Before the marriage, painters and poets celebrated her charms and her beauty, for she was the belle of London society. She is remembered today as the inspiration for Alexander Pope's 'The Rape of the Lock,' a poem telling how Lord Petre stole a lock of her hair and caused a great scandal. Arabella was humiliated and accepted Perkins' offer of marriage in order to live quietly in the country instead. Tradition asserts that the great hall and western half of Ufton Court were refashioned for the lady's arrival, and this seems to fit with the date of the architecture and interior décor there. Bonnie Prince Charlie is supposed to have secretly visited the couple during the Jacobite rising of 1745. They had six children together, but they all died childless and the house gradually fell into a state of disrepair.
