Lucretia Newman Coleman

Lucretia Newman Coleman
1890
Born Lucretia H. Newman
1854
Dresden, Ontario, Canada
Occupation writer, journalist
Years active 1883–1894

Lucretia Newman Coleman (1854 –?) was an African-American writer born in Canada to a fugitive slave. Fluent at the end of the nineteenth-century, her works were praised by her contemporaries of the African-American press.

Early life

Lucretia H. Newman was born in Dresden, Southwestern Ontario, Canada to Nancy D. (née Brown) and William P. Newman.[1][2][3][4] Her father was a runaway slave from Virginia, who was ordained as a Baptist minister after attending Oberlin College in 1842 and 1843. He pastored for a few years at the Union Baptist Church of Cincinnati, making numerous mission trips to Canada. After the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 passed, he settled his family in Ontario, where they remained until 1859.[5][6] During this time, Lucretia was born around 1854.[7] At that time, the family of six went to Haiti to investigate the possibility of settling there, but the prevalence of Catholicism made him turn his sights to Jamaica. In 1863, he determined to return to the United States and settled again in Cincinnati, resuming his pastorate at Union Baptist. He died in 1866 during a cholera epidemic.[5][6][8]

Some accounts state that Newman's mother died after the family moved to Appleton, Wisconsin, and a 13-month illness ensued.[9] Others state that when the family moved to Appleton in 1867 following Rev. Newman's death, the family matriarch was Newman's step-mother, Sarah Cleggett Newman.[7][Notes 1] The family lived a block away from the Cleggett family home in Appleton.[7] In 1872, Newman enrolled in Lawrence University to study sciences, as one of the first black students at the university. Some of her biographers have said that Newman graduated from Lawrence, but university archives show she was only there for two years and did not earn a degree.[7][14] The family left Appleton in 1876.[7][14]

Career

After her studies, Newman became a music teacher and worked in a dry goods store, before being hired as a secretary and book keeper for the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1883.[9][15] That same year, her first known work, "Lucille of Montana", was published in Our Women and Children to acclaim.[9] In 1884, Newman married Robert J. Coleman in Des Moines, Iowa[7][16] and soon afterwards moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Their daughter, Alberta Roberta was born in 1886 while they lived in Minnesota,[7][17] Coleman's home included her brother Albert Newman.[18][17] Through the 1880s and 1890s, she published in such volumes as the A.M.E. Church Review and the American Baptist[9] and her works were widely praised in black journals for the scientific and philosophical depth of the writing.[19][20] Her novel, Poor Ben: A Story of Real Life (1890), was critically acclaimed by her contemporaries[20] and in 1894, she served as a vice president of the Colored Authors' Association.[21]

By the 1920s, she and her daughter were living in Chicago, where she listed her occupation as dressmaker.[7]

Notes

  1. ↑ The 1851 Canadian Census of Chatham, Kent County, Canada West enumerated a W. P. and a Nancy D. Newman.[10][11] A Nancy D. Newman died in 1859 and was buried in the British American Institute Cemetery, of Dresden, in the Chatham-Kent Municipality, Ontario, Canada[12] On 15 August 1859 in Kent, Ontario, Canada, William P. Newman of Williamsburg, Virginia married Sarah Clegget of Pennsylvania.[13]

Selected works

  • Coleman, Lucretia H. Newman (1890). Poor Ben: A Story of Real Life. Nashville, Tennessee: Publishing House of the A.M.E. Sunday-School Union. p. 8. OCLC 919955215.

References

Citations

Bibliography

  • Cheek, William F.; Cheek, Aimee Lee (1996). John Mercer Langston and the Fight for Black Freedom, 1829-65. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-06591-0.
  • Dix, Erin (18 January 2013). "Lucretia Newman Coleman". Lawrence Archives. Appleton, Wisconsin: Lawrence University. Archived from the original on 6 September 2015. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • Jackson, Eric R.; Cooper, Richard (2014). Cincinnati's Underground Railroad. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4396-4461-4.
  • Majors, Monroe A. (1893). Noted Negro women, their triumphs and activities (Reprint 1971 by Freeport, New York: Books for Libraries Press ed.). Chicago, Illinois: Donohue and Henneberry. ISBN 0-8369-8733-0.
  • Nelson, Jessica A. (1996). "Lucretia Newman Coleman (18??–??)". In Smith, Jessie Carney. Notable Black American Women. II. New York, New York: Gale Research Group. pp. 124–125. ISBN 978-0-8103-9177-2.
  • Penn, Irvine Garland (1891). The Afro-American press and its editors. Springfield, Massachusetts: Willey & Company. OCLC 503673564.
  • Scruggs, Lawson Andrew (1893). Women of Distinction: Remarkable in Works and Invincible in Character. Raleigh, North Carolina: L. A. Scruggs. OCLC 4255360.
  • Taylor, Henry Louis (1993). Race and the City: Work, Community, and Protest in Cincinnati, 1820-1970. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-01986-9.
  • "1851 Canada Census, Chatham, Kent County, Canada West (Ontario)". FamilySearch. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Library and Archives Canada. 1851. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "1851 Canada Census, Chatham, Kent County, Canada West (Ontario)". FamilySearch. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Library and Archives Canada. 1851. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "1895 Minnesota State Census, Minneapolis, Wards 5-6". FamilySearch. St. Paul, Minnesota: State Library and Records Service. June 11, 1895. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "1900 U. S. Census, Minneapolis, Ward 5". FamilySearch. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration. June 9, 1900. NARA publication series T623. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "Colored Authors' Association". Washington, D. C.: The Washington Times. July 27, 1894. p. 2. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "Iowa, County Marriages, 1838–1934". FamilySearch. Salt Lake City, Utah: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 3 July 1884. GS Film #001014766. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "Kent County marriage register, 1858–1869". FamilySearch. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: The Archives of Ontario. 1859. Archives of Ontario film #MS 248, reel 8. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "Lucretia H. Newman Coleman" (PDF). Neighborhood News. Appleton, Wisconsin: Old Third Ward Neighborhood Association. Winter 2016. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 July 2016. Retrieved 26 February 2017.
  • "Nancy D. Newman". Find A Grave. July 18, 2009. Retrieved 26 February 2017. Only photograph of tombstone being used as reference.
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