Sir George Vernon, the ‘King of the Peak’ with one of his two wives
Last year we visited Haddon Hall in Derbyshire as part of our research, both for the upcoming workshop and the continuing trail of clues we follow as we look back through history. We learned a lot about the Manners and Vernon families who lived there and who were so important to the area. Following that visit, we went back to the church in Bakewell to visit their family monuments.
Monument to Sir George Manners (1573 – 1623), his wife, Grace Pierrepoint and their nine children.
We had already seen many faces at Haddon Hall, and learned the stories of some of the inhabitants, but in a side-chapel at Bakewell were the magnificent monument of the George Manners, his wives and descendents.
The Vernon chapel is part of the Newark, the chapel whose history had so intrigued us. The tombs are located behind a fourteenth century oak screen and the chapel, sadly, seems to have become a storage ground for spare chairs and church equipment. I always find this disturbing…. it is a matter of respect. While I do not believe that the dead care one iota about how their monuments are cared for, I am very sure that the living family will care…and I happen to know at least one living descendant of the Vernon family.
Not only that, though, it is a lack of respect for the history that remains to us. I do not personally care for these grandiose monuments that seem designed to reinforce the power and presence of the families for whom they were built. I do care, however, that they give a very detailed glimpse into the lives of those families and the era in which their occupants lived.
No two dimensional painting can give a true idea of how clothes were worn… how their volume and drapery actually looked on a figure. Details of the fold of a veil or the set of a piece of armour are very easy to see and understand on these sculpted tombs. And there are other insights…
Most are carved with an epitaph and often with exhortations to the reader. They offer a glimpse into the spiritual mindset of the age, as well as shedding light on the social perspectives of the day. While some of the effigies on these monuments are stylised, others offer portraits sculpted in life.I have also always been struck by the fact that the very many babies who died in infancy are also remembered with as much care as the adults.
There are other monuments in the side chapel, including an alabaster effigy of a knight, Sir Thomas Wendesley who was killed at the Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403.
Sir Thomas Wendesley
Sir George Vernon (1510-1567) lies in state between his two wives, Margaret Tayleboys and Maud Longford. His father was Richard Vernon, and his mother Margaret Dymoke. The Manners and Vernon families had been linked for a long time and his daughter would continue that tradition in a most romantic fashion.
Dorothy Vernon (1545-1584), daughter of George Vernon, the ‘King of the Peak’, fell in love with John Manners (1534–1611) , against her father’s wishes. The lovers eloped and lived happily ever after…according to all the stories. Their family monument occupies the outer wall of the chapel and shows effigies of two of their four children… the other two were sadly stolen. There is something about learning their tales that changes the nature of these over-elaborate tombs… though the change is in the viewer, not the stone. For all I do not care for such monuments to wealth and power, learning the stories behind them made me care about the people, and so, on this visit, I saw beyond the cold stone to their lives.
Brass commemorating Sir Vernon and Lady Vernon, 1467
Instead of ostentation, I saw a couple grieving over the death of their infant son, their first-born child. I saw an angry father forgive star-crossed lovers. I saw couples growing old and welcoming grandchildren into the world… then husbands burying wives and wives grieving for husbands. History is neither faceless nor without emotion. Nor is it cold. We still live and share the same stories, fashions may change, but the human heart still beats and dances as it always has.
If you missed my earlier posts, you can read about Haddon Hall, the Manners and Vernon families and some of the rather odd things we discovered, by clicking the links below:
A visit to Haddon Hall, All in the Details, The Face of History, Woodsmoke and Oranges,
A Garden Ever Green, The Chapel at Haddon Hall, Riddles in the Churchyard
Sue Vincent's Daily Echo 
I love hearing about how you observe history—as an exciting viable piece of who each of us is.
And I wonder what we’re leaving to history, and if we’ll be lucky enough to get a Sue Vincent to appreciate it someday!
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I worries me how little hard evidence we are leaving in this digital age… and what wll survive of it from a throwaway society.
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Pingback: Cold stone and warm hearts – The Militant Negro™
Thanks fr sharing.
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Reblogged this on Die Erste Eslarner Zeitung – Aus und über Eslarn, sowie die bayerisch-tschechische Region!.
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Thanks for sharing, Michael 🙂
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Reblogged this on Viv Drewa – The Owl Lady.
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Thanks, Viv xxx
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Thank you for making history come alive. Fabulous post, Sue. The part that surprised me was the two children who were stolen. Stolen seems worse than death. Excellent photos.
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It does seem very strange, doesn’t it?
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Indeed!
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🙂
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You mean the effigies of the children were stolen rather than the children being stolen?
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I do… or at least, I hope I do!
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What a great post, full of information and wonderfully thought-provoking observations. Thoroughly enjoyed this 🙂
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Thanks, Peter 🙂
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A beautiful place with so many stories. It’s easy to be drawn into the real lives of those who once lived, worshipped, and are remembered there. Thanks for all the images, Sue.
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After exploring parts of their stories and visiting their home, there is a strange sense of kinship with these people.
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I imagine that the more you learn, the easier it is to connect with the human story that threads through all our lives. 🙂
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I think so… those stories are what make us human. We recognise each other and ourselves in them.
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Your writing is so beautiful and meaningful about the lives of these people who lived so far in the past. I think about how much people meant in the lives of one another then as written in the stone in a way that would carry through to the present day. I think of the contrast today, where homeless people are the invisible people at least in my world of the USA and when the pass on, they are cremated in a heap of . I think of a cemetery here where a woman volunteered to provide funerals of meaning for all the nameless newborn babes who were cast still alive in many cases into trashcans, suitcases to be thrown out along the freeway, and so many other unbelievable ways of disposing of human lives. I think of how many people in this world never even marry each other, but sleep together until the woman becomes pregnant, and then she is either disposed of, left to find a way to take care of the unwanted child, or in some cases, the child is the one who is tossed out with no more thought than disposing of a Kleenex one has used to wipe one’s nose.
There is huge hope looking at the past. Yes, people still killed people in those distant times and places, and if I remember correctly from my own readings, even newborn babes were sometimes not spared. But there were still the words, inscribed in stone as it were, of a sense of value over time in that place. What a beautiful memory of how a world could have been, likely would have been. I wonder in this universe that seems to be cyclical in nature, if it will return in this or a future lifetime.
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Past, present or future, the human heart and mind do not change…there is always both the dark and the light side of human nature.
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Wow Sue, it’s like walking into a storybook! 🙂 ❤
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There are so many of these old tombs and monuments in our churches…even the tiny village churches can have magnificent tombs. x
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Fascinating! 🙂 xx
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Sue, is that an elephant at the foot of Lady Veron in the brass? xxx
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It does look rather like it, doesn’t it? xxx
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What a mystery. xxx
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Rather … I may have to dig a bit xx
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Oh good, I was hoping you might try and find out. xxx
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No luck so far…but I haven/t given up 🙂 xxx
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