<p align="left"><font size="4"><strong>T</strong></font>he Civil War in the 1860s helped bring spelling to the forefront. Since the telegraph had made long-distance communication  possible, the folks back home wanted to know if those names on the Union and Confederate casualty lists that they were  receiving were those of their sons. At this point uniform spelling became important -- not only to get the right amount of dots  and dashes transmitted -- but to know if that casualty on the list was theirs.</p> <p align="left">Various branches of the family have handed down stories about why they changed the spelling of their last name -- a dispute  between father and son, a run-in with the law, etc. Tales like these are common in most families. These may very well be true  -- or not! Take them with a grain of salt.</p><p align="left"><font size="4"><strong>H</strong></font>owever, it is important to note that "Palmer" (a corruption of it that's come to be "Parmer") and "Parmenter" and their  various spellings are <em>not</em> associated with our family.</p><p align="left">&nbsp;</p><h1>Surname's Meaning <br /></h1> <p align="left"><font size="5"><strong>I</strong></font>t's believed that our name is a compound of "palmer" and "lea."</p> <p align="left">In 1086, William the Conqueror ordered a statistical survey of England be done to register the landed wealth of the country to determine taxes. It was at this time that many families first came up with their surnames. About 43% of surnames today are the names of places -- Brooks, Woods, Hill, Moore, Atwater (at water), etc.; another 32% are descendant names -- Johnson (John's son), McDonald (son of  Donald), Petersen (son of Peter), etc.; another 15% are occupational names -- Baker, Smith, Cooper (maker of barrels), Chapman (merchant or trader), etc.; and about 9% are nicknames -- Stout, Goodman, Longfellow, Smart, Reid (for a red-haired man), etc.</p> <p align="left"><font size="4"><strong>'P</strong></font>almer" -- and there are relatively a lot more of  these families than ours -- is the name many men who participated in the Crusades at various times from 1095 to 1270 chose for their surname. The legend goes that these warriors returned home with palm fronds to show that they'd returned from the Holy Lands.</p> <p align="left">"Lea" is another word for field, or meadow.</p> <p align="left"><font size="3">T</font>hus, our name means "the palmer's field" -- a combination of occupation and location.</p> <p align="left">Chances are the first families to have this name lived in a field that belonged to someone who fought in the Crusades -- or the head of the household himself was a Crusader who lived in a field. </p> <p align="left">While there are a few instances of surnames sounding like ours on the Continent, there are only two places in England where the name existed in the late 1500s: the North, where it's usually spelled "Parmley" and can still be found today, and the South where the family only lived a few generations before settling in New England in the 1630s.</p><p align="left">&nbsp;</p><p align="left">&nbsp;</p>                        <p align="left">Taken from thefamilyparmelee.com </p>