In the stories by V. C. Andrews, Foxworth Hall is a grand and immense estate sitting on over 100 acres of land in Charlottesville, Virginia. It has been the official headquarter home for generations of the Foxworth family members for over 200+ years.
Description[]
Welcome to Foxworth Hall
On the property, there are many beautiful gardens and a large lake big enough to swim or ice skate in depending on the season. The grounds are also surrounded by a wooden area that hides the mansion from view to any outsiders. There is also a small living quarters close by, for the servants and groundskeepers.
Inside, the mansion consists of high, immense staircases, long and lonely corridors, large oil paintings hung up on the walls, and several sitting rooms filled with expensive and delicate antique decor. The mansion also includes a large ballroom for parties and social events, a trophy room full of mounted animal heads, a large library filled with hundreds of books, and a famous swan room complete with a swan shaped bed (formally kept as a shrine to Malcolm Neal Foxworth's mother who abandoned him as a child).
The third floor contains the bedroom where the Dollanganger children were imprisoned in the late 1950's through the early 1960's. This was in a less visited section of the mansion where guests never roamed. This nearly forgotten room lead to a secret passageway to the spacious, soundproof attic via closet.
Inside the attic stand marble statues, mannequins, old sewing machines and large, antique armories full of old clothes including uniforms from the Civil War and Victorian era attire. The Dollanganger children also found many leather-bound trunks filled with photo albums, family keepsakes, old books and clothing from the Victorian era. There were also lots of old antique furniture stacked up in the attics corners and covered with dust, real crystal chandeliers laced with cobwebs, porcelain vases, forgotten family heirlooms and much more. At one point, the children find a picture of their great grandmother, Corrine (their mother's namesake).
Destruction and Rebirth[]
Foxworth Hall burning to the ground
The newly rebuilt Foxworth Hall in the distance
When the youngest Dollanganger child, Cory dies in October of 1960 of arsenic poisoning, his mother Corrine secretly hides his dead body in a small, hidden room of the attic and passes his death off as a fatal case of pneumonia. Because the attic was so large, no one smelled the decomposing body.
Years later in the early 1970's, the Foxworths threw their annual Christmas party. But the function was interrupted when Corrine's oldest daughter, Cathy confronted her mother in front of the party guest about her crimes against her family. So in a state of madness, Corrine started a fire in the attic of the mansion, setting the whole house ablaze, killing her bedridden mother named Olivia and second husband, Bart in the process.
Foxworth Hall was rebuilt during the 1980's and finished by the time Corrine died. In her will, she left everything to her grandson, Bart Sheffield.