62 Facts About Edward Coles

Edward Coles was an American abolitionist and politician, elected as the second Governor of Illinois.

From an old Virginia family, Coles as a young man was a neighbor and associate of presidents Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe, as well as secretary to President James Madison from 1810 to 1815.

An anti-slavery advocate throughout his adult life, Edward Coles inherited a plantation and slaves but eventually left Virginia for the Illinois Territory to set his slaves free.

Edward Coles manumitted 19 slaves in 1819 and acquired land for them.

Edward Coles corresponded with and advised both Jefferson and Madison to free their slaves, and publicly supported abolition.

Edward Coles was the youngest male among ten surviving children of John Coles and Rebecca Tucker.

Young Edward Coles determined not to be a slaveholder and not to live where slavery was accepted.

When his father died in 1808, Edward Coles received 12 slaves and a 782-acre plantation on the Rockfish River in Nelson County, Virginia, subject to a mortgage.

Edward Coles went to Kentucky in the summer of 1809 to investigate a land claim of his uncle Travis Tucker, but came home without plans to move to that new state.

Edward Coles placed his plantation for sale in December, 1809, despite the collapsed real estate market during the depression of 1807, and began to plan for a move to the Northwest Territory.

Edward Coles turned down offers to exchange his slaves for other property, but honored the requests of his family and neighbors to keep his plans secret from his slaves.

The Edward Coles family was one of the First Families of Virginia.

Edward Coles's maternal grandfather was born in Bermuda, and related to Virginia jurist St George Tucker.

Mary Edward Coles married Robert Carter and moved to his nearby Redlands plantation.

Some months after taking office as President, James Madison invited Edward Coles to become his private secretary.

Neighbor James Monroe convinced Edward Coles to accept that secretarial position, and Coles served from January 1810 to March 1815, despite intervals of ill-health.

However, Edward Coles developed a good relationship with Madison, with whom he would often speak with "perfect candor", and formed a lasting admiration for the president.

Edward Coles gained political experience as Madison's assistant, served as his primary emissary to Congress, and managed much of the patronage flowing from the 162-employee executive branch.

Edward Coles met John Adams during a tour of north-eastern states in 1811.

Edward Coles spent considerable time in Philadelphia receiving medical treatment from Dr Physick, among others, as well as began a long friendship with Nicholas Biddle, who became controversial as a banker and anti-slavery advocate.

Edward Coles wrote letters to President Madison and to relatives expressing dissatisfaction with the high land prices in Ohio, then with squatters, real estate speculators and fraudulent businessmen as he travelled further west into the Indiana Territory.

Edward Coles extolled such enthusiasm about Illinois that Birkbeck bought land, moved and established a settlement.

In 1814 Edward Coles wrote a letter to his Albemarle County neighbor Thomas Jefferson, asking the former President to again embark on a campaign of emancipation and publicly work for an end to slavery in Virginia.

At age 71 and generally retired from politics and because Virginia law did not allow for emancipation of slaves, Jefferson declined Edward Coles' request, advising his young friend and associate to stay in Virginia to help in the long-term demise of slavery.

Edward Coles' disappointment is clear in his return letter of September 26,1814, in which he referred to the example of revolutionary leader Benjamin Franklin who late in life campaigned for abolition.

Edward Coles bought land in the American Bottom in Illinois Territory.

Edward Coles participated in the Illinois Constitutional Convention at Kaskaskia, Illinois after Indiana became a state.

Edward Coles worked with Baptist John Mason Peck, Methodist Peter Cartwright, Quaker James Lemen, and publisher Hooper Warren to successfully oppose a faction that wanted to legitimize slavery in the new territory's constitution.

Edward Coles then returned to Virginia, planning to display his deep moral objections to slavery and finally manumit the slaves he inherited from his father after leaving the Commonwealth.

In late March 1819, having collected the final payment from Walter, Edward Coles was ready to move to the Illinois Territory.

Edward Coles sent his trusted slave Ralph Crawford with wagons and 16 other slaves ahead on the Great Wagon Road north to Pennsylvania.

Edward Coles selected a point west of Pittsburgh to announce to his slaves their immediate freedom and his plan to provide land to each head of a family.

Edward Coles captured the scene in an autobiographical piece written some 25 years later.

The Coles party arrived in Edwardsville, early in May 1819, and Coles began his service as Register of Lands.

Edward Coles completed the manumission process by purchasing land so as to give each freed head of family 160 acres.

Edward Coles provided employment and other ongoing support for those he had freed.

Edward Coles had left Illinois on election day believing he had lost, and received the news of his victory while in Virginia recovering from bilious fever.

Edward Coles accordingly cleared up his land office accounts in Washington, DC and returned to Illinois.

Edward Coles' bold call for an end to slavery stiffened their resolve and led to a rancorous legislative effort which began with the Shaw-Hansen Affair.

Governor Edward Coles led the opposition to a bill approving a referendum to hold another constitutional convention, recognizing it as a dishonest attempt to more clearly legalize slavery in the state.

Finally, a lawsuit that political opponents in Madison County, Illinois brought against Edward Coles for failing to pay a slave tax on his freed slaves years earlier took several more years, including shenanigans by pro-slavery judge Samuel McRoberts, before the Illinois Supreme Court ruled such payment unnecessary.

Edward Coles focused on agricultural and business pursuits, between continued trips to Virginia and Philadelphia to visit family and friends and to search for a wife.

Edward Coles had been out of public view for some years, and refused to align himself with any political party.

Still, Edward Coles felt devastated by the political defeat, and moved back east.

Nonetheless, in 1835, Illinois legislators authorized Edward Coles to sell bonds to finance his canal project, but since they refused to back the bonds with state credit, sales proved slow.

Worried about his unmarried status and increasing partisanship, Edward Coles decided to leave Illinois shortly after his election loss.

Edward Coles made another trip to Virginia, which was involved in its own debate over slavery after Nat Turner's rebellion.

Edward Coles moved to Philadelphia in 1832, gratified by its active social and intellectual life, as well as slavery's absence.

At age 46, Edward Coles married prominent socialite Sally Logan Roberts on November 28,1833.

Sally Edward Coles inherited significant property upon her father's death, but it was devastated by the Panic of 1837.

Edward Coles unsuccessfully sought political appointments from his Virginia classmates who had become high federal officials, John Tyler and Winfield Scott.

Edward Coles was elected as a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1839.

However, Edward Coles never resumed his political career, uncomfortable with the new party system.

Edward Coles was recognized as one of the few remaining men with close personal knowledge of both Madison and Jefferson, and burnished their reputations as champions of the republican ideals that had motivated Coles during his entire life.

Edward Coles had lobbied both Jefferson and Madison to free their slaves.

Edward Coles was surprised when Madison failed to do so, only later learning that lawyer Robert Taylor had persuaded the former President to leave emancipation instructions for his widow, whose father had gone bankrupt after freeing his slaves many years earlier.

Roberts Edward Coles died during the Battle of Roanoke Island, February 8,1862.

Edward Coles died, aged eighty one years, in his home on July 7,1868.

In 1895 Mary Edward Coles secured the re-interment of her brother Roberts from the family cemetery at Enniscorthy.

Edward Coles was among the very few slaveholders who manumitted his slaves entirely as a testament to the republican ethos that was at the heart of the American Revolution and enlightenment.

Edward Coles is noteworthy for his attempts to pressure Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Jefferson Randolph to work to end of slavery in Virginia and for James Madison to free his slaves.

Edward Coles Grove was renamed Gilead when it became the county seat of Calhoun County when Calhoun County was divided from Pike County.