GREL Expressions: 

GREL(Google Refine Expression Language) Expressions:
value.parseHtml().select("date")[0].htmlText()
value.parseHtml().select("persName")[0].htmlText()
value.parseHtml().select (“placeName")[0].htmlText()


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NB: Even though the expression says it parses html, the elements are still XML. 
Google Refine has no XML parser but after looking at forums and documentation,
 I found out the HTML parser, parsers tags and hierarchy and would work from XML.