Ahead of you is a rough sandstone tower with a round lower drum, a squarer upper turret, and a crenellated spur wall marching back to the city walls.
This started life as the New Tower, though by the seventeenth century everyone sensibly called it the Water Tower, and the City Assembly rather hopelessly tried to correct them. John de Helpston designed it between thirteen twenty-two and thirteen twenty-five, when this spot stood in the River Dee itself. From here, guards watched shipping, defended Chester's port, and made sure merchants paid their customs dues... medieval tax enforcement with a good view.
Its shape is satisfyingly odd: a circular base, then a square turret above, with two octagonal chambers stacked inside, and even a tiny latrine tucked into the angle by the wall. That spur wall links the tower to Bonewaldesthorne's Tower, and the battlements - the tooth-like gaps along the top, called crenellations - may be the only surviving medieval example on Chester's walls. The app has a photo of the medieval toilet if you want proof that military architecture still had to solve ordinary human logistics.
By the end of the sixteenth century, the Dee had silted up, leaving the tower stranded about two hundred yards inland. If you like, check the comparison in the app; it shows how this former river outwork became part of a much more managed city setting.
In sixteen thirty-nine, the city renovated it, then turned parts of the wall into gun ports, and Civil War fighting damaged it. After that, it slipped into life as a storehouse, and by seventeen twenty-eight someone dismissed it as "useless and neglected"... a bit harsh, honestly. In eighteen thirty-eight, the Chester Mechanics' Institution opened a museum here; Grosvenor Museum later took over and reopened it to the public in nineteen sixty-two. Since two thousand and sixteen, it has housed the history-of-medicine museum, Sick to Death.
If you want to go in, it is usually closed on Monday, open Tuesday and Wednesday from ten to three, and Thursday to Sunday from ten to four.
This tower is Chester's old river sentry, stranded on land but still stubbornly impressive.
When you're ready, we can head on to Watergate.
