Picturesque Over Haddon may be one of Derbyshire’s smallest settlements but, as Mike Smith discovers, it has fascinating stories to tell.
Who would have guessed that one of the eleven children of Joseph Oldfield, a tenant farmer in the small Peak District village of Over Haddon, would progress from these humble beginnings to become Britain’s most decorated Cold War spy?
Although John le Carré denied that Maurice Oldfield had been the inspiration for the fictional character of George Smiley, the author is known to have set up a meeting between Oldfield and Alec Guinness in order to provide the actor with ‘a sense and manner of an old spy in retirement’, in preparation for his taking on the role of Smiley in a film adaption of one of le Carré’s books.