Ray Palmer (1808 – 1887)

Rev. Ray Palmer (1808 – 1887) D.D. was an American clergyman and hymnwriter. He was born in Little Compton, Rhode Island, the son of the Hon. Thomas Palmer, a Judge in Rhode Island. His early life was spent at Boston, where he was for some time clerk in a dry-goods store. At Boston he joined the Park Street Congregational Church, then under the pastoral care of Dr. S. E. Dwight. After spending three years at Phillips Academy, Andover, he entered Yale College, New Haven, where he graduated in 1830. In 1835 he became pastor of the Central Congregational Church, Bath, Maine. During this period visited Europe in 1847. In 1850 he was appointed to the First Congregational Church, at Albany, New York, and in 1865 Corresponding Secretary to the American Congregational Union, New York. He resigned in 1878, and retired to Newark, New Jersey until his death in 1887.