthy patron of musical performances in the Theatre of Dionysus, and erected the monument as a commemoration of his winning performance.

The fountain base will be cleaned and restored and new water connection and plumbing will be installed to bring it back to working order. The metalwork will be restored by a specialist metalwork conservator and reinstalled on the base. The fountain will be relocated in its new prominent position in Wimbledon Village.