Charles Henry Palmer was the architect and builder of Urbanna Baptist Church. Born in Urbanna in 1845, Palmer attended Palmer School, a private school financed by his father, Alfred Palmer, for the children living on and near Watling Street in town.
At 16 years of age, he entered the Confederate Army as a substitute for his father. At the Battle of Frayser’s Farm in 1862, Palmer was shot in the jaw and carried off the field by the highest ranking Middlesex County officer in the Confederate army, Dr. William S. Christian.
He was carried to a surgeon’s barn where the bullet was removed. Anecdotal history passed down was that they put a stick in his mouth to help him stand the pain but when the stick broke they used a bullet instead for him to bite down on. Ultimately, Palmer passed out on the surgeon’s table and the bullet was removed.
Years later when his family was going through old things, they found a little white box with two bullets in it — a round Civil War .69 caliber musket ball and a .58 caliber three ridge bullet with teeth marks in it. A letter inside the box stated that after Palmer awoke from the surgery, he found two bullets in his uniform pocket, the round ball that came from his jaw and the three ridge bullet that was picked up after it dropped when he passed out on the table.
After the war, Palmer and Columbus (Lum) Burton went to Binghampton, N.Y., where they were employed as house carpenters. They learned to build in a folk Victorian architectural style with an Italian influence, which is found today in Urbanna homes and buildings that Palmer built from 1870 to 1904.
The design of the steeple on Urbanna Baptist Church has been admired for generations. In the 1870 U.S. Census Palmer, then 25 years of age, was listed as a house carpenter. Just a quick glance at the church steeple shows Charles Henry Palmer was much more than an every day house carpenter.
It Happened Here in Rivah country!
