Walter Palmer (Puritan)

Verbatim excerpt from Robert Charles Anderson, FASG [Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists], The Great Migration Directory: Immigrants to New England, 1620–1640; a Concise Compendium [Boston: New England Historical and Genealogical Society, 2015], 251: “Palmer, Walter; … 1629; Charlestown, Rehoboth, Stonington …” In contrast to other entries, Anderson does not name the ship on which Walter Palmer sailed.

It is reported to be Four Sisters, leaving Gravesend, England on 24 Apr 1629 and arriving in Salem Massachusetts in July 1629 [2] The next year, he was indicted on manslaughter charges for allegedly beating a man to death, but was acquitted in November 1630.

[1] On August 24, 1643, Palmer and Chesebrough left Charlestown and started a new settlement called Seacuncke (later renamed Rehoboth).

[3] In August 1652, Miner built his father-in-law and himself a house on their land; the next year, both their families joined them, and other settlers soon followed.

It took until 1661 to build a church meetinghouse due to resistance from the General Court of Connecticut, which preferred that the colonists travel across the river to New London.