American theologian and politician. He was the son of John (1768–1843) and Mary Sturgis Gorham Palfrey (1772–1803) and the grandson of William Palfrey (1741–1781), prosperous merchant and Paymaster General of the Continental Army. He was educated at Harvard and in 1818 was ordained as Minister of the Brattle Street Church, Boston. In 1823 he married Mary Ann Hammond (1800–1897). In 1830 he was selected to succeed Andrews Norton as Professor of Sacred Literature at Harvard. He also became the first Dean of the university’s Divinity School. Palfrey supplemented his income as editor of the Christian Disciple (renamed the Christian Examiner) in 1824–1825 and the North American Review, 1835–1843. The son of a slave owner, he was an active abolitionist. His engagement in political life led to his being elected to the House of Representatives (1847–1848) for the Fourth Congressional District. In later life he became Postmaster of Boston and researched and wrote a History of New England (1858). Palfrey visited Southey at his home in Keswick in 1825.