Named after a man called John Lester who once leased the
neighbouring land, Lester’s dam provided Belfast’s first piped
water. Nearly 200 hundred years ago, the dam was built to hold
back a reservoir of one acre capable of holding 1,000,000
gallons. Nearby there was a small pump house with a modest set
of engines. The brick ruins of this building, and the remains of
the dam, are visible today, and the spring still flows. The
water was conveyed to Belfast by gravity in an open aqueduct,
which followed the line of the river until it reached two small
holding ponds at Mount Pleasant and then it was piped down to
Cromac and Fountain Lane. In 1840 the newly formed Belfast Water
Commissioners took over responsibility of Lester`s Dam, and the
water scheme from the Charitable Society, who had helped
establish it. Now, two centries later, the spring is again being
tapped, by the Water Service, to supplement Belfast`s water
supply. In 1177 John de Courcy led an army of Anglo- Norman
knights and soldiers from Dublin. Af