38 Marple Hall. 



considerable breadth and volume, and ascending among 

 the trees upon the left, we presently reach the very 

 interesting and celebrated Elizabethan mansion called 

 MARPLE HALL, a peep of which was obtained from the 

 hill by Marple Aqueduct It was built either at the end 

 of the reign of Queen Mary or at the beginning of that 

 of Elizabeth, and underwent alterations in 1659. The 

 outer walls have never been altered, and the front being 

 now enriched over a large portion of the surface by a 

 luxuriant tapestry of ivy, the aspect of the place is one 

 of the most picturesque to be found near Manchester. 

 For many generations Marple was a seat of the Vernons 

 of Haddon Hall, Derbyshire. When the estates of the 

 Vernon family were divided between two co-heiresses, 

 one of whom married into the Manners family, and the 

 other into that of the Stanleys, Marple fell to the share 

 of the latter. By an original deed, retained among the 

 archives, and dated June 4, 1606, it appears that Sir 

 Edward Stanley conveyed the Hall and adjoining estates 

 to Henry Bradshaw, Esq., who occupied it as tenant, as 

 his father had done before him. From that time to the 

 present it has remained in the Bradshaw family, Mary 

 Bradshaw, surviving daughter and heiress, becoming 

 the wife, about one hundred and twenty years ago, of 

 Nathanael Isherwood, from whom are descended the 

 present proprietors. 



Special interest attaches to Marple Hall from the cir- 

 cumstances connected with the history of the Bradshaw 



