University Archives
Palmes family, of Naburn
The Palmes family traced its pedigree back to Manfred Palmes who was living in 1140 and had lands in Taunton, Somerset. It is a family unique in being able to trace an unbroken inheritance from son to son from the twelfth century to 1974, with only one exception in the eighteenth century. In 1226 lands at Naburn in East Yorkshire were assigned to William Palmes and the demesne lordship of Naburn then descended in the Palmes family to the twentieth century. The Palmes family built a manor house on the east bank of the River Ouse, first mentioned in 1345 and the family was comfortably wealthy, although it was not until the early sixteenth century that any of the them held public office. There are no personal papers surviving for the late middle ages, but their collections are unusual in being rich in medieval estate papers, including marriage settlements. After the Reformation the family remained Catholic and Brian Palmes (d.1581) was the first member of the family to be recorded as paying a recusancy fine in 1577. They intermarried with other landed Catholic families like the Langdales and the Stapletons. Some younger members of the family became Jesuit priests. The daughter of George Palmes (d.1654) went to the Augustinian convent in Louvain. He was knighted by Charles I, probably for his Royalist support during the 1640s. George Palmes (1666-1732) and his wife, Anne, were responsible for harbouring several Catholic priests at Naburn. The estates passed to his son, Brian Palmes (1696-1737), who rebuilt the hall in Georgian style. John Palmes (1732-1783) was the last Catholic member of the family and his eldest son, George Palmes (1776-1851), was the first to hold public office for ten generations; he became a Justice of the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant of the East Riding. His son, William Lindsay Palmes (1813-1851) was an accomplished modern linguist and was vicar of Hornsea and Riston from 1848. Two more generations went into the church. George Brian Palmes (1884-1974) was the last member of the family to live at Naburn. The papers of the Palmes family of Naburn have arrived in two deposits, the first of which relates almost entirely to the Naburn estates and is rich in medieval title deeds. The second includes some nineteenth-century rentals, correspondence, wills and genealogical papers. Papers for Naburn date from the thirteenth century and include a title deed of 1278 and manorial rolls from 1424. Family accounts include some seventeenth-century quietuses for recusancy fines and the rental and steward's account book 1781-94. Correspondence conists of about forty family letters, especially those written by the sons of George Palmes (1776-1851) while in the West Indies. Miscellaneous material includes an illuminated pedigree of circa 1600 and an 1842 journal of a voyage to the West Indies and South America. [DDPA; DDPA(2)]