“The present Guest Room [300] was Mrs Van der Elst’s bedroom. She turned a room in a kitchen for herself, and also put in a bath in the adjoining dressing room. Until then only hip baths had been used except for the bathroom at the other end of the Blue Corridor which the servants used during Mr Pearson Gregory’s occupation. Oil paintings hung on hooks in the passage leading to the Old Library [Van der Elst Room].
In Pearson Gregory’s time (1892-1935) the main bedrooms on the Blue Corridor were used only when visitors came for a shoot, even then the room known as the Clock Room [Room 317] was not used because the sound of the clock kept the occupant awake. When guests did use these rooms they had a coal fire in each one.
There was a bedroom known as the Chinese Room. When the house was sold the wallpaper in this room was sold separately, and the purchaser came to the Manor and removed it roll by roll.”
Mrs. Thornton’s recollections, Head Housemaid, 1928-1937
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Harlaxton Manor Archives 