Herbert Palmer (Puritan)

Herbert Palmer (1601–1647) was an English Puritan clergyman, member of the Westminster Assembly, and President of Queens’ College, Cambridge. He is now remembered for his work on the Westminster Shorter Catechism, and as a leading opponent of John Milton's divorce tracts.

He was a younger son of Sir Thomas Palmer, knt. (d. 1625), and grandson of Sir Thomas Palmer (1540–1626) of Wingham, Kent. He was born at Wingham in 1601, and baptised on 29 March. His mother was the eldest daughter of Herbert Pelham of Crawley, Sussex. He learnt French almost as soon as English, and always spoke it fluently.

On 23 March 1616 he was admitted fellow-commoner in St. John's College, Cambridge; he graduated B.A. 1619, M.A. 1622, and was elected fellow of Queens' College, Cambridge on 17 July 1623. He took holy orders in 1624, and proceeded B.D. in 1631. In 1626, on his way to visit his brother, Sir Thomas Palmer, Bart. (d. 1666), at Wingham, he preached at Canterbury Cathedral. The report of his sermon reached the ears of Philip Delme, minister of the French church at Canterbury, who made his acquaintance at Wingham, got him to preach again at St. George's, Canterbury, and made efforts to procure his settlement as lecturer. He was licensed by Archbishop George Abbot for a Sunday afternoon lectureship at St. Alphage's, Canterbury. He acted as a spiritual adviser, and did much religious visiting, though without pastoral charge. Occasionally he preached to the French congregation.

While strongly opposing the separatist party, he resisted the innovations favoured by William Laud. He was articled for his puritanism, but the prosecution proved abortive. About 1630 the dean, Isaac Bargrave, put down his lectureship, on the ground that he had gone beyond his office by catechising and that his lecture drew 'factious persons' out of other parishes; the lecture was revived in consequence of an influentially signed petition to Abbot. His friends, headed by Thomas Finch, twice tried without success to secure for him a prebend at Canterbury.

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