Running out from the cellars of this four hundred-year old manorial hall house are elaborate escape routes and two tunnels, one connected with the church, each nearly a mile in length. The Emmotts who once lived here, owning most of the property in the vicinity, were recusants who kept up the old faith in the church and protected priest and people from persecution during penal times. In other times of religious persecution there was an escape route for meetings of nonconformists in this house.
In 1816 Dr Whittaker, Vicar of Whalley, writes 'Haworth is to Bradford as Heptonstall is to Halifax – almost at the extremity of population, high bleak, dirty and difficult of access.' As though that and the conditions provided by the present owners are not atmosphere enough, Emmott Old Hall, as it is known locally, has a far older history.
This fine specimen of an old hall house – a communal dwelling house, court house and resting place for the inhabitants of the area, the manorial lord and his court. – stands at the bottom of the Church Gate, no doubt on the site of the original manor house. In the reign of the first Queen Elizabeth, the present house was erected as rooms off the entrance hall, which itself was a most magnificent room with polished oak rafters.
By the 1870's the Old Hall, though still regarded as a capital specimen, was divided into two cottages. Tenants came and went, certain additions were made to the house early in the twentieth and in recent times it has been reconverted into one residence, the ancient hall becoming the dining area, revealing the two magnificent stone fire places which are the principal features of it. The last of the Emmott line to remain at the hall was General Emmott Rawdon, but the association of the family with it continues among the characters described by the Bronte sisters in their novels. Reading from these, perhaps one can add a little to the atmosphere of this house on the wuthering heights.
