Pages from Volume One, Palmer's Perlustration, introduction UNPDF

THE

by

CHARLES JOHN PALMER, F.S.A.

VOL. I

Printed and published by subscription, by

GEORGE NALL, 182, KING STREET, MARKET PLACE.

1872.

Foreword

Charles John Palmer’s Perlustration must surely rank as the finest

history of any town ever written. It was first published in parts,

and then in three volumes, printed in 1870, 1872, and 1874. The

compilation of events and the history of the families who lived

here is so detailed and exhaustive as to defy anyone to match it.

Worldwide, to anyone interested in genealogy, the history of their

family, having any link to the town, it is invaluable. It is therefore

for all those persons not already possessing access to the original, and to revive the interest in

it and in Yarmouth, that I have decided to republish it in full. At first I thought that a scan of

the pages might suffice, and produced it in that form on CDRom, but it was immediately clear

that a completely retyped and recompiled version was necessary, searchable in every word and

detail. I have meantime been at work on my own new and updated version which has the

benefit of modern computer graphics and digital photography. The first volume of this is now

also ready for the press. Thus the first volume of both the old and the new will be printed at the

same time and supplied in each case with a CD Rom that can be fully searched and used for

personal study. I have taken the liberty of adding a few extra notes to Palmer’s book that may

be of interest, but the layout and the grammar remains that produced by Palmer, with very

little change, I trust.

A study of the Victorian English and a comparison with modern American English is

interesting, since spellings and word useage that we might think are now Americanised, are

actually nearer to the original than much of the language which we now commonly use

ourselves. Charles Palmer (1805-88) lived for many years at no.4 South Quay, Great

Yarmouth. This house had been re-fronted in Georgian style (white brick) by his father, John

Danby Palmer when he first acquired it, and the house survives in that form today. Charles

Palmer’s mother was the daughter of Charles Beart of Gorleston. In due course Charles

inherited the Elizabethan mansion, but he was quite scathing concerning the vogue of the time

for refacing houses with white brick. He absolutely preferred the original, and could see the

folly of unnecessary change for fashion’s sake. Internally the house remains full of character,

fine carved fireplaces and moulded ceilings. It is reputed to be the place where the deed of

execution of Charles I was signed. It seems likely that living there, influenced by the interest

of his father in local history, then being articled as a solicitor to Robert Cory, another

significant local historian, stimulated his lifelong obsession with local history.

Charles was said to have been sickly as a child, and was at first tutored at home by a female

governess together with his sister. He later went to Mr Bowles’ school in Queen Street in

common with James Paget and other local men of importance. Palmer later gave the opinion

that he learned nothing at Bowles’ school. In a similar way, it is obvious that he held women

in low regard. His extreme chauvinism comes out throughout his writing. I am led to wonder

what his governess was like. He can have had little close contact with his mother Amelia. The

only woman he ever commented upon favourably was Mrs. Dawson Turner. His own wife

was never mentioned, nor was his sister, and he generally avoids describing women altogether.

He is also evidently something of a snob. He mixed from an early age with prominent men

C.J.P., aged about 20 years.

in the town such as Dawson Turner and the Palgraves

the wealthy Doctor Penrice and the latter’s benefactor,

Lord Chedworth. His historical works are copiously

full of such people, but he made relatively little mention

of such as beatsters, fishermen and fish girls.

Palmer’s major historical work was the three volume

Perlustration of Great Y a rmouth , but his printing of

Manship’s work with copious additions, and his

Continuation of Manship, unrelated as it is to the

original, were very substantial works indeed. He

retained thousands of deeds and documents of relevance

in his offices as solicitor, and I think that he must have

used his secretarial assistance to good advantage. Palmer

was a most prolific writer, and indeed the detail in his

work is so great as to be scarcely credible of research

without modern aids such as computers and copiers.

Palmer was well aware that there was no secure archive,

and that many important documents were in private hands, frequently being bought and sold

by collectors at auction. They could easily be lost or dispersed, and were very difficult to

keep track of. Documents of importance had already passed from the locality and were in

the British Museum and in the Bodleian Library. Remarkably, although Palmer was well

aware of documents in the British Museum, he did not appreciate that there were documents

of relevance in the Bodleian Library. His list of sources, written in a substantial notebook,

came to light in 1994, and relates to documents held either locally and in the British Library.

James Paget F.R.C.S.

Palmer’s The Perlustration of Great Y a rmouth is probably unique. It follows several works

of a very different style that in the main process or reprint old manuscripts and documents

and present information but do not break new ground. Palmer follows such substantial

historians as Robert Surtees, born in 1779, whose first volume of the History and Antiquities

of the County Palatine of Durham , was reviewed in the quarterly review by Robert Southey.

Southey was quite in favour of the work, describing it as a “farrago in folio”. Surtees’ work

ran to four volumes, printed in 1816, 1820, 1823, and 1840. He had used his predecessors

work substantially. Durham history began to be written in 1573-4 by Christopher Watson,

a four volume work, now in the Cottonian mss. The first book is an abstract of the lives of

the Bishops, the second is a Saxon history, the third and fourth are both poetry and

ecclesiastical matters. When Palmer wrote, ecclesiastical items were still very much in

vogue. He writes several chapters on the work and family histories of various ministers in

Yarmouth. His bibliographical notes suggest that he might have thought of taking such an

approach to an even greater depth, since he has included substantial lists of sermons and

local ecclesiastical publications. In Durham, history continued in the hands of William

Claxton of Winyard, who in 1575 assisted Stowe and Camden. Then Roger Dodsworth was

employed by Lord Fairfax and collected one hundred and sixty volumes of papers that are

now in the Bodleian. Likewise a Durham barrister, James Mickleton, collected 50 volumes

of items. Others continued to transcribe, such as John Rudd, Thomas Rudd, George Smith,

Dr.Christopher Hunter, the Rev. Thomas Randal, Thomas Lyll and George Allan. In 1785,

Hutchinson published the first of four volumes of his History of Durham . William Hutchinson

(1732-1814) was an attorney at Bamard Castle. He first wrote An Excursion to the Lakes

in W e stmorland and Cumberland and in 1776, A T o ur through part of the Northern Counties

in the years 1773 and 1774 . Richard Gough dismissed the latter as “a hasty crude performance

with little information, and in a quaint style”. Palmer in Yarmouth had similar antecedents,

collectors of copious materials followed by a similar spread, if rather less a number of

historical authors. Palmer brought together an enormous mass of material, perhaps inspired

by such as Dugdale, and with many authors attempting likewise in other shires, he strove to

be their equal, or to surpass them. His description of the town and its occupants in the

Perlustration is exceptional. Many other authors, like Hutchinson in Durham, had written

tours of a county or greater areas of the country. The attempt at such a detailed and complete

tour within a single town, appears to be unique.

A contemporary and friend of Palmer was Dawson Turner (1775-1858). Dawson was the

Grandson of the Rev. Francis Turner, master of the Hospital School and minister at St.

George’s Chapel, and born accidentally at 40 Middlegate Street in 1775, where his mother

was visiting her husband’s uncle.

Turner’s bank had been started by his father James at what had been the Three Cranes Public

house between rows one hundred and six and one hundred and eight. The business moved

to Hall Quay, where the upper floors were used by Dawson Turner as his private residence.

At one time Dawson Turner also owned a brewery business and public houses in conjunction

with Samuel Paget, father of Sir James, the world-famous physician. I suspect that Turner

had no difficulty in predicting the ruin of his friend Paget. In the deeds of no 68 King Street,

I found details of Paget’s business, and details of the mortgage that he held with Dawson

Turner. Business however went into a steep decline, and in 1831 Paget was paying Gurney,

Turner and Brightwen the sum of £6,000 per annum in interest upon a loan of £60,000 with

all of Paget’s properties mortgaged to them.

Palmer had access to a multitude of sources, yet made less of the contents of the council

archive than may commonly have been supposed. He had two additional sources of which

he made extremely fine use. Firstly, property deeds. These inevitably related the succession

of ownership of the buildings within the town, and so were readily described as he

perambulated (metaphorically) on his ‘perlustrations’. The latter was his finest work, being

an entirely original idea. Thought by many to be the finest description of any town, it

contains descriptions of many of the inhabitants, combined with a description of the streets

and rows, the whole being described as though taking a walk around the town. Although as

a result it is often rambling, and in no sense chronological, it presents the reader with an

extraordinarily in-depth survey of the town, many trades are mentioned, and descriptions are

given of the finer buildings, in association with their ownership and the family connections

of the owners. It includes considerable detail of the political aspects of the town, concerning

the various councilmen, Mayors, Burgesses, Members of Parliament, clergymen and

merchants of the town. This does often leave a gap with respect to the common man, his life

generally being considered by Palmer to be rather beneath a detailed description of this

kind. Nevertheless this criticism should not be taken too seriously. The book is simply an

incredible piece of scholarship.

Mark Rumble,

12th January, 2007.