John W. Coleman
ID # 3631, (1786-1862)
| Father | William Coleman |
| Mother | Mary Wilson |
| Birth | John W. Coleman was born on 10 April 1786 at New Jersey. |
| Marriage | He married Margaret Hayes, daughter of Moses Hayes and Mary (--?--), on 15 April 1806. The date of marriage for John and Margaret is taken from War of 1812 pension card information as found on Familysearch. |
| Death | He died in 1862 at Poplar Grove, Boone Co., Illinois. |
| Burial | He was buried at Poplar Grove Cemetery. |
| Note | The list of siblings that we have for John W. Coleman is provided by a family source and, in part, by the Bell-Cornwell Family Record, by Frances Bell Fordyce. The list goes back to the family of Phoebe Coleman and her husband Gabriel Cornwell. The list of children that we have for John W. Coleman and Margaret Hayes is also found in the Bell-Cornwell Family Record. Most, though not all, of these children can be confirmed independently. Some confusion does exist in early records. At least two sources locate the family in Beverly, Leeds County, Ontario, in the 1820s. This is the result of a misunderstanding of Ontario geography. More than adequate documentation exists to locate the family in Beverly Township of the Gore District (later in Wentworth County) from at least 1822. John W. Coleman appears in Beverly Township at the time of the 1825 census. He has: Males under 16 5 Females under 16 1 Males over 16 1 Females over 16 1 Total 8 The above 1825 census does raise an interesting issue. Phoebe, born approximately 1824 probably qualifies as the female under 16. The one male and one female over 16 will be John and his wife Margaret. This leaves the question of Mary, said to be born 10 July, 1807, and Sarah, said to be born 15 December, 1808. For the era, it is just possible that they were already married. It is also possible that they were deceased. Certainly, no further records for Mary and Sarah have been found. The names and dates of birth are from a Cornwell source and have at least the look of being taken from a family bible. (Probably, these sources go back to the Bell-Cornwell Family Record.) If any children of John W. Coleman and Margaret Hayes remained in Ontario, other than William who went to Caradoc, and James who remained in Beverly, it is unknown, but it is possible that daughters Mary and Sarah married young men from the Beverly area. We do not have a record of such marriages, however, so this remains uncertain. Substantive documentation for the presence of John W. Coleman in the Township of Beverly exists in the form of a file regarding a contentious land claim. This appears at the Archives of Ontario on microfilm, MS657 reel 33 (Second Heirs and Devisees). This covers a half lot of land known as the south half of lot 6 on concession 1. It refers to an agreement to purchase the land from John Mucklehone of Stamford Township in the District of Niagara dated 1829. The widow of John Mucklehone did not consider the transaction to be complete. Further money changed hands and an envelope is photocopied onto the microfilm which authorizes William H. Coleman to complete the deal with the monies in the envelope. It is signed by John W. Coleman. The date on the envelope is 1834. The land transaction was completed in 1835 and appears on the Abstract Index list for their property in Beverly. The original land transaction with John Mucklehone places John W. Coleman in Beverly in 1829. Beverly land assessments place him there from at least 1822. The abstract index for lot six on the first concession dates John's gaining the Crown Grant for the south half of this property on 21 January 1835. He sold this on 3 March 1835 to his son William H. Coleman. On 16 April 1838, William H. Coleman and his wife sold this property. (Abstract indexes were not created until 1867 in response to a law of the day. Mostly, they provide us with a degree of accuracy, but care needs to be taken. One unfortunate aspect of the AIs is that, if a dispute arose to do with ownership, as it did with the Mucklehone-Coleman transaction, and if the Second Heirs & Devisees Commission made a decision, then it had the force of the Crown. The clerks then tended - not always - to only list the history of the lot from the commissioner's decision, thus wiping out any previous history on the lot. Such might be reconstructed from township assessments or from the Township Paper's file specific to the lot. In the case of the Mucklehone-Coleman property, S-1/2 lot 6, concession 1, from what information there is to be found, John Mucklehone was the original recipient of the Crown Grant, so there was only one previous owner involved.) The 1842 census taken at Brantford Township shows a John Coleman with three persons in the household. The two adults are both born in the U.S. A young male between the age of 14 and 18 is present for the third person and may be Moses Coleman. Some sources state that John W. Coleman was born in Reading, Berks, Pennsylvania, as was his wife Margaret. The 1850 census in Boone, Illinois, however, states that he was born in New Jersey and that his wife Margaret was born in Pennsylvania. The 1860 census at Boone shows both John and Margaret as being born in New Jersey. Such census evidence as we have, indicates that John was born in New Jersey and that Margaret was born in Pennsylvania. The Bell-Cornwell Family Record (section 2, page 1), tells that John W. Coleman fought in the War of 1812. He is said to have enlisted in Captain Daniel Kline's Company at Stewardsville, New Jersey, on or about September 10, 1812. He was discharged on or about September 15, 1814, at either Buffalo or Black Rock, and was a veteran of the Battle of Lundy's Lane. This has yet to be verified. |
Children of John W. Coleman and Margaret Hayes |
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| Last Edited | 18 Jul 2022 |