Nineteen-year-old Margaret Hale has lived for almost 10 years in London with her cousin Edith and her wealthy Aunt Shaw, but when Edith marries Captain Lennox, Margaret happily returns home to the southern village of Helstone. Margaret has refused an offer of marriage from the captain's brother Henry, an up-and-coming barrister. Her life is turned upside down when her father, the local pastor, leaves the Church of England and the rectory of Helstone as a matter of conscience; his intellectual honesty has made him a dissenter.

Wendy Williams
Margaret Hale

Richard Leech
John Thornton

Sonia Dresdel
Mrs. Thornton

Edwin Richfield
Nicholas Higgins

Freda Bamford
Dixon

Freda Dowie
Fanny Thornton
David Markham
Reverend Richard Hale
Peter Welch
Williams
Bernard Brown
Henry Lennox