The estate had been purchased by Batte's Halifax-born father, a receiver of rents to the Savile family, who resided at Howley Hall in Batley.

The hall's interiors were restored to a late-17th-century condition, the time the Batt family lived here, with the aid of research into local inventories .

[2] The Great Hall originally had two storeys but, in the mid-17th century, John Batt's grandson removed the ceiling and inserted a gallery and a large mullioned and transomed window.

In the 1630s the Batts added a magnificent plaster ceiling and painted the oak panelling including a landscape scene above the fireplace.

The rush matting in this and other family rooms was a feature of wealthy households, and was warmer than bare floorboards or stone floors.

Lack of a fireplace and unpanelled walls would have made it cold in winter, although warmth from the kitchen below would keep the stored food dry.

The warm colours of the panelling and bed curtains are echoed in the carpet on the table, a feature of wealthier 17th-century houses.

A Stone Ram statue, rumoured to have stood above the gates to Dewsbury Brewery, stands on the lawn in front of the hall.

The patterns of the box hedges were taken from furniture and plaster work in the hall and feature the lozenge design local to the area.

The nutrient-poor soil has been reseeded with meadow plants such as red clover, ox-eye daisy, self heal and yellow rattle.

The field is sometimes used for historical English Civil War battle re-enactments, horse shows and country fairs.

Large numbers of creatures are attracted to the pond, such as toads, moorhens, smooth newts, swan mussels plus varieties of damselfly and dragonfly.

Nova Meadow is damp area containing moisture loving plants including lady's smock, common tussock grass, meadowsweet, ragged robin and yellow flag iris.

Much of Nova Wood was coppiced for pit props for Gomersal Colliery but the trees have regrown to produce multi-stemmed sessile oaks and birch.

Nova Wood is carpeted by bluebells during spring and is a habitat for summer migrant birds such as chiffchaff and blackcap.

Many of the species present such as yellow archangel, wood anemone and wild garlic are good indicators of ancient woodland.

It does not support the same diversity of plants as Nova Beck, but in spring and early summer, the wooded areas are thick with wild garlic, lesser celandine and bistort.

Ash, alder and willow make up the majority of the tree cover and provide habitat for tawny owls.

A legend concerns the ghost of William Batt, aged 25, a bachelor whose widowed mother, Elizabeth, lived at Oakwell.

Her account is as follows: "Captain Batt was believed to be far away; his family was at Oakwell; when in the dusk on winter evening, he came stalking along the lane, through the hall and up the stairs, into his own room, where he vanished.

The historical facts from the archives show that Batt was at the Black Swan, in Holborn, London on 9 December where he borrowed money.

Local diarist Oliver Heywood has two entries recording his death; one that he died 'in sport'; the other that he was 'slain by Mr Gream at Barne near London'.

"If Fieldhead had few other merits as a building, it might at least be termed picturesque: its irregular architecture, and the grey and mossy colouring communicated by time, gave it a just claim to this epithet.

The old latticed windows, the stone porch, the walls, the roof, the chimney-stacks, were rich in crayon touches and sepia lights and shades.

The trees behind were fine, bold, and spreading; the cedar on the lawn in front was grand, and the granite urns on the garden wall, the fretted arch of the gateway, were, for an artist, as the very desire of the eye."

The enclosure in front, half court, half garden; the panelled hall, with the gallery opening into the bed-chambers running round; the barbarous peach-coloured drawing-room; the bright look-out through the garden-door upon the grassy lawns and terraces behind, where the soft-hued pigeons still love to coo and strut in the sun, – are described in Shirley.

In May 2008 the lawn in front of the hall was excavated to reveal post holes, probably left from a farm that occupied the site and disappeared from maps between 1834 and 1844.