Enfield Wash was where Elizabeth Canning (later married name Treat; 17 September 1734 – June 1773), an English maidservant claimed to have been kidnapped, held in a hayloft for almost a month and threatened with prostitution. These events became one of the most celebrated English criminal mysteries of the 18th century, and a cause célèbre at the time. Magistrate and author Henry Fielding was consulted on the matter. Mother Well's house was opposite the Sun and Woolpack public house, formerly the Sun and Punchbowl. The United society, the first friendly society, began to meet in the Sun and Woolpack inn, Enfield Wash, in 1794.