ABSTRACT
Kempe (?I78S-1846) was an antiquary, and sometimc civil servant at the statc paper office, who wrote books and articlcs on ancient monuments and other antiquarian matters. His description of the papers at Loseley House, Surrey, included an account ofDonnc's marriagc and career. Loseley Housc was the home of the More family into which Donne married; and among the documents preserved there were the pleading letters Donne wrote from confinement to Sir George More and Sir Thomas Egerton after the disclosure of the clandestine marriage, and his own draft of the epitaph for his wife. Kempe printed a number of Donne's letters for the first time, from the holographs, introducing them with some observations on Donne's writings (The Loseley Manuscripts, 1836, pp. 32S-6).
