Robert Stafford Arthur Palmer

The Honourable Robert Stafford Arthur Palmer (26 September 1888 – 21 January 1916) was a British Army officer, barrister and poet. Palmer was born into an aristocratic family. He was the son of William Palmer, 2nd Earl of Selborne, grandson of Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, and cousin to Sir Edward Grey. Palmer was educated at Colet Court and Winchester College and developed an interest in the Church of England and law at an early age. He won a scholarship to University College, Oxford, where he studied classical moderations and literae humaniores (classics). At university he was president of the Oxford University Church Union and the Oxford Union debating society. In between studies he volunteered at the Oxford House Church of England settlement and campaigned in support of the Liberal Unionist Party.

After graduation Palmer made a trip to India, an account of which was published as A Little Tour in India. From 1912 he served as governor at Edghill House in Sydenham, a school providing education to the poor. He turned down an offer to become dean of Divinity at New College, Oxford, to pursue a career in law. He was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1913 and in 1914 prosecuted his first case on the Western Circuit.

The First World War interrupted Palmer's short legal career. He had joined one of the Hampshire Regiment's Territorial Force battalions as a second lieutenant in 1913 and was mobilised shortly before Britain joined the war. He was promoted to lieutenant and posted with his unit to India where he received the temporary rank of captain. He commanded a draft of men sent for service with another of his regiment's battalions in the Mesopotamian campaign in August 1915. A football injury prevented him from accompanying his men during the advance on Kut. Palmer recovered sufficiently by the end of December to join the force sent to try to relieve the siege of Kut, where the first force had been surrounded. He was killed during the defeat at the Battle of Hanna. A poem Palmer had composed on the campaign was published in The Times shortly before his death. He is remembered on the Basra Memorial and by an altarpiece at Winchester College.

Birth and family Palmer was born on 26 September 1888 at 20 Arlington Street, London. This was the house of his grandfather Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, who was at that time the Conservative Party prime minister of the United Kingdom. Palmer was the second son of Salisbury's daughter Maud and William Palmer, Viscount Wolmer. His father was a politician of the Liberal Unionist Party (allied to the Conservatives) who went on to hold high office as First Lord of the Admiralty and entered the House of Lords as the 2nd Earl of Selborne.

Robert Palmer was known to friends and family as Bobby. His forenames came from Lord Salisbury (Robert) and his two godfathers, the Conservative politician (and future prime minister) Arthur Balfour and Conservative politician Sir Henry Stafford Northcote. He was pupilled to Howard Wright of Lincoln's Inn, working from the same barristers' chambers that his grandfather Roundell Palmer, 1st Earl of Selborne, a lord chancellor, had worked from. Palmer served initially in G Company, based in Petersfield. His unit was posted to Dinapur, India, in October 1914.

In August 1915 Palmer was sent to Mesopotamia in command of a draft of men for service with the regiment's 4th Battalion which was serving in the Mesopotamian campaign. Upon joining the 4th battalion Palmer was assigned as second-in-command of A Company.

On 24 November, while stationed at Amarah, Palmer sprained his leg whilst playing football. Despite his best efforts to join the march he was left in medical care when half of the battalion, including his company, was sent to fight in the Battle of Ctesiphon, the next step on an offensive towards Baghdad. Palmer spent the next five weeks in hospital recovering. Writer and naval division soldier A. P. Herbert wrote to Palmer's parents in May 1916 to relate the events around his death. He said Palmer had been badly wounded in the chest and was attended by doctors and visited by a colonel but died four hours after arriving at the prisoner-of-war camp hospital. He is also commemorated by an altarpiece at Winchester College. The piece depicts a soldier and his mother and was erected to also commemorate Lieutenant Wilmot Babington Parker-Smith, son of James Parker Smith. The altarpiece was dedicated by the Prince of Wales in 1923. A biography of Palmer by Lady Laura Ridding was published by Hodder & Stoughton in 1921. The poem was featured in episode 23 of the documentary TV series The Great War. As reproduced in Poetry of the First World War:

How long O Lord, how long, before the flood Of crimson-welling carnage shall abate? From sodden plains in West and East the blood Of kindly men streams up in mists of hate, Polluting Thy clean air: and nations great In reputation of the arts that bind The world with hopes of Heaven, sink to the state Of brute barbarianism whose ferocious mind Gloats o’er the bloody havoc of their kind, Not knowing love or mercy. Lord, how long Shall Satan in high places lead the blind To battle for the passions of the strong? Oh, touch Thy children’s hearts, that they may know Hate their most hateful, pride their deadliest foe.