The defeated Parliamentarian Sir Thomas Fairfax, retreated by Warren's Lane, which runs past Oakwell Hall, on his way to the safety of Halifax, whilst his father, Lord Ferdinando returned with their defeated forces to Bradford. The Royalists entered the Hall searching for their fleeing enemy to the great terror of Mrs Batt, who was ill. Henry Batt, the builder of Oakwell Hall, was an eccentric character. By an inquisition taken in Elland in 1601, he was found to have appropriated for his own use money which had been left by the Vicar of Birstall for building a new school. It is said that he also stole and sold the bell from Birstall church and had the vicarage demolished.
Some people say that a bloody footprint sometimes appears in one of the bed-chambers.
The story is that Captain Batt was in London but one winter's evening his family saw him come down the lane, through the hall and up the stairs into his room where he vanished. He had been killed in a duel that very afternoon. The Hall passed out of the hands of the Batt's in the early 19th century and into the possession of Fairfax Fearnley, a lawyer of great repute in his time. In later years it became a girls boarding school and was attended by Charlotte Bronte who accurately describes the Hall in her novel 'Shirley', but under the name of 'Fieldhead'.