MALVERN is known across the world for its pure spring water, but it was the town's supply of domestic water that was making headlines 100 years ago.

It seems that the water supply was less than reliable, as a report of a meeting held in the town shows.

The meeting was held at the Imperial Hotel (now Malvern Girls' College), whose proprietor, F A Moerschell, was also a member of the district council.

It was chaired by the Vicar of Christ Church, who said it was imperative that Malvern "should have water, plenty of it, and of the best quality; but at the same time he hoped it would be procured at a moderate cost".

The paper noted: "With regard to the latter point, the council are taking what is looked upon as the best and most economical step, and the outlay of £17,000 on the Bromsberrow scheme will be money well spent if they attain the object they have in view, and which they have reason to believe will be secured, as there is a large water-bearing strata in that particular district."

Mr Moerschell said that Malvern relied on its "natural beauties, its pure water, invigorating air and health-giving properties" to attract visitors.

"But the water supply must not only be plentiful, but, as Mr Moerschell added, of the very best quality. River water from the Severn won't do. However well filtered it might be there would always be the suspicion that it was contaminated by Worcester sewage, and Malvern's reputation for pure aqua would speedily disappear.

"How inadequate the present supply is to meet the needs of the district can be gathered from the figures supplied by Mr Moerschell. At the present moment, the Link borehole yields 130,000 gallons per day - about half the quantity originally expected - and auxiliary sources give an additional 50,000.

"This is quite insufficient even at the present time when there are hardly any visitors in the town."

The meeting ended with expressions of support for a Water Bill the district council was putting before Parliament, to enable it to finance the Bromsberrow boreholes."