Joseph Palmer

Joseph Palmer (March 31, 1716 – December 25, 1788) was an English-American general during the American Revolutionary War, beginning with the Siege of Boston and the Battle of Lexington. A Cambridge Committee of Safety member, he issued the Lexington Alarm dispatch for Israel Bissell to ride to warn that the war with Britain had begun. Palmer went on intelligence-gathering missions in Vermont and Rhode Island. George Washington issued letters of commendation to Palmer for his service.

Palmer made a fortune before the war, and lost it after the war. Due to the kindness of Abigail Adams, his wife Elizabeth and their daughters lived at her Old House (in Quincy, Massachusetts) after Palmer's death. Elizabeth died two years later. His son Joseph Pearse Palmer attended Harvard College, participated in the Boston Tea Party, and fought with his father during the war. Joseph Pearse Palmer and Elizabeth Hunt Palmer were the parents of Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, and Sophia Amelia Peabody Hawthorne.

Early life and marriage

Palmer was born at Shaugh Prior, Devonshire, England, on March 31, 1716, a son of John and Joan Palmer, née Pearse. He married Mary Cranch in 1746 and emigrated to Massachusetts later that year with his brother-in-law Richard Cranch.

W. D. Cooper, Boston Tea Party, engraving, in the book The History of North America, 1789. Son John Pearse Palmer participated in the Tea Party Palmer and Mary had two daughters, Mary (Polly) and Elizabeth. They first lived in Watertown and then Germantown. The Palmers had nine children, one of whom was Elizabeth Palmer, wife of Nathaniel Peabody and mother of Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Mary Tyler Peabody Mann, and Sophia Amelia Peabody Hawthorne.

On the same day, Palmer fought at the Battle of Lexington Palmer died four years later at his home in Dorchester, Massachusetts, on December 25, 1788.