Thomas Read Kemp had a profound influence in shaping Regency Brighton and his name lives on today in the east side of the city.

Yet Kemp, a wealthy man and big landowner, was not much of an entrepreneur and he ran into crippling financial trouble.

In a new essay on Kemp and Brighton in the Georgian Group Journal, historian Sue Berry says Kemp’s father (also Thomas) was a wealthy Lewes merchant who later became the local MP.

With his wife, Anne Read, he had high hopes for his son and settled a large sum on him in 1806 when he married Frances, a member of the Baring banking family.

Among the properties they bought was Herstmonceux Place in East Sussex. They had ten children before her death during childbirth.

When the old man died in 1811, Kemp also became MP for Lewes and inherited the family estate, mainly land in Brighton.

But he resigned from Parliament in 1816 aged 34, having joined a dissenting evangelical sect under the heavy influence of his wife. Kemp took up preaching and had Holy Trinity Chapel in Ship Street (now Fabrica) built for him the following year.

At the same time he built The Temple, a large villa on open land just north- west of Brighton. It is now part of Brighton and Hove Girls High School.

In abrupt changes, Kemp then sold Herstmonceux Place, gave up the sect, disposed of the chapel and became MP for Arundel, regaining his former Lewes seat in 1826.

Kemp wanted to build large houses near Brighton and erected a handsome building called Hampton Villa. His sister built Western Lodge nearby. But he gave that up to pursue other interests.

In 1822 he became a director of the Chain Pier and was also involved in developing Ireland’s Gardens (near Park Crescent), plus Brighton (now Queen’s) Park. Both were private gardens and he did not make money from them.

He helped start the Royal Sussex County Hospital, was a magistrate, became a director of the railway company and promoted the Brighton Water Company. He provided the site for St Peter’s Church, and welcomed a school, St Mary’s Hall, on to his land.

But his grandest venture was creating Sussex Square and Lewes Crescent. He employed the esteemed Charles Busby and Amon Wilds as architects for housing on a vast scale.

It all proved too much for everyone and Busby and Wilds went off to other projects. Just when many houses had been completed in 1826, Kemp went bust. He recovered enough to buy some of the buildings back but was never the same again.

One reason was that the rival Brunswick Square project, now with Busby involved, was more manageable and closer to the heart of Brighton. Another was Kemp’s poor organisation.

In 1837, he quit as MP and moved abroad, allegedly for the sake of his health, but really to avoid creditors. He only came back once, three years before his death in 1844.

He is buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris. The man is long dead but many of his magnificent buildings remain as a monument to him.

l Thomas Read Kemp And The Shaping Of Regency Brighton c.1818-1845 is part of the research by Dr Sue Berry for the new Victoria County History of the entire city of Brighton and Hove. It will be 190,000 words long and is due out at the end of 2011.