I rented a car when I was over there, but I knew I would be doing a lot of travelling, not just to Holmfirth.
The one I got was an automatic and I am glad I did. While I am quite comfortable with a manual gearbox (stick shift) AND the driving setup was basically the same as here (drive on left,sit on right..etc. etc.) AND I am an experienced and highly trained, I didn't feel comfortable driving around a lot of England. Scotland was better, both because the traffic was lighter and I was starting to get the hang of all the idiots on the road.
I don't think I would have been so keen if I was coming from a RIGHT side driving country. The main roads and motorways are not too bad, but the narrow roads, blind corners and intersection, or even worse ANGLED intersections where you need to have a castor wheel in your neck to check for traffic take a LOT of getting used to.
I found the road directions (or rather LACK of them) distracting as they seemed to deliberately give you exactly HALF the information you needed, especially when negotiating the multitude of roundabouts with seemingly hundreds of entries and exits and, just occasionally, a set of traffic lights right in the middle, specifically designed to be difficult to see when your head is rotating like a radar dish to make sure you don't get hit, find the right lane and try and get into it.
Like everything else, things are easy when you grow up with them, but when you are not as familiar your concentration level leaps up dramatically.
I was in Britain for only two and a half weeks and in that time got rammed up the backside once and had my drivers side exterior mirror hit on numerous occasions, NONE of which was my fault, in fact I was bloody stationary, in a line of traffic, on most instances.
So, Onslow, what I am trying to say is, if you are going to drive, YES hire an automatic. DON'T get a "big" car. For reference, in Britain a "big" car is anything larger than a motorbike and sidecar!, (A SMALL motorbike!!)
If you are only going to be around the Holmfirth area, then public transport, or even Taxi's and Ubers are the way to go for short visits. Less stress and hassle and probably cheaper! As a bonus THEY always know where they are going and how to get there!