Edward Coles, Champion of Freedom

Early Life

Virginia roots

John Coles emigrated to Virginia from Enniscorthy, Ireland, in the 1730s. The Coles patriarch built an empire in the colonies. When his five children divided up the estate after his death in 1747, his son John II inherited nine slaves and 3,000 acres in Albemarle County.

John Coles II married Rebecca Elizabeth Tucker. The couple had thirteen children, including middle child Edward born on December 15, 1786. Edward Coles grew up at the Enniscorthy plantation, about ten miles from Monticello.

After his initial education by private tutors, Coles briefly attended Hampden-Sydney College in 1805. He didn't like it and transferred to the College of William and Mary. A severe leg fracture kept him from graduating in 1807.

Abolitionist influences

College president Bishop James Madison (not to be confused with the future president) helped shape Edward Coles' belief system. He urged students to study the ideas and texts of Enlightenment thinkers. Madison believed that the morally indefensible institution of slavery violated the principles outlined by Jefferson in the Declaration. Coles absorbed Bishop Madison's lectures and concluded that slavery conflicted with natural law. Man was not chattel. Coles believed that the institution caused harm to both parties and corrupted the republic.

Coles corresponded with Thomas Jefferson on the subject, urging him to take the lead in abolishing slavery. Jefferson understood Coles' viewpoint. But the 71-year-old elder statesman saw practical difficulties and feared that more harm might come to newly freed slaves due to a lack of infrastructure. Jefferson advocated the end of slavery by peaceful avenues. Coles continued to urge the sage to take up the cause and interest the young nation's citizens in gradual emancipation.

"My object is to entreat and beseech you to exert your knowledge and influence, in devising, and getting into operation, some plan for the gradual emancipation of Slavery."
— Letter from Edward Coles to Thomas Jefferson, July 31, 1814.

Footnotes

1. One should not confuse the idea of abolition with equal rights. Those who sought to free the slaves did not automatically seek to grant them rights equal to their white counterparts. Coles later supported the American Colonization Society which sought to send freedmen to Africa (even those born on American soil).

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Edward Coles, Reluctant Slaveholder

A human inheritance

Coles' father died in February 1808. When the family gathered for the funeral, Coles told them he intended to immediately manumit the enslaved people included in his inheritance.

The entire family objected to Coles' plans. Besides being offended by his rejection of his father's provision, they questioned whether he could afford to forfeit the value of his slaves and the free labor they provided. They also dreaded the social embarrassment of having a family member who broke with Virginian norms. Coles' slaveholding neighbors worried that his actions would raise expectations of freedom and/or foster hostility among those remaining enslaved.

Coles considered these arguments and developed an alternate plan: to travel to the Northwest Territory with any of the people he inherited who were willing and able, and manumit them there.

As his share of the estate, Coles received 782 acres of land on the Rockfish River in Amherst County, Virginia. He also inherited a $500 debt and about twenty enslaved people. Coles began looking for a place to live where he could implement his emancipation plans. He put the Rockfish Plantation up for sale. But his career path suddenly changed, distracting him from his objective.

Working for President Madison

Edward Coles' older brother Isaac had a position as President Madison's personal secretary. When Isaac Coles resigned in December 1809, Madison invited his former secretary's younger brother to take his place.

Coles accepted. He moved to Washington, D.C., and hired a manager to run Rockfish Plantation in his absence. Coles decided not to sell his land in the depressed market. Unable to pay off the inherited $500 debt, Coles struggled to avoid getting further in the hole. He remained a slaveholder.

Coles resigned as Madison's secretary in the spring of 1815. Now 28 years old, he refocused on his plan to leave Virginia, free his slaves, and resettle them and himself in an antislavery state.

Coles traveled to the northwest frontier to scout out a suitable place. Ralph Crawford, an enslaved coachman in his early forties, accompanied Coles on the trip. They liked the fertile and inexpensive land in Illinois. Coles purchased some land in an attractive spot close to the relatively civilized atmosphere of St. Louis.

A request from the president again distracted Coles from his plans to move west. Madison asked Coles to act as his personal envoy to the Russian czar. It seems that the prosecution of a sex scandal involving the Russian consul in Philadelphia had threatened diplomatic relations between the two countries. Coles accomplished the mission and returned to the United States in the fall of 1817. That same year, Coles' brother Walter purchased Rockfish Plantation. This gave Coles the freedom to start his new life in Illinois.

Footnotes

1. Even if he could afford it, Coles couldn't legally keep the freed workers on as paid laborers: Virginia's Removal Act stipulated that all enslaved people emancipated after 1806 had to leave the state within a year or risk re-enslavement.

2. The division of real property in the will included the enslaved people who worked the land, rather than designating specific individuals. Furthermore, lists of enslaved people did not always include small children. Coles' plans to manumit his human inheritance remained delayed for several years: in the meantime, people died and were born. We do know the exact number of Illinoisans who eventually realized their freedom through Coles' action, and their names. But we know very few details about the enslaved people Coles first inherited in 1808.

3. Isaac Coles' appointment may have had something to do with the fact that his (and Edward's) father and First Lady Dolley Madison's mother had a double-first-cousin relationship. In a typical first-cousin relationship, one of the parents of one cousin is the sibling of one of the parents of the other cousin. In other words, the children of siblings are first cousins. In a double-first-cousin relationship, the cousin's other parents are also siblings. For example, when two sisters marry two brothers, their children are double-first-cousins; this was the case with double-first-cousins John Coles II and Dolley Madison's mother, Mary.

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Coming to Illinois

Leaving Virginia

Coles felt uncertain about his ability to support himself as an Illinois farmer. He asked the new president, James Monroe, for an appointment as Register of Lands in Edwardsville and received the position in March 1819. Around the same time, Coles met with the people of his estate and told them about his plans to leave Virginia for Illinois. Although he didn't say it, they knew the move would mean their freedom.

Two women decided to remain behind. They wanted to stay close to enslaved family members working for Coles' mother. Coles arranged for them to live with his mother at his expense. The rest of the group — at least sixteen people, including a woman named Sukey and her children — elected to go with Coles to Illinois. Coles also secured Sukey's husband Manuel from a neighboring plantation so that he could come along to Illinois with the rest of his family.

They began the journey on April 1, 1819. Led by Ralph Crawford, everyone but Coles traveled by wagon over the Alleghany Mountains to Brownsville, Pennsylvania; Coles followed on horseback. From there, the group traveled by river in two flatboats.

Ceremony on the Ohio River

On the Ohio River the morning after leaving Pittsburgh, Coles had the boats lashed together. He called the enslaved people on deck and told them of his plans to manumit them. As Coles describes the scene, the group reacted with stunned silence. After the news sank in they started giggling and then wept for joy.

The ceremony concluded with Coles presenting the group with a general certificate of freedom listing their names. The document did not include Manuel, Sukey, and their children: the family remained in slavery. On July 4th, 1819, Edward Coles submitted the emancipation paperwork at the Madison County Courthouse.

Sukey and her husband Manuel had five children and a baby on the way. As enslaved people in Coles' estate, Sukey and the children had the option to accompany him to Illinois. But in 1819, Manuel remained bound in slavery to Coles' neighbor for another six years. Coles purchased Manuel's remaining indenture so the family could come to Illinois together. Rather than emancipate Manuel along with the others, Coles pledged to manumit Manuel after he reimbursed Coles' purchase of his time. Manuel's indenture made him unable to provide for his family, so he and Sukey asked Coles to retain her and the children as his slaves in the meantime as the only way to ensure their basic needs would be met.

Footnotes

1. Some sources suggest that up to 24 people owned by Coles left Virginia with him for Illinois. Some of them may have parted ways with Coles and the rest of the group at Louisville, Kentucky. Unfortunately we have no details about any people manumitted by Coles except those who accompanied him all the way to Illinois.

2. Coles described the final overland portion of the journey in a letter to his friend and former president James Madison: "Owing to the very wet spring, a great portion of this flat Country was under water, and most of the little streams were overflowing their banks, and could only be crossed by swiming [sic] or ferrying. This rendered this part of the journey very disagreeable, even to me who was on horseback, but to those in the waggon [sic] or on foot it was inconceivably bad."

3. Sukey and her husband Manuel (we don't know their surname) had five children and a baby on the way. As enslaved people in Coles' estate, Sukey and the children had the option to accompany him to Illinois. But in 1819, Manuel remained bound in slavery to Coles' neighbor for another six years. Coles purchased Manuel's remaining indenture so the family could come to Illinois together. Rather than emancipate Manuel along with the others, Coles pledged to manumit Manuel after he reimbursed Coles' purchase of his time. Manuel's indenture made him unable to provide for his family, so he and Sukey asked Coles to retain her and the children as his slaves in the meantime as the only way to ensure their basic needs would be met.

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Life in Illinois

Edward Coles

Coles set up his initial 80-acre farm homestead in the southwest corner of Section 4 of Pin Oak Township. Prairieland Farm eventually grew to over 400 acres. The area became known at the time as Ridge Prairie.

Coles actually lived in James Mason's home in Edwardsville rather than on Prairieland Farm. He hired Ralph Crawford, Robert Crawford, and Tom Cobb to work the farm along with Manuel. He employed Kate Crawford as the cook.

As Register of Lands at the land office in Edwardsville, Coles administered the orderly sale of lands on behalf of the federal government. The two-man operation located in an office on Main Street included Coles as Register of Lands and Benjamin Stephenson as Receiver of Public Monies. Stephenson collected money from land sales for the Edwardsville Land District. A businessman and president of the Bank of Edwardsville, Stephenson owned 35 slaves. Three months after Coles moved into the office, Stephenson moved out, setting up a new office in "Buncombe" (sometimes referred to as "New Town").

Manuel and Sukey

Sukey and the children legally remained Coles' property while Manuel paid off Coles' purchase of his indenture. But their arrangement with Coles afforded them some autonomy. The family moved as a unit to St. Louis in September 1819. There Manuel could earn a higher wage to pay off Coles more quickly. Soon the family fell on hard times. Their infant daughter, born in August, died in November. The family experienced other hardships but eventually gained their freedom.

Ralph and Kate Crawford

Ralph Crawford died of fever in September 1819.

Coles gifted a quarter section (160 acres) of unimproved land each to Kate Crawford, Robert Crawford, and Tom Cobb, in what is now Knox County (then part of Madison County). However, all three, along with Kate Crawford's children, initially remained living and working on Coles' farm. In the farm's second and third seasons, Coles paid for all the farm expenses including stock, tools, and food. Robert Crawford, Tom Cobb, and Kate Crawford got half the sales rather than a wage. Unfortunately the farm failed to show a profit.

Robert Crawford, Tom Cobb, and more about Kate Crawford

As previously mentioned, Crawford and Cobb each received a quarter section of unimproved land from Coles but initially stayed on Prairieland Farm working for Coles. When the farm failed to show a profit, the two men left Coles' farm for more lucrative work; however, both returned to Prairieland Farm in 1822.

Tom Cobb died in his early forties after falling into a public well. Robert Crawford and his widowed sister-in-law Kate Crawford continued as tenant farmers at Prairieland Farm. They married in December 1826.

In the 1830s, the couple sold their land holdings from Coles in Knox County and purchased land in Pin Oak Township. They moved off Prairieland Farm, but Robert Crawford continued working as Coles' agent and manager. Crawford also pursued a parallel career as a preacher and became known as "Uncle Bobby" Crawford. He pastored Mt. Zion Baptist Church (also known as Ridge Prairie Church) and participated in the Wood River Baptist Association, an early coalition of black Baptist churches. In 1843, the Crawfords sold their land in Pin Oak Township and moved to East Litchfield in Montgomery County, Illinois. Thomas, Kate Crawford's partially paralyzed adult son from her first marriage, went with them.

Polly Crawford and Nancy Gains

Polly Crawford and Nancy Gains didn't work for Coles on Prairieland Farm. Instead they found other employment in Edwardsville. Gains died of fever in her late teens or early twenties. Crawford married Michael Lee in 1822. They had three daughters. The family eventually moved to Decatur, Illinois.

Footnotes

1. What we know about Manuel and Sukey's children: Daughter Frankey got married and lived near St. Louis on the Illinois side of the river. By age fourteen, Wilson became indentured to a St. Louis brickmaker. Alfred went on an expedition to the South Sea.

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Governor Edward Coles

Illinois counted 34,610 individuals in the state overall with a population of 5,456 in Madison County when it achieved statehood in 1818. By 1820, the state had swelled to 55,211 people. Madison County rocketed to 13,550 Illinoisans, almost 25% of the state's population.

Coles earned a reputation for fairness and honesty in his capacity as Register of Lands. In October 1821, about three years after he arrived in Illinois, Coles decided to throw his hat in the race for governor of Illinois.

According to the Illinois Constitution, the incumbent governor could not run for re-election. Coles campaigned throughout southern Illinois. He won, beating second-place finisher Joseph Phillips by only fifty votes. In his inaugural address, Coles called on the legislature to abolish slavery in Illinois. He also recommended revising the 1819 Illinois "Black Code."

The legal status of slavery in Illinois became a more central political issue after the gubernatorial election. Although technically illegal, slavery still existed in the state. Slaves already present in Illinois when it achieved statehood in 1818 remained in slavery. Effective enslavement perpetuated under the ploy of lifetime indentures.

Pro-slavery groups advocated for a convention to amend the Illinois constitution and fully legalize slavery. The conventionists garnered the legislative support necessary to put the convention question to the voters in a referendum.

Coles distributed antislavery literature, wrote articles for the Illinois Intelligencer, and spent large sums of his own money to ensure the defeat of the referendum. The elections on August 2, 1824, resulted in a 57% vote against calling the convention. This ended the push to permanently legalize slavery in Illinois, but Coles made enemies within the state.

Footnotes

1. The 23 sections of the "Black Code" (actual title: An Act respecting free Negroes, Mulattoes, Servants, and Slaves) outlined multiple restrictions on black people's lives. For instance, it required people of color to provide legal documentation of freedom, compelled slaveholders to give bond for any slaves they emancipated, prohibited the employment of free people of color lacking proper documentation, and restricted the movement and assembly of servants and slaves.

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Madison County vs. Edward Coles

In January 1824, Coles received a summons to the Circuit Court of Madison County. The County Commissioners had entered a plea of debt against Coles to the tune of $2,000. Citing Section 3 of the 1819 Illinois "Black Code," the complaint alleged Coles failed to give the required bond of $1,000 for each of the ten slaves he freed who made a home in Illinois. He therefore owed a penalty of $200 for each person freed.

The Illinois Black Code explicitly sought to discourage people from coming to Illinois for the purpose of freeing slaves. The bond requirement made emancipators responsible for ensuring that freed people would not become a financial drain on the state. The Black Code became law on March 20, 1819. Coles and the people he planned to manumit left Virginia for Illinois just two days later.

The Commissioners' complaint against Coles described the ten people he had failed to bond in 1819: Ralph and Kate Crawford and their four children; Ralph Crawford's siblings, Robert and Polly; Thomas Cobb; and Nancy Gains.

The case went to trial. Judge John Reynolds presided. James Turney represented the plaintiffs; Starr and Lockwood defended Coles. In September of 1824, a jury found in favor of the County Commissioners. In fact, John Howard, one of the plaintiffs, acted as the jury foreman. The court ordered Coles to pay $2,000.

Coles requested a retrial. In the meantime, Illinois residents had decided the fate of slavery in Illinois: the conventionists hoping to legalize slavery had been defeated the month before the verdict. On January 3, 1825, the Illinois General Assembly passed a law absolving violators of Section 3 of the Black Code from penalties. The Supreme Court of Illinois ruled in favor of Coles on appeal.

None of the ten people Coles manumitted had become financial dependents of the county in the five years since 1819 when they had gained their freedom. But in 1824, pro-slavery Illinoisans sought to force a constitutional convention and legalize slavery in the state. The conventionists used the legal battle to undermine Coles' reputation and distract his attention and financial resources from fighting to prevent the convention.

Footnotes

1. None of the ten people Coles manumitted had become financial dependents of the county in the five years since 1819 when they had gained their freedom (see Life in Illinois in this online exhibition). But in 1824, pro-slavery Illinoisans sought to force a constitutional convention and legalize slavery in the state. The conventionists used the legal battle to undermine Coles' reputation and distract his attention and financial resources from fighting to prevent the convention.

2. The Illinois Black Code wasn't repealed in full until 1865. John Jones, a wealthy freeborn black abolitionist, led the repeal effort.

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Life After Politics

Coles ended his term as governor in 1826 with overwhelming support from the Illinois people. The Illinois Constitution, however, prohibited incumbent governors from running for re-election. Coles then set his eyes on a senatorial seat.

Despite his personal popularity, Coles didn't have any institutional party support. When he ran for the United States Senate in 1831, he found himself at odds with the rising tide of Jacksonian politics. Jackson supporters blamed Coles in part for Jackson's defeat in the 1824 presidential election. Coles' persona as a polished Virginian seemed old-fashioned compared with Jackson's rugged frontier image. Coles and Judge Sidney Breese both lost badly to incumbent Joseph Duncan.

After retiring from the political spotlight, Coles moved to Philadelphia. In 1833, he married a much younger Sally Logan Roberts. The couple had three children.

Coles maintained a friendship with former president James Madison. While celebrating Christmastime together at Montpelier, Madison told Coles about a tentative plan to free his slaves in his will. Coles continued the conversation in a letter to Madison from Philadelphia. Encouraging Madison to follow through with his plan, Coles wrote that failing to do so "would be a blot and stigma on [Madison's] otherwise spotless escutcheon." He argued that the debt-free Madison could afford to free his slaves, and proposed a graduated plan of emancipation to be invoked upon Madison's death.

Ultimately, Madison's last will did not provide for freeing his slaves. This disappointed and baffled Coles. He struggled for years to try to understand his friend's decision.

Footnotes

1. Madison left money in his will to the American Colonization Society. He and Coles had both joined the organization, which supported free African Americans' colonization of Africa. Some members, like Coles, saw universal emancipation and emigration as the only means of eradicating slavery. In fact, Coles wrote to Madison that "it [is] impossible for the two races ever to live harmoniously together—or, if they could, I do not think it would be for the interest of either to do so." Others in the American Colonization Society wanted to retain slavery but ship free black people "to Africa." The Society played a role in establishing the colony of Liberia in West Africa.

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A Family Tragedy

Sally Roberts Coles gave birth to her youngest child, Roberts, one month before her husband Edward's 52nd birthday in 1838. The young boy would grow to assume an identity and a life completely different from that of his father.

Edward Coles' decision as a young man to leave Virginia for Illinois defined his life. In Illinois, Coles became his own man politically and ideologically. A generation later, Coles' son left Pennsylvania for the Albemarle County roots his father had rejected. At 22 years old, Roberts' motives may have involved rebellion or romanticism. Clearly his decision to live in a slavery-dependent economy emotionally pained his father.

Roberts started a life in Virginia. He purchased 900 acres, known as "The Plantation," from a relative, and fell in love with Jennie Fairfax of Richmond. A year later, in April of 1861, the Southern soldiers fired on Fort Sumter and the American Civil War broke out.

Roberts joined with his Virginian neighbors to fight for the Confederacy. He and his friends raised a company of ninety volunteers from Albemarle and nearby counties. The "Green Mountain Greys" mustered into the Virginia Infantry's 46th Regiment on July 16, 1861, with Roberts as their captain. The news devastated Coles. He recognized his son's adopted identity as a Virginian would prohibit him from fighting against the South. But he had tried to convince him to go abroad rather than to support the Confederacy and all it represented.

Two days after getting engaged, Roberts and his company left Richmond to aid in the defense of Roanoke Island. The 23-year-old sustained fatal injuries in the battle on February 8, 1862, in North Carolina. He had written a letter to his fiancée, Jennie Fairfax, the previous day:

"The battle has commenced. In five minutes we will be on Roanoke Island. The sight is beautiful — our gun boats and batteries are engaging the enemy in full view and the shot and shell are whistling around us. If I fall, God grant you a happy life, as happy a one as I would have tried to have a role in. Be assured my last thoughts on earth will be of you, my dearest Jennie. Your picture will be the last sight I see if time is given me to look once more upon it. I have volunteered for this service. What honor I crave is only craved that you may share it. May God Almighty bless you and may we meet in the world to come if denied that blessing again here. And now I strike for Virginia. Again Goodbye. Yours forever, Roberts Coles"

In October 1861, both Coles and Roberts wrote to Col. John Rutherford (married to Coles' sister Emily) about Roberts' decision to fight for Virginia. Roberts wrote: "Although born in Philadelphia, I have always regarded myself as a Virginian. Virginia is the land of my father." Coles wrote: "From what has occurred, and will probably occur, there is little or no prospect of my ever being again happy."

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Legacy

Edward Coles died in his home on Spruce Street on July 7, 1868, at the age of 81. He now lies entombed in a family plot at Woodland Cemetery in Philadelphia. A monument to his memory stands at the Valley View Cemetery in Edwardsville, Illinois.

Coles had a firm grasp of the indefensibility of owning human beings, despite underappreciating the urgency of effecting justice and misunderstanding the concept of racial equality. Coles walked the talk in his personal and public life. Inspired by Thomas Jefferson and mentored by James Madison, Coles exhorted these monumental men to lead by personal action regarding emancipation. But Jefferson and Madison both avoided the issue.

The death of his son on the Confederate battlefield, fighting to preserve enslaving others as a way of life, provides a poignant end to Coles' story. It must have deeply anguished Coles that the people he respected and loved diverged with him on such a foundational principle. Despite manumitting his own slaves and keeping slavery out of Illinois, Coles ultimately failed to convince those closest to him to change the way they thought about slavery.

An Illinois State Historical Society marker at the grounds of the first Edwardsville town center commemorates the site where Edward Coles stood trial. It includes the following quoted inscription on the importance of education from Governor Edward Coles' second message to the legislature on November 16, 1821:

"To preserve a continuous line of generations that liberty obtained by the valor of our forefathers, we must make provisions for the moral and intellectual improvement of those who are to follow."
— Quotation on the Illinois State Historical Society marker commemorating the trial of Governor Edward Coles, installed in 1999.

Fittingly, two Lincoln Schools (both segregated and desegregated) previously educated the town's students where the marker now stands. Today the Mannie Jackson Center for the Humanities occupies the adjacent lot.

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Bibliography

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• Norton, W.T. Edward Coles: Second Governor of Illinois: 1786-1868. Philadelphia: J.P. Lippincott, 1911. Available at the Madison County Archival Library.
• One of Many [i.e. Coles, Edward]. "No. 1: To the Citizens of Illinois." Illinois Intelligencer, May 14, 1824.
• One of Many [i.e. Coles, Edward]. "No. 3: To the Citizens of Illinois." Illinois Intelligencer, May 28, 1824.
• One of Many [i.e. Coles, Edward]. "No. 4: To the Citizens of Illinois." Illinois Intelligencer, June 4, 1824.
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• "Roberts Coles, Green Mountain Grays, 46th Virginia Infantry." Accessed March 2020. scottsvillemuseum.com
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