Page:Highways and Byways in Lincolnshire.djvu/308

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SIR JOHN BOLLES

  • pany. He was knighted by James I., after withstanding his

majesty in the matter of travelling through the city of London on a Sunday, on which occasion his conduct somewhat recalls that of Judge Gascoigne in Shakespeare's "Henry IV." He died in 1621, and his monument is in St. Swithin's church, London. His son John was made a baronet by Charles I., and his son George is commemorated on a monument opposite to that of his grandfather, in a pretty Latin inscription beginning—

Nil opus hos cineres florum decorare corollis;
  Flos, hic compositus qui jacet, ipse fuit.

We hear of a Sir George Bolle being killed at Winceby in 1643, fighting against Cromwell; certainly George's brother, Sir Robert of Scampton, was one of the jury in 1660 for trying the regicides, and at the death of his son, Sir John, in 1714 the title became extinct. The distinctions of the elder branch, who settled at Haugh, were more military than civil. Their name also has passed away, their lineal descendants being named Bush, Ingilby, Bosville and Towne. The earliest monument to this branch is on a brass plate in Boston Church to Richard Bolle of Haugh, 1591, son of Richard Bolle of Haugh and Maria, daughter and heiress of John Fitzwilliams of Mablethorpe. He was thrice married, and his only son Charles died a year before him, 1590, and is commemorated at Haugh. His daughter Anne married Leonard Cracroft, the others married John and Leonard Kirkman of Keel. His son Charles, whose mother was a Skipworth of South Ormsby, had four wives, his first wife a daughter of Ed. Dymoke of Scrivelsby, and his fourth a daughter of Thomas Dymoke of Friskney. His only son, John, was the son of number two, Brigitt Fane; and his daughter Elizabeth of number three, Mary Powtrell. To this son John, there is also in Haugh Church a well-preserved monument, which shows him kneeling with his wife, attended by their three sons and five daughters, in the usual Jacobean style; date 1606, Aet. suæ 46. Sir John built Thorpe Hall, and was a famous Elizabethan captain. He was at the siege of Cadiz under Essex, 1596, and had custody of the young lady of high position who goes by the title of the Spanish Lady or the Green Lady, and whose story is told in Percy's "Reliques" in the ballad of "The Spanish Lady's love for an Englishman."