(1606 - 1679)
Joan Carlile (1606-1679) was born Joan Palmer in c. 1606 and was the daughter of William Palmer, an employee of the royal parks of St James’s, and his wife Mary. Joan Palmer married in 1626, a poet and court dramatist named Lodowick Carlell (called Carlile), who was also groom of the privy chamber and gentleman of the bows to King Charles I. In 1637, Lodowick was made a keeper of Richmond Park and the Carlile family moved to Petersham and lived in Petersham Lodge in the north-west corner of the park. Although information of Carlile’s early life is scant, the surviving correspondence of Bishop Duppa (1589-1662), a royalist advisor who was exiled to Richmond during the Interregnum reveals that the Carlile’s took in wealthy aristocratic lodgers. In 1654, the Carliles relocated to Covent Garden which was already home to a number of prominent artists including Samuel Cooper (1608-1672) and Mary Beale (1633-1699). By 1656, Carlile was back in Petersham and in 1663, Carlile and her family moved back to London. She died in 1679.
