Dr John Arthur Goodchild

He qualified as a medical doctor and in 1873 set up a private medical practice in Bordighera Italy. He stayed there during the summer months and returned to the UK in the winters. The start of his link with Glastonbury was in 1880, when he came across an unusual glass bowl in a shop in Bordighera. He felt that the bowl had special qualities and purchased it.

In 1900, he returned to the UK for good. He was a psychic and much caught up with the Celtic revival. In 1898, he wrote his book ‘The Light of the West’ in which he contends that the Irish, long ago, worshipped the female aspect of the deity, who was eventually Christianized as St Bride. He also suggests that the legends of Glastonbury and Ireland were somehow linked. On sending the book off to his publishers, he had a waking dream in which a voice told him that his blue bowl had once been carried by Jesus, that it had a powerful influence to play and that he should take it to Glastonbury and ‘place it in the Women’s Quarter’ there. He decided that the Women’s Quarter was Bride’s Hill, in Glastonbury and in due course hid it in a well, pending the arrival, as he was told, of a maiden who would come and retrieve it.

Sometime later he felt inspired to send a drawing of the bowl to his friend, Tudor Pole, who lived in Bristol. Pole showed the drawing to two young sisters who were friends of his, Janet and Christine Allen. These ‘maidens’ felt called to endeavour to find this bowl, and, through various intuitive promptings, they finally found themselves in Glastonbury, and the well, and found the bowl. On their return to Bristol, they reported to Pole who became intrigued by the whole thing. This is the start of the involvement of the Blue Bowl with Tudor Pole and Chalice Well.

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