The Vernons lived at Haddon Hall from 1195 to 1567, and, among the many beautiful women of their line, the most beautiful is said to have been the self-willed Dorothy. Her youthful love-dream was thwarted by her equally obstinate father, some say because of family feuds, others say on account of difference in religion.
Whatever the cause, parental opposition was so strong that one night, when a grand ball was in progress in the famous ball-room of Haddon Hall, the heiress stole away through the door of the anteroom and fled, in all her festive array, along "Dorothy's Walk" (a long terrace lined with stately yews), down the long flight of steps to the lower terrace, and over the little bridge to her waiting lover. He carried her away on his fleet steed to a hasty morning wedding, carefully placing many miles between the irate father and the lovely bride.
Dorothy's father, Sir George Vernon, "The King of the Peak," allowed his wrath to cool in time, and the happy couple returned and made their home at the Hall.
John Manners was a younger son of the Earl of Rutland, and father of the first Duke of Rutland, whose cradle is now exhibited in the state bedroom of Haddon Hall.
The great ball-room from which Miss Dorothy fled is over one hundred feet long, eighteen feet wide, and fifteen feet high. On the south side, toward the garden, are three very large, recessed windows, and on the north side is a huge fireplace with ancient fire-dogs. At the east end of the room is a glass case containing a bust of Grace, Lady Manners, wife of Sir George Manners. This is said to have been made from a cast taken after death. Certainly the lady was far from beautiful if one judges from this representation of her charms!
The interior of the family chapel is in a semi-ruined state. On the right there is a stoup for holy water, about four hundred years old, and just beyond it are the servants' seats. In the chancel are two large, high, family pews, one on either side, the master and his sons occupying one, and the lady and her daughters the other.
The stained-glass window in the chapel was of great beauty, but, early in the nineteenth century, the greater part of it was mysteriously stolen in the night, and its place has been filled with fragments of colored glass taken from other windows.
In the kitchen may still be seen the immense fireplace, the large, hollowed-out block, evidently used for a chopping-tray, a salting-trough, and a few other pieces of culinary apparatus.
In the banqueting-hall is the minstrels' gallery, the front of which is carved and paneled, and decorated with stags' antlers, and there is also a gallery along one side, probably of later construction. The lord and his guests sat at one end of the hall on a raised platform, while the retainers sat at tables in the body of the hall. The high table is a remarkable specimen of its kind, and one of the most interesting relics of feudal times.
At the north end of the hall, just inside the entrance, is a kind of handcuff, fastened to the wall and so arranged as to hold a man's wrist up at arm's-length while liquor was poured down his sleeve—the punishment meted out to every guest who did not drink all that the laws of hospitality forced upon him!