A slab, on the south side of Thimbleby Church, bears the inscription: “Here lyeth the body of Michael, the son of Mr. Michael and Elizabeth Boulton, buried the 7th of Septemr, 1692, ætatis suæ 7. His mother the 28th of May, Anno Dom. 1725, ætat suæ 61.” The Register has the following entries, “1725, Mrs. Boulton, ye wife of Mr. Mich. Boulton, buried May 28th.” “1738, Michael Boulton buried May 8th.” The last entry connected with this family is that of “Michael, son of Michael and Mary Boulton,” who was baptized in 1726 and buried in 1767. These were the ancestors of the late Mr. Henry Boulton, of St. Mary’s Square, Horncastle. Michael Boulton, in 1719, left 40s. a year, from the Hall estate, at Bransby near Stow, for the education of poor children at Thimbleby; leaving also a bequest for the poor at Bransby. At the beginning of the 19th century this manor was held jointly by Richard Elmhirst, Esq., of Usselby, and Mr. Thomas Kemp, the latter of whom resided at the Old Hall. {173a} There is a field at the west end of the village, now the property of H. N. Coates, Esq., traversed by mounds and ditches, which was formerly divided into three separate plots, belonging to Elmhirst, Kemp, and Hotchkin. The Kemps were of an old stock. In the Thimbleby Registers the first mention of them is in 1723, {173b} but their name implies a much greater antiquity. One theory has been that they were a Huguenot family, who came over to England at the time of the French massacre of Protestants, on St. Bartholomew’s day, 1572. Those refugees, in their enforced poverty, prosecuted various kinds of useful industries; and the Kemps, it is suggested, acquired their name from being kempsters, or comb makers. But it is probable that the name had a much earlier origin. Kemp (Saxon Cempa) meant a soldier {173c} being connected with the Norman-French and modern English “Champion;” and although we might look back with pride to forefathers who suffered for their religion, it is pleasanter, if only in imagination, to regard them as having been a race of doughty warriors, sufficiently distinguished to win a name by their deeds. {173d} Mr. Thomas Kemp, in the first half of the 19th century, was a wealthy bachelor, and added to the Hall-garth estate by the purchase, from time to time, of adjacent property. He lived in some style, with two maiden sisters to keep house for him. By his will the land at Thimbleby passed into the possession of his great nephew, Robert Edwin Kemp; another nephew, Samuel Harrison Kemp, inheriting most of the personal estate. But alas! liveried servants, crests and arms, and other emblems of wealth have become things of the past; for when this Robert died the property passed to his son, Thomas Kemp, in whose hands the patrimony speedily evaporated; and other members of the family are now dispersed, “their places knowing them no more,” save as a lingering memory, which will soon be gone.