Palmers can trace their roots in Haughley back to Tudor times but in 1869 our current story began……..

William James Palmer moved to Haughley in August of 1869, taking over Barnes Bakery as a going concern, baking bread and cakes in the building which is on the site of the old market stalls on Haughley village green. This Bakery had been running since at least 1752 and was at the time in direct competition with two other bakeries in the village.  William J. Palmer was a staunch Liberal and a supporter of the Thomas Paine movement and was also the leader of the Agricultural Movement in Haughley and Stowmarket in 1874; he later married Miss Emily Archer at Thetford.

The 1881 Census shows them in Old Street, Haughley, as William aged forty-five, baker and newsagent,; Emily aged thirty-nine,; Harry aged eighteen, baker, Charles Bradlaugh, aged fourteen, baker’s assistant, Ellen H, aged twelve, scholar, Annie aged seven and William Ewart Gladstone, aged three.

Harry was to set up a bakery business in Thetford, he then moved to Bury St Edmunds and started up Palmer’s – Ye Olde Tea House, Charles became a painter, Annie moved back to Thetford and married Thomas Doran, the town mayor, who built steam engines and William E.G. stayed in the Haughley business.  Apparently the zeal with which William Senior followed his convictions caused the business to be affected by his constantly spending money on leaflets furthering his cause, and frequently travelling to London with Harry and Charles to distribute them.  It was during one of these visits that he caught smallpox.  He was put into quarantine and was fortunate to recover, but despite being pronounced clear of the disease, on returning home, the infection was passed to his daughter Ellen (Nellie) and then to his wife; both unfortunately never recovered.  After Emily died, William J Palmer married Keziah Codd, who was related to the Mayhew’s bakery family of Stowmarket.  It is acknowledged by the family that it was Keziah’s influence that saved the business.  Keziah had been born in Stowmarket in 1841 and died in the town aged ninety-nine in 1940, after an accident.

In 1910 William E G Palmer married Mabel Florence Woods, only daughter of Alfred Woods the village post-master and first chairman of the Haughley Parish Council.  Alfred and is brother Edgar, also a Parish Councillor and Churchwarden, owned a coach building business and a rake factory.  William James Palmer died in 1915 aged seventy-nine and W E G became more involved with the business from about 1903, helping his step-mother.  Frederick became accountant for the family business after his retirement from Paul’s of Ipswich.  William was one of the founding directors of Elmswell Bacon Factory, and he also helped to establish other well-known local businesses.  A sash-cord factory was purchased in 1903, which then became the flour mill, although some of the factory was retained and the business developed into a pig merchant’s and farm, fertiliser, feed and corn merchants.  The family also owned two windmills.

In the 1920’s William bought The White House, which stands close to the bakery and looks across the triangular village green in Old Street.  The house was originally a part of the Tyrell estate of Plashwood and Gipping and was actually the Gipping and Shelland Parsonage built circa 1590.

The children of William and Mabel were Frederick Ronald (Ronnie), Eric (Tom) and Roy.  Ronnie held the position of Chief Bread Officer for the area during the Second World War and joined the Home Guard.  Roy married Margaret Burns, a Northern Ireland girl in 1943 whilst on active service.  Roy and Margaret had two children, Kenneth born in 1945 and Gordon, born in 1950.  After leaving the Ipswich School, Kenneth attended the Ipswich Civic College to study Catering where he met Christine Forsdike, an Ipswich girl.  He joined the family business and they married in 1970.

From the 1930’s through to the end of the 1960’s, up to fifty people were employed, some on bread rounds that covered an area reaching out as far as Tostock.  Village rounds were vitally important to daily life and one very large family in Wickham Skeith placed a regular order for fourteen loaves each day!  Ronnie went into the insurance business and was also a coal merchant.  He died in 1976.  Tom ran the mill and the farm, thus supplying the bakery with flour.  Roy ran the bakery until his death in 1989.

Margaret supported many organisations and village events, by both attending them and opening up the grounds and gardens of her house to the public for teas, street fairs and flower festivals.  She was also a prominent member of the Mothers’ Union and would service tea and cakes to over forty people a week who used to visit her house to see her late husband’s bakery museum, one of only three in Europe.  She died in 1997 aged eighty-one.  The Stowmarket shop in Station Road was opened in 1970, with another branch at Stanton and Woolpit.

Kenneth and Christine’s son Kieron, was born in 1973 and attended local schools.  He joined the business in 1991 and also studied with Institute of Legal Executives.  His work, along with his father Kenneth, at the bakery includes overseeing the making of one hundred types of bread and four hundred types of cake, mostly using recipes from the 1850’s, the one hundred and twenty year old brick ovens are still being used, although they are now oil-fired instead of being heated by coal and wood.  Flour and yeast are sold in the shop should anyone wish to make their own bread, and orders are also taken for sponges and wedding cakes.  During the bread strikes of the 1970’s there were long queues at both the Haughley and Stowmarket shops, but Palmer’s rose to the occasion thus ensuring that everyone was able to have their daily bread.