Historic Williamsburg

22. Palmer House

Williamsburg, VA

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The Palmer House on Duke of Gloucester Street was built by and named for John Palmer. During his lifetime, Palmer served as the clerk of the Governor's Council, the bursar of the College of William and Mary, and a vestryman at Bruton Parish Church. An older house already existed on the site when Palmer purchased the property in 1749. In 1754, a disastrous fire started in a store on the property that had been leased to a merchant. The fire burned several of the outbuildings and badly damaged the house, so Palmer had it torn down. He used some of the brick from the original home when he constructed the current building. After Palmer's death, the home passed through a succession of owners before merchant William W. Vest purchased it around 1834. Vest was very wealthy, and he nearly doubled the house's size during his ownership. In 1862 the Confederate army used the home as their headquarters during the Battle of Williamsburg, which was the first major battle of the Peninsula Campaign. The Yankees commandeered the house after the Confederates withdrew. Like many other Williamsburg residents, Vest evacuated Hampton Roads that same year and fled to Richmond. He passed away in 1893. The house changed hands a few more times before Colonial Williamsburg acquired it in 1927. During the Palmer House's reconstruction, the experts who headed the operation became convinced that the eastern portion of the building was not part of the original structure, despite the protests of local residents. Someone removed a portion of the plaster on the eastern portion of the central hall, and behind it the team found dead ivy and bricked up windows on what had originally been an exterior wall, proving conclusively that the eastern portion had been one of Vest's later additions. Colonial Williamsburg removed the nineteenth-century features and restored the home to its colonial appearance in 1952.