The manor changed hands through the centuries many times the manor maintained its importance until the end of the 19th century, when the hereditary Lords of the Manor sold the estate piece by piece. The manor belonged from the 1620s to the 1830s to the Osbaldestons, a branch of a prominent Lancashire family; the most notable member of the family was Richard Osbaldeston, Bishop of London 1762–64. The manor passed by inheritance to the Mitford family, of whom the most notable was the novelist Bertram Mitford.