Seven Wells (Dover Plains, NY)The Seven Wells are a series of expansive glacial potholes.

Manitou Well

On the eastern flank of West Mountain in Dover Plains lies a series of “wells” or cylindrical basins that are carved deep into the bedrock along a steep-sloped brook. The deepest among the lot of seven plunges approximately 60 feet into the earth and is about half as wide. Each well is separated from one another by long fissure-like flumes. In some instances, the brook is narrowed to no more than a few feet wide, yet, in at least one spot, extends 30 feet down. The entire brook has a strong serpentine course. Its walls, polished smooth and containing unique striations that flare out wherever the walls are strongly curved, imbues the watercourse with whimsy. Waterfalls add to the scene. At the head of several of the wells the stream plunges perpendicularly, creating picturesque cascades and cataracts that make Seven Wells Brook one of the most beautiful streams in the entire Hudson Valley.

The birth of the Seven Wells occurred around 15,000 years ago, at the wane of the last Ice Age. Its genesis is owed to the power of glacial action. As the mile thick Laurentide Ice Sheet began to recede north, it now, instead of bulldozing the landscape, began to alter it in other ways. The glacier melted especially unevenly against the sides of mountains and hills. At these uneven glacial fringes torrents of meltwater were channeled in certain areas. It’s important to note that the glacier, at this time, was in a pretty sad state, dirty and pitted. It was vaguely reminiscent of what’s seen in parking lots towards the start of spring, as once-massive piles of snow begin to reveal their hidden contents.

In its heyday the ice sheet bulldozed anything it encountered on its march south, and in doing so acquired a substantial amount of debris ranging from pebbles to car- and house-sized boulders, all of which became trapped within the enlarging glacier. When it finally began to melt, the debris was condensed, some of which eventually exited the shirking mass via the torrents of meltwater previously mentioned. This slurry of liquid sandpaper cut through solid rock like a knife though butter.

In the case of the Seven Wells Brook, the meltwater from a glacial stream followed a preexisting crack or joint in the bedrock, hence the narrow and deep course of the present brook. The crack was a point of weakness in the mountain and ensured the stream would cut more vertically than laterally. This is similar to how the nearby Stone Church was created.

The wells were formed by powerful eddies within the stream. Gyrating stones caught in vortices of water drilled into the stone, ultimately creating the seven “glacial potholes.” Potholes such as these are sometimes referred to as a giant’s kettle or cauldron. The Seven Wells are among the largest glacial potholes in the Northeast, if not the country. The only comparable formation in the region is located in New Hampshire along the Lost River.

Both the Seven Wells and the Stone Church (a spacious cavern in the mountainside a mile north) helped to usher in a plethora of tourists to the otherwise sleepy agricultural hamlet of Dover Plains. By the 1830’s enough visitors were arriving to imbibe in the area’s natural splendor that hotels began popping up to accommodate them. The Stone Church Hotel, perhaps the most popular, was situated only “about a hundred rods from the Church.”[i]

The scene at hand rarely disappointed. One visitor was so taken with the grandeur of the Seven Wells that he remarked that they “made up one of the most interestingly beautiful scenes that I have ever beheld.”[ii] Others were similarly smitten and prone to hyperbole. “Some are so deep,” one admirer wrote, “that one would fain be lowered into them to see the stars at noon.”[iii] Another person casually mentioned that some of the wells “are found to be several hundred feet deep.” This same individual in his description of the Wells and the Stone Church would later rapturously declare that “In viewing these objects of external nature, the mind rises above the material character of the structure to that Power who formed all things.”[iv]

Hemlock FallsPart of the Seven Wells. Adjacent the Dover Stone Churh Preserve in Dover Plains, NY.

Hemlock Falls

While some ventured to the wells on semi-religious pilgrimages, others came for entertainment. The deep wells with their cool, crystal water were perfect aquariums for native brook trout. “We were met by a gentleman with a fishing-rod,” a tourist recorded, “who informed us that in some of these he found very excellent sport.”[v]

Thomas Lossing, the son of Benson J. Lossing, the famous author and historian who lived in Dover up on Chestnut Ridge, regularly visited the Seven Wells. In Thomas’ memoir, My Heart Goes Home, he recounts a childhood visit in which he and a friend made a ladder of ropes and descended thirty feet into one of the wells to carve their names just above the waterline. The task took three hours. “The names could be seen ever afterward in the morning sunlight from the slope toward the well,” Thomas recalled.[vi]

At the conclusion of Thomas Lossing’s narrative he wonders what his mother would have thought had she known what he was up to that day. His family always made a point to warn him about the wells. They weren’t being overprotective. Philip Smith in his General History of Dutchess County notes that “One of two fatal accidents are mentioned as having occurred here.”[vii] In fact, a relative of the family had died by falling into one “and it required the services of a diver to recover his body.”[viii] Making a close approach is generally ill-advised due to the strongly sloping nature of the land near the edges of the wells. In addition, a thick layer of slippery needles from white pines and hemlocks coat the ground surrounding the potholes, further compounding the risk of inadvertently tumbling into one. A sage piece of advice offered up by a traveler was to “Conduct the examination of the Wells from the bottom upward, for we found that it is not near so dangerous to go up precipitous places as to descend.”[ix]

One source notes that “A young man named Germond, one of a picnic party, slipped from the bank and was drowned in one of the ‘Wells’ in 1844.”[x] This was likely Charles S. Germond. Records from the South Amenia Cemetery report the death of an 18-year-old by this name on October 2, 1844.

Reports of Strange Creatures

During the 19^th century several baffling encounters took place around the Wells. On rare occasions visitors reported seeing what can best be described as an incredibly large snake within or near the seemingly bottomless basins. The first documented appearance of the creature took place in 1831 and was seen by Isaac Thompson, an old hunter who frequently navigated the slopes of West Mountain in pursuit of deer and other prey. While passing the wells one day he looked down into one of the larger wells and spotted a snake of herculean proportions reposing on a flat rock within a rod or two of a raging cataract. Thompson said the reptile was as large as a man and possessed a scaly head that matched the size and likeness of a bear. Shortly after being spotted, it entered the water and disappeared. In all his years in the woods he had never seen anything like it.

In the 1850’s sightings dramatically increased and incensed locals began scratching their heads. One particularly chilling encounter took place in 1855. On a summer afternoon, a young man named George Lewis ventured to the Seven Wells with his younger sister to escape the stifling August heat. After following the brook up the mountain for about 1,000 feet the duo heard a strange noise, and upon turning their heads, saw the snake along the edge of the brook devouring some type of carcass that they said was similar in size to a dog. The creature had a thick red stripe running along its spine, Lewis reported, but otherwise boasted a dull coloration, blending in well with the surrounding leaf litter. Due to the sheer size of the creature, which they stated to be at least 10 or 12 feet in length and as thick as a pig, they quickly retreated back to town.

Following the string of sightings attempts to locate the creature were undertaken, but to no avail. Whatever the almost larger than life beast was it appears to have been known to local Native Americans. In 1842, an octogenarian recalled that Indians generally avoided the place, believing the Seven Wells to be inhabited by some type of monster or fearsome deity.

After the 1850’s reports began dwindling. It’s hard to say exactly what this mystery snake was. Rattlesnake dens are known in the area, but this species typically doesn’t venture near water and never attains a size as large as what was reported. Rattlesnakes rarely exceed 5 feet. The largest on record in New York State measured in at just under 75 inches (6.25 feet). Northern water snakes, while similar in length, are much thinner. It is difficult to believe that even the largest of either of these species could be mistaken for a beast on par with an anaconda. Might the witnesses, like some of those who reported the wells to be hundreds of feet deep, have exaggerated the size? It’s unlikely we’ll ever know for sure. All that we are certain of is that whatever lived along the margins of the Seven Wells Brook long ago plagued the town with a maelstrom of fear and anxiety that lived on long after the last sighting took place.

Rare and Unique Flora

Botanically speaking, the area surrounding the Seven Wells is of great interest. The shaded confines of the narrow valley caused by topography and the numerous evergreens that inhabit the area reduces the temperature enough to allow plants of more northern affinity to gain a foothold. In many ways the composition of flora here is reminiscent of the Catskills and Adirondacks. Plants typical of northern hardwood forests like mountain maple, red elderberry, and hobblebush thrive in this cool, moist oasis. Numerous spring wildflowers abound as well, ranging from the delightful purple fringed polygala to yellow trout lilies and pink lady slippers.

Manetta CascadeSeven Wells. Dover Plains, NY.

Manetta Cascade

The Harlem Valley, unlike most parts of the region, possesses limestone and other rocks that are imbued with high quantities of calcium. This creates soil that’s neutral to alkaline. Plants fond of these conditions are known as “calciphiles” and can often be found in abundance where their needs are met. Many of these are quite rare. While the acidic needles from the evergreens along the Wells Brook increases the pH to an extent that limits their presence in the immediate vicinity, less than a mile away a preserve harbors numerous threatened and endangered plants that rely on neutral soils for survival.

In early May of 1938, the Torrey Botanical Society embarked on a field trip to Seven Wells. Their most interesting find was a few specimens of eastern leatherwood, a rather uncommon shrub. They also intended to explore the environs of Stone Church that day, too. But as they followed the serpentine brook up the mountainside they discovered that the Seven Wells “proved more interesting than the short spectacular beauty of the Old Stone Church” and so they “left the latter spot out of the trip entirely.”[xi] While the Stone Church is generally credited as being the more scenic of the two spots many “think that the ‘Wells’ even surpass the ‘Church’ in interest.”[xii]

The water from Wells Brooks has a remarkable purity to it and at one time was used as Dover Plain’s water supply. In September 1900, a group of 50 men under the direction of the Dover Plains Water Company began digging a ditch for the laying of pipe from the lower well to town. A 6-inch diameter pipe was installed. It was a rather simple gravity-fed design: “This company simply drops a slot in the hole and nature does the rest.”[xiii] This system stayed in place until 1958 when the town began looking for alternative sources of water to meet the needs of a growing town. In times of drought it was necessary to ration water from the vast natural reservoirs. Moreover, the amount of water for fire protection measures was deemed to be inadequate. Today, Dover utilizes a system of artesian wells.

Sometime after 1917 the privately owned Seven Wells were closed to the general public. For over a hundred years the magnificent string of glacial potholes brooded in solitude, offering their grandeur only to the wild creatures of the forest and a few select individuals. In 2022, the Town of Dover, with funding from several environmental and land agencies, purchased the property the Wells sit on with the intention of making this historic landmark accessible to all. Now that both the Seven Wells and the Stone Church have finally been conserved, visitors venturing to the tranquil hamlet of Dover Plains can once again fully partake in a set of experiences first enjoyed more than two centuries ago. As an admirer penned in 1838, “If thou shouldst ever happen in Dutchess county, with a spare day, I would advise thee by all means to visit these two scenes.”[xiv]

Manitou WellSeven Wells. Dover Plains, NY.

Seven WellsSeven Wells (Dover Plains, NY)

This article is from my book, Hudson Valley History & Mystery, Volume 2.