No surface feature marks where it sits, no trickle of water gives it away, and a visitor walking across the field above it would have no idea anything was there. Holy wells are among the most enduring features of the Irish rural landscape, typically small springs or pools associated with a saint and visited for purposes of prayer or cure, but this one has been blocked up entirely, its existence now a matter of local memory rather than observable fact.

The well sits within a cluster of older features that suggests this corner of Tipperary has been continuously significant for a very long time. About 200 metres to the south lie the remains of Saint James's Church and its associated graveyard, which share the well's dedication and presumably once formed part of the same devotional geography. Two ringforts, the circular earthwork enclosures characteristic of early medieval Irish farming settlements, stand roughly 120 metres to the north-east and 220 metres to the south. The well itself was stone-lined, which points to deliberate construction rather than a simple natural spring, and at some point it was adapted for a more domestic purpose: according to local information, it was used to pipe water to Peppardstown House, located about 80 metres to the south-west. That practical reuse may have been what eventually sealed its fate, the infrastructure quietly blocking the well off from both the land above and the tradition it once held.