Thomas Jordan Coles

Notes:

Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography, Volume V

Name: Thomas Jordan Coles (cont.)

Thomas Jordan Coles, youngest of the six children of Walter (2) and Lavinia Catherine (Jordan) Coles, was born at Coles Hill, Pittsylvania county, Virginia, July 5, 1875. He attended the local schools until he was eleven years of age, then entered the Kenmore University High School at Amherst Court House, Virginia. He was afterward successively a student at Greenwood School, Greenwood, Virginia, Keswick School for Boys, Cobham, Albemarle county, Virginia, and Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, in the last-named institution taking a teacher's course, after entering the pedagogical profession. He began this career when he was eighteen years of age and continued therein until his thirtieth year, in that period holding positions as principal in several of the leading academies of the state. For the three following years he engaged in the insurance business, returning to Chatham in 1907 and establishing in that line, in December, 1909, being appointed by the court treasurer of Pittsylvania county, the largest county in the state, assuming the duties of the office on January 1, 1910. At the election of 1912 he was returned to this position without opposition, his present term expiring in 1916. Immediately after returning to Chatham, Mr. Coles was elected clerk of the local school board, and for the past six years he has been a vestryman of the Episcopal church at that place. His fraternal societies are the Masonic order, Pittsylvania Lodge, No. 24, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Royal Arch Chapter, No. 56; Dove Commandery, No. 7, Knights Templar; Acca Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine; the Modern Woodmen of America, No. 11641; the Junior Order of United American Mechanics, No. 117; the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, No. 227, Danville, Virginia. In the administration of the finances of the county he has displayed careful ability and systematic thoroughness that have gained him much favorable mention, and among the public servants of Pittsylvania county there is none who holds the respect and confidence of its citizens to a greater degree than does Mr. Coles. He is backed by generations of men noted in county, state and nation, men whose deeds are written boldly across the history of the country, whose memory he reverences and to whom no shame can be brought through him. Mr. Coles is a busy man of affairs, universally well-regarded, popular because of a pleasing personality, and in him is found all of the loyalty to lofty principles that made his ancestors men of distinction and importance.

Birth:
"Coles Hill", Pittsylvania Co., VA

Notes:

Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography, Volume V

Name: Thomas Jordan Coles (cont.)

Captain Walter (2) Coles, son of Hon. Walter (1) and Lettice P. (Carrington) Coles, was born August 12, 1825, died November 11, 1914. He was educated at Benjamin Hallowel's celebrated school at Alexandria, Virginia, and at the University of Virginia. He entered into the practice of law, but the declining health of his father and mother made it necessary for him to abandon his chosen profession to assume the responsibilities of the management of the Coles Hill estate. With the breaking out of the war between the states he was assigned to a high position in the quartermaster's department with the rank of captain, having charge of much government property and large sums of money. Evidence of the faithfulness of his war record is evinced by personal letters which he had in his possession addressed to Captain Walter Coles, from Quarter Master-General A. C. Myers, Major-General James G. Paxton and Major Johnson. Just before the close of the war he was commissioned to furnish the army of General Lee with all necessary horses but before he could assume charge of this position together with its promotion in rank the surrender came. In 1860 he was a delegate to the Democratic conventions which met in Charleston, South Carolina, and Baltimore, Maryland. In 1869-71 he was a member of the Virginia state legislature, and although he was urged to again become a candidate for re-election, he refused, pleading pressing duties and private responsibilities. For many years after the close of the civil war he was a member of the Democratic committee of Pittsylvania, and during the reconstruction period he worked tirelessly to restore the South to its former high standard and to secure white supremacy in place of ignorant dominion. In public office, in private business transactions, in all occasions of life causing contact with his fellow-men his actions were marked by unfaltering honor and an integrity that left no room for doubt or question. He resided on the home plantation, Coles Hill, Pittsylvania county, Virginia, and despite the weight of almost ninety years took an active interest in the affairs of the day and the home acres. At his death there passed away a splendid type which will soon disappear from our land, a man, a noble gentleman and devoted churchman, a lifelong resident of the county who filled a large and honorable place in its history, full of years and the recipient of the regard and esteem of his countrymen.

He married, in 1862, Lavinia Catherine Jordan, born in Luray, Page county, Virginia, August 3, 1833, died January 20, 1906, daughter of Gabriel and Elizabeth Ann (Sibert) Jordan. Her father, born in 1792, died in 1862, was a patriotic citizen, devoting his life to the improvement of the section of the country in which he lived; a man of many affairs, who had accumulated considerable wealth at the outbreak of the war between the states. Her father fitted out a cavalry company at his own expense, her youngest brother, Macon, being made captain; it being known as Jordan's Cavalry. Her maternal grand-uncle, a Mr. Withers of South Carolina, served with distinction on the staff of General Sumpter. Her Jordan ancestors were of English origin and related to the Washingtons of England. Her grandfather, Thomas Jordan, fought in the revolution, associated with the Marquis De Lafayette. In a letter written years afterward, in 1824, to her father, Gabriel Jordan, of Luray, Virginia, the Marquis De Lafayette regrets his inability to visit him, "The worthy son of my gallant old Comrade in arms, Thomas Jordan." Her brother, Francis, was a captain on General Beauregard's staff. Her brother, Colonel Gabriel Jordan, was a prominent railroad man in the South, being at different times vice-president and general manager of the Mobile & Ohio Railroad, the Memphis & Charleston Railroad, and the Houston & Texas Central Railroad.

Her eldest brother, General Thomas Jordan, for whom Thomas Jordan Coles was named, was a West Point graduate in 1840, two of his classmates having been General U. S. Grant and William T. Sherman, the latter having been his room-mate. General Thomas Jordan entered service at once and early distinguished himself in Florida in the Seminole uprising, 1841 to 1843. While still a lieutenant he served in the Mexican war, his company with three others being the first battalion to cross the Rio Grande, as a cover to the crossing of General Taylor's whole army into Mexico. Later, he was made captain on General Taylor's staff and was assigned to the quartermaster's department, and finally, owing to the illness of his senior, he had charge of all the quartermaster's arrangements, and was the last American soldier to leave the soil of Mexico. His efficiency in this service was especially mentioned by General Twiggs, the commander at Vera Cruz. From 1852 to 1860 he served on the Pacific coast during the suppression of an Indian insurrection in the present state of Washington. In May, 1861, under a sense of superior obligation, he resigned his commission in the United States army and offered his sword and life to his native state, Virginia. He was appointed lieutenant-colonel on the staff of General Phillip St. George Cocke. Colonel Jordan became convinced of the strategic importance of Manassas Junction and the critical necessity of immediately occupying it in force. He successfully commended the movement to General Lee, by whom Colonel Jordan was complimented in a personal letter and assigned as adjutant-general of the forces which were thereupon ordered to assemble there. On June 3rd General Beauregard took command and on July 21st the first battle of Manassas or Bull Run was fought. After the battle Colonel Jordan suggested to General Beauregard that the Federal surgeons be released without parole to which General Beauregard acceded, this being the first time in war that an enemy's surgeons were thus treated as non-combatants. During the Shiloh and Corinth campaigns Colonel Jordan was the adjutant-general of the Confederate army, and then promoted a brigadier-general.

In 1869 General Jordan consented to direct the revolutionary forces of Cuba and was commissioned by the Cuban government commander-in-chief. The odds against him in that campaign are now well known. Spain valued his services against her one hundred thousand dollars which she placed upon his head. General Beauregard in his history pronounced General Thomas Jordan as one of the ablest military organizers living. After the civil war and prior to his services in Cuba, General Jordan had been for a time editor of the "Memphis Appeal." After his return from Cuba to New York he founded the "Financial and Mining Record," and was recognized as an authority on the silver question. General Thomas Jordan was born 1819 in Luray, Virginia, died in New York City, 1895.

Children of Walter (2) and Lavinia Catherine (Jordan) Coles: 1. Walter (3), born July 25, 1863; manager of the Coles Hill farm; married Miss Wooding, of Virginia, and has a son, Walter (4). 2. Russell Jordan, born December 31, 1865, for twenty-five years identified with the tobacco trade of Danville, Virginia. 3. Agnes Cabell, born April 17, 1868; married Edward B. Ambler, of Monroe, Virginia. 4. Lettice Carrington, born September 17, 1870, died in 1882, aged twelve years. 5. Harry Carrington, born February 26, 1873; living in New York City, connected with the United States civil service; married Miss Marshall, of Fauquier county, Virginia, a great-granddaughter of Chief Justice Marshall. 6. Thomas Jordan, of whom further.

Walter married Lavinia Catherine Jordan in 1862. Lavinia was born on 3 Aug 1833 in Luray, Page County, VA; died on 20 Jan 1906. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

DAR # 593761 and # 502396

Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography, Volume V

Name: Thomas Jordan Coles (cont.)

Walter Coles, son of Colonel Isaac, Sr. and Catherine (Thompson) Coles, was born in December, 1790, died at Coles Hill, Pittsylvania county, Virginia, in November, 1857. He was first a lieutenant and later a captain in the American army in the war of 1812, and for ten years held a seat in the Virginia legislature, from which body he was sent to Congress, of which he was a member from 1835 to 1845, his father having preceded him to both law making institutions. He was a man of practical wisdom, unblemished honor and patriotism, and successful in all his undertakings. The Democratic party claimed his allegiance throughout his entire career. He married Lettice P., who died in 1875, youngest daughter of Judge Paul Carrington, Sr. Judge Paul Carrington, Sr., was a son of George Carrington, a member of the Virginia house of burgesses. George Carrington, when a youth of nineteen years, assisted Colonel William Byrd in running the boundary line between Virginia and North Carolina, and in his mature years was a personage of influence and power in his colony. Judge Paul Carrington, Sr. was a member of the Virginia house of burgesses from 1765 to 1775, in which latter year it was replaced by the conventions of the people. In 1765 he voted against Patrick Henry's resolutions in regard to the Stamp Act, considering that the colonies had too few munitions of war with which to oppose a mighty kingdom grown old in waging victorious wars on land and sea. In the journals of the house of burgesses Paul Carrington's name is found as a member of every important committee appointed between 1765 and 1775 He was a member of each of the three conventions of 1775 and was appointed one of the eleven members of the celebrated committee of safety, which at that time held the supreme executive power in the colony. He also sat in the famous Virginia convention of 1776, and on the organization of the new government took a seat in the house of delegates, from which he passed to the bench of the general court and thence to the court of appeals. He was a judge of this latter court until 1811, when, in the seventy-ninth year of his age, he resigned, being succeeded by his nephew, Governor William H. Cabell, and died in 1818, aged eighty-five years. Apart from the invaluable service he rendered his state and country he gave three youthful sons to the Colonial army in the war for independence. Walter and Lettice P. (Carrington) Coles were the parents of: Lettice, died aged fourteen years, and is buried in the Congressional Cemetery, Washington; Isaetta, died in childhood, buried at Coles Hill, Pittsylvania county, Virginia; Isaac, died in childhood, buried at Coles Hill, Virginia; Walter, of whom further; Helen C., died at Coles Hill in 1897; Mildred H., married Colonel Stanhope Flournoy, died in Missouri, in 1901; Agnes C., married Dr. J. G. Cabell, of Richmond, and died January 31, 1901.

Died:
"Coles Hill", Pittsylvania Co., VA

Walter married Lettice P. Carrington. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

DAR # 593761 and # 502396

Notes:

Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography, Volume V

Name: Thomas Jordan Coles (cont.)

Colonel Isaac Coles, son of John (1) and Mary (Winston) Coles, was born in Richmond, Virginia, March 2, 1747, died on his plantation in Pittsylvania county, Virginia, June 3, 1813, and is there buried. He was educated at William and Mary College, Williamsburg, Virginia, was a colonel of militia during the revolutionary war, and was a member of the Virginia legislature in 1783-84-85-87. He was a member of the convention which met in Richmond in June, 1788, to ratify the new Federal Constitution, and there voted against its ratification. He was a member of the first United States Congress which met in New York City in 1789 and there "voted against the adoption of the Constitution as it came from the hands of its framers, for he saw the poison under its wings." It is also on record that he voted to "abolish the slave trade," although a large land-owner and slave-holder himself, while his brother-in-law, Elbridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, voted to continue it. He held his place in Congress until 1797, and while a member of the Philadelphia Congress he voted "to locate the seat of government on the banks of the Potomac. "He was twice married, (first) in 1771, to Elizabeth, died in 1781, daughter of William Lightfoot, of Charles City county, Virginia. They had three children, only one of whom lived to maturity, Isaac (2), who built and lived at a place called Springwood, near Houston, Halifax county, Virginia, and was the grandfather of the late Hon. Paul C. Edmunds and Captain Henry Edmunds, of Halifax county. Colonel Isaac Coles, Sr., married (second) in January, 1790, Catherine Thompson, a "New York belle and beauty," whom he met while attending the New York Congress. She was a daughter of James and Catherine (Walton) Thompson, of New York, and a descendant of the Beekmans. Her sister, Ann, had previously married Elbridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, an old bachelor at the time of his marriage. Elbridge Gerry was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, governor of Massachusetts, member of Congress, vice-president of the United States at the time of his death in 1814, and was once sent abroad on an important diplomatic mission with Pinckney and Marshall. Catherine Thompson, second wife of Colonel Isaac Coles, Sr., was born in New York City in 1767, died in Pittsylvania county, Virginia, in 1848. being buried by the side of her husband. They were the parents of a large family, of one of whom, Walter, further mention is made. Colonel Isaac Coles, Sr., during his political career, lived on the plantation in Halifax county, Virginia, inherited from his father, located at Coles' Ferry on the Staunton river, and about 1800 moved to Pittsylvania county, Virginia. His home in this locality was a plantation of five thousand and fifty-seven acres, which land he had purchased from Philip Lightfoot, a cousin of his first wife. His reason for disposing of his Halifax property was two-fold; because of the malarial conditions there prevalent, which affected both his health and that of his family, and because of financial embarrassment, for the political positions that had taken such a large share of his time had been honorary or with small remuneration attached and wide inroads had been made upon his finances during his long public service. Colonel Isaac Coles, Sr. was known as a great wit and entertaining raconteur, and in the declining years of his life prominent men from all parts of the country journeyed to his home to enjoy his unmatched hospitality and the gleams from the intellect that time had not deprived of its luster.

Died:
"Coles Hill", Pittsylvania Co., VA

Isaac married Catherine Thompson on 2 Jan 1790 in New York City, New York, New York, USA. Catherine (daughter of James Thompson and Catherine Walton) was born in 1767 in New York City, New York, New York, USA; died in 1848 in Pittsylvania County, VA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Papers of Harriet V. Miller.
DAR # 593761 and # 502396 cite Campbell's History of VA, p. 625.
Herringshaw's Encyclopedia of American Biography, p. 196.
Judge Paul was at the VA Conventions of 1774 and 1776 and Member of the Comm. of Safety (the Rev. executive body in VA until formation of the state in July 1776).
"Carrington," by M.E. Tillye, 1843 - Paul's home was called "Mulberry Hill," near the junction of the Little Roanoke and Staunton Rivers.
The Carrington Family of VA, from Natl. Gen. Soc. Quarterly, Vol. 70 (1982), pp. 264.

Paul married Priscilla Sims on 6 Mar 1792 in Charlotte County, VA. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

DAR # 593761 and # 502396
There were also two unnamed infants who died.