Kimpton is a village in
Hertfordshire, England, six miles south of
Hitchin, seven miles north of
St Albans and four miles from
Harpenden and
Luton
Luton () is a town and unitary authority with borough status, in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 census, the Luton built-up area subdivision had a population of 211,228 and its built-up area, including the adjacent towns of Dunstable a ...
. The population at the 2011 Census was 2,167.
History
Kimpton is mentioned in the
Domesday Book
Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...
: "In the Half-Hundred of HITCHIN 24 Ralph holds KIMPTON from the Bishop. It answers for 4 hides. Land for 10 ploughs. In Lordship 2; a third possible. 2 Frenchmen and 12 villagers with 2 smallholders have 7 ploughs. 3 cottagers; 5 slaves. Meadow for 6 oxen; woodland, 800 pigs; 1 mill at 8s. The total value is and was £12; before 1066 £15. Aelfeva, mother of Earl Morcar, held this manor."
[''Domesday Book'' (1976, Phillimore, Chichester) 12 Hertfordshire Chapter 5 (folio 134 d)]
The manor was later held by the Hoo-Keate family, and then by marriage to the
Dacre family
Baron Dacre is a title that has been created three times in the Peerage of England, every time by writ.
History
The first creation came in 1321 when Ralph Dacre was summoned to Parliament as Lord Dacre. He married Margaret, 2nd Baroness Mul ...
. The village hall is called Lady Dacre Hall.
Governance
North Hertfordshire District Council
Kimpton Ward is located within the local government district of North Hertfordshire.
The
North Hertfordshire District Councillor for Kimpton i
Cllr Ralph Muncer(
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
).
Hertfordshire County Council
Kimpton Ward is located within the
Hertfordshire County Council
Hertfordshire County Council is the upper-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Hertfordshire, in England, the United Kingdom. After the 2021 election, it consists of 78 councillors, and is controlled by the Conservative Party, ...
Division of Knebworth and Codicote and is represented b
Cllr Richard Thake(
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
).
Parliamentary Representation
The Ward is represented in Parliament by
Bim Afolami
Abimbola "Bim" Afolami (born 11 February 1986) is a British Conservative Party politician. He has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Hitchin and Harpenden since the 2017 general election.
Early life
Afolami was born and brought up ...
MP (
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
) who was first elected as the MP for
Hitchin and Harpenden
Hitchin and Harpenden is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2017 by Bim Afolami, a Conservative.
History
The constituency was created for the 1997 general election from parts of several former Her ...
in 2017.
The Village
The village lies along the valley of a dried-up river bed and is about one mile long. Some of the houses on the High Street date back to the 16th century, but most are 19th and early 20th century. Behind the High Street are two large housing estates built in the 1970s.
The village school is a primary and nursery school with over 150 children.
Parish Church of St. Peter and St. Paul
Kimpton has a spacious
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
-built parish church in the unusual transitional style between
Norman
Norman or Normans may refer to:
Ethnic and cultural identity
* The Normans, a people partly descended from Norse Vikings who settled in the territory of Normandy in France in the 10th and 11th centuries
** People or things connected with the Norm ...
and
Early English. The Dacre Chapel has a fine
Perpendicular
In elementary geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at a right angle (90 degrees or π/2 radians). The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the ''perpendicular symbol'', ⟂. It ca ...
screen, and the remains of early wall paintings in the chancel show
St Christopher and the Seven Corporal
Works of Mercy
Works of mercy (sometimes known as acts of mercy) are practices considered meritorious in Christian ethics.
The practice is popular in the Catholic Church as an act of both penance and charity. In addition, the Methodist church teaches that the ...
.
The belfry contains a peal of eight bells, the oldest having been cast c.1390.
The Kimpton Flood
In February 2001, Kimpton was hit by flooding due to an unprecedented amount of rainfall. The dried up river Kym, which was now a vital road, emerged again and followed its natural course from Netherfield Springs, through Kimpton and joined the Mimram at Kimpton Mill. The situation became fairly serious on the 24th when business owners from the Industrial Estate on Claggy road and also residents at risk hired pumps and called the Fire Brigade to try to deal with the 1-metre-deep water flow. The total cost of the damage caused by the flood was approximately £500,000. There is evidence suggesting that this is not the only flood to occur in the history of the village. There was a BBC news report on the situation.
References
External links
Kimpton Village WebsiteKimpton Scouts WebsiteKimpton Art Show
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Villages in Hertfordshire
Civil parishes in Hertfordshire
North Hertfordshire District