Sir Roger Palmer, 5th Baronet

Lieutenant-General Sir Roger William Henry Palmer, 5th Baronet (1832–1910) was a senior officer in the British Army and the Anglo-Irish Conservative MP for Mayo. Sir Roger was the last of the Palmer baronets of Castle Lackin, Co. Mayo, who owned, in addition to some 115,000 acres of land, Kenure House, Rush, County Dublin,[1] Castle Lackin in Mayo, Cefn Park in Wrexham and Glenisland House in Maidenhead.[2]

Sir Roger Palmer caricatured by Spy in Vanity Fair, 1880
Glen Island House, Taplow

He was the son of Sir William Henry Roger Palmer, Bt and the great-grandson of Sir Roger Palmer of Mayo, who was MP (1768-1783) for Portarlington in the Irish Parliament. His only sibling Ellen married Archie Peel, a nephew of the UK Prime minister.[3] He was educated at Eton and joined the Army.[4]

He served in the Crimea War with the 11th Hussars and took part in the Charge of the Light Brigade of 1854. He exchanged to the 2nd Life Guards in 1856 (until 1870) [4] and was placed on the retired list in 1881.[5] He was granted the colonelcy of the 20th Hussars from 1891 until his death in 1910.[6]

During the Irish Famine, he was known to have evicted many tenants.[7]

He was the Anglo-Irish Conservative MP for Mayo from 1857 until 1865.[4] He succeeded his father in 1869 and the same year built Glen Island House on an island in the Thames near Taplow. He was High Sheriff of Mayo in 1888.

On his death, Kenure Park passed to Colonel Roderick Henry Fenwick-Palmer. Sir Roger had married Gertrude Millicent, daughter of the Rev. Plumer Rooper, who survived him, dying in 1929.[8]

In a 2014 episode of Who Do You Think You Are? actress Julie Walters learns that her Irish great-grandfather, Anthony Clarke, was a tenant at will of Palmer's, living on and cultivating 43 acres of land in County Mayo owned by Sir Roger.[9]

References
  1. Comerford, Patrick (9 May 2010). "Sad and Lonely Ruin is a Reminder of what could have been". Retrieved 21 November 2021.
  2. "Glen Island". South Buckinghamshire Council. Retrieved 24 February 2017.
  3. Kenure Church Rush www.rushdublin.com
  4. "WhoWasWho" (PDF). angloboerwar.com. Retrieved 24 February 2017.
  5. "No. 24999". The London Gazette. 26 July 1881. p. 3675.
  6. "No. 26178". The London Gazette. 3 July 1891. p. 3528.
  7. "The Great Famine in Co. Mayo West of Ireland | mayo-ireland.ie". mayo-ireland. The Telegraph. Retrieved 18 September 2021.
  8. The Last Palmers Ask About Ireland
  9. Julie Walters Who Do You Think You Are? S11 E01. Retrieved 20 May 2019.


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