Notable Women Ancestors: Elizabeth Martin Colman

Elizabeth was born on 12 June 1744 in Lunenburg, Massachusetts. She was the sixth of twelve children of John Martin and Elizabeth Thomson. The family had moved west from Ipswich about 1739. These were unsettled times on the "frontier" and Lunenburg was the fortified center of the region.

Her father died before she was twelve years old, and a month before the birth of her twin sisters, Prudence and Patience. He had been in the militia, but the cause of his death is not found. The family remained in the area and we must assume that her mother remarried, but the record has not been found. It is hard to imagine being a mother of 12 alone at any time, but somehow she went on. Elizabeth named David Goodridge as her guardian in documents filed with the Worcester County Courts. That is where her signature (above) was found. In 1762 her father’s property was probated and Elizabeth received a parcel of approximately 3.6 acres adjacent to the “widow’s wood lot.” In 1767 the property was transferred to David Goodridge.

When John Martin died his estate included a “note of James Colman.” Elizabeth married James’ son Job on 20 February 1766 in Lunenburg. Her sister Susannah married Job’s brother Benjamin Colman a few years later. Their first child, Mary, was born at or near Lunenburg on 15 October 1766. Son Samuel was born 28 September 1768 in Ashburnham. He was followed by Elizabeth on 11 August 1770.

About 1772 the family moved west to Shelburne. Another son, John, was born on 21 June of that year. Their farm was near the Deerfield River and neighbors included the Parker Dole family. Children born in Shelburne included Rachel Andrews born 21 June 1774 and Benjamin born 3 July 1776, who died just after his first birthday, on 18 August 1777. He was buried in the Shelburne hill cemetery. Other children were lost to an epidemic that summer, including neighbor Enoch Dole.

Job served in the Revolutionary War, marching with the Minutemen on 20 April 1775 for 15 days, and again for 36 days in 1777. The time he was away was short, but the uncertainty of the times must have weighed on the family.

Daughter Rhoda was born in Shelburne 18 May 1778, followed by Benjamin on 9 October 1780, Joseph Emerson on 21 December 1783, Zenus on 21 October 1785, and Zur on 15 June 1789. Elizabeth had borne 11 children before she was 46.

About 1796 the family moved north to Royer Road in the town of Heath, MA. There are reports that they may have operated a tavern. Their property was located at a crossroads known as "Colman's corner." Mary, Samuel, and Rachel had already married. Mary lived nearby with her husband Thomas Town and children. Samuel and Rachel had moved west to central New York state. Shortly after the turn of the seventeenth century Benjamin moved to Vermont and John may have followed to New York.

The Colman family was stricken by typhus, along with some neighbors, in 1805. That summer must have been unimaginably painful for Elizabeth. Rhoda died on 8 July at the age of 27; Zenus died on 2 August at the age of 20; Joseph Emerson died on 5 August at the age of 22. A month later her husband Job died on 2 September at the age of 64, and Elizabeth succumbed on 25 October 1895. She was 61 years old. No monuments mark their graves in the Shelburne hill cemetery. The youngest, Zur, was spared. He lived in Phelps, NY for a time and ended his life in Michigan.

A detailed inventory of the estate was performed and it paints a picture of their domestic life. There was livestock and a sleigh. Their home was populated by a looking glass, a clock, five beds, a chest, a large bible and psalm book, as well as a book of music. The table had seven plates, a fancy bowl, platter, butterboat, teapot. They had 14 sheets, towels and pillow cases. The image "one cotton sock, unfinished" brings a picture to mind of the knitting basket by the fire.

Notable Women Ancestors: Abigail Lawrence Dole

I choose to believe that all of my ancestors were "notable," especially the unsung women. The lives they lived and the changes they experienced are intriguing in a historical perspective.

Abigail Lawrence began her life in colonial north-central Massachusetts, born 26 July 1745 in Groton, MA. She was the eighth of eleven children of Jonathan Lawrence and Tripheuny Powers. The Lawrence family multiplied in the region and she was likely surrounded with extended family as a child. A significant event that has been found in historic records tells us that her oldest brother was in the militia and was captured by Indians in 1748 and taken to Canada for several months. Although only three, the worry of her elders must have had an impact in her life.

Abigail lost her mother when she was only seven. She had older brothers and sisters to guide her and after two years her father remarried. When she was 16 she married Parker Dole, who had also been born and raised in the area. Although he was five years older than she, he had sisters of her age. Could that be how they got acquainted? The couple had four sons in the next ten years: Isaac, Parker, Josiah and Moses. A four year gap may indicate the loss of a baby, but none is found in the records. Their livestock was listed in the Littleton tax valuation of 1771: 2 oxen, 2 cattle, 3 goats and sheep, 1 swine.

Their first daughter Abigail "Nabby" was born in October of 1773 in Ashby, which was about the time the family moved west to Shelburne, on the Deerfield River. Their son Enoch was born in 1776 and died the next year in an epidemic that took many young children in town. We know of at least one other family, the Job Colman family, who came from Ashby and settled nearby. They also lost a son, Benjamin, in August of 1777. Their son Samuel was to become Nabby's husband. Abigail named her next son Enoch as well, born in 1779, and the Colmans had another Benjamin. Enoch was followed by Triphenia, Lydia, Lucy and Levi; in all eleven children over a 30 year period. The circle of life continued, with the older sons beginning their families at the same time that her child-bearing years ended. Most continued to live nearby.

Abigail's husband Parker held several offices in the town of Shelburne including Surveyor of Highways, School Committee, and Constable. He wrote a will in 1813 shortly before he died at 73. All of their children were still living, and only Lucy and Levi were unmarried. Abigail was given 1/3 of the estate during her lifetime. Levi married three times, and we can assume they lived together at the family home. Lucy married in 1826. A structure that was reportedly their home at the end of Barnard Road only recently was razed. It had been empty for years.

When Abigail died January 12, 1829 the newspaper reported that it was accidental. She was 83 years old. Her obituary states, "In her last illness, which continued five months and was particularly distressing, she was sustained by the consolations of gospel hope; a numerous posterity survive her, consisting of 10 children, 58 grandchildren and 50 great-grandchildren."

Samuel Colman comes from Massachusetts to New York State in 1794

Samuel Colman was the first family name, written on a cemetery monument, that started me wondering about my family history. My mother, Betty Coleman Simmons, grew up in Cooperstown, NY and I had many visits there with my grandmother and her sisters. When she photographed Sam's grave marker while passing through Richfield Springs, NY in 1990, I started wondering about the other names I had never heard before. That's when I started to dig into the records. Luckily, Massachusetts vital records are well documented. The following "story" is constructed from these bare facts and supplemented with deeds, newspaper items, letters and published histories.


Samuel Colman was born in colonial Ashburnham, Massachusetts on September 28, 1768. His baptism was recorded on December 22, 1769. He was the second child and first son of Job Colman and Elizabeth Martin. His sister Mary was two years older. His family moved west to Shelburne, MA about 1772. By that time there were two more siblings: Elizabeth born on 11 August 1770, and John born 21 June 1772. Job Colman bought land from Daniel Beldon in Shelburne in 1773. They lived near the Deerfield River, at the end of Barnard Road, near the family of Parker Dole, where another sister, Rachel, was born in 1774.

When the “shot heard round the world” was fired in Concord it was heard in Shelburne. Samuel was a boy of 5. His father Job marched with Captain Hugh McClellen’s Minute Men of Colrain on April 20, 1775. Records show he served 15 ½ days. Again under Captain John Wells Company in the Northern Department, he served from 22 September to 28 October 1777.

Samuel had five more brothers and another sister: Benjamin in 1776 (died in 1777 as many local children succumbed to an illness that year); Rhoda in 1778; Benjamin in 1780; Joseph Emerson in 1783; Zenus in 1785; Zur in 1789.

On 30 June 1794 in Shelburne, 24 year-old Samuel married Nabby Dole, four years his junior. Soon after they moved west into New York State. They settled in Stewart’s Patent, now part of Springfield, Otsego County, NY. According to The History of Springfield, “In his young manhood he journeyed into what was then ‘the unknown west’ seeking a desirable location for a home. Lured by the beauty of the hills and woods he purchased from the town a tract of timber land near Allen’s Lake and erected a log cabin.”

Children born to Samuel and Nabby included:

• Anson 17 March 1795
• Franklin about 1797
• Horace about 1800
• Homer about 1802
• Hamilton 7 October 1804
• Caroline
• Nelson about 1807
• Charles Darwin after 1810
• Parker 1813

Of these children, only Parker was given a family name, after Nabby's father Parker Dole.

In 1798 Samuel was appointed Lieutenant of the militia in a new company in the Town of Otsego, under Captain Asa Fisk (Otsego Herald 14 June 1798).

The 1800 and 1810 census’ of Springfield also include a John Col(e)man. The age bracket indicates that it could be Samuel’s brother John. In 1810 this John had six children. In 1820 he is no longer listed in Springfield. A Heath MA town history, which includes a discussion of the division of their father Job’s land, indicates that John had died by 1812 when the land was probated. No further information has been found about this family. Names of other than the head are not included on the census before 1850.

At the annual town meeting in Otsego in 1803, Samuel was named Commissioner of Highways, with Abner Pier and Israel Loomis (Otsego Herald 10 March 1803).

The Otsego County Registry of Deeds documents the purchase in 1804 of 52½ acres of land by Samuel Colman for $800 from Perry Allen, being a portion of lot 55 of McNeil’s patent. In 1818 he purchased the easterly side of lot 56 from Richard Elwood for $605.

In the summer of 1805 his parents’ family was stricken by typhus, along with several neighbors in Heath, MA where they had relocated. Rhoda, aged 26, died as well as Zenus, aged 19, Joseph, aged 21, then both parents. Their graves in the old Shelburne Hill cemetery are not marked. The youngest, Zur, survived. He was 16. His guardianship is registered in the Hampshire County records. Samuel inherited a portion of the property which was later sold to a neighbor.

In 1814 he was named a justice of Otsego County, along with a long list of others (Otsego Herald 23 April 1814).

On January 1, 1817 “a respectable number of citizens from several towns in the county of Otsego convened at the house of Col. Henry…to consider the expediency of organizing a society for the promotion of Agriculture and the Useful Arts” (Otsego Herald 9 January 1817). Samuel Colman was named Secretary. James (Fenimore) Cooper was also an officer. The Colmans were progressive farmers, taking a strong interest in improved farming methods. Otsego County was reputed for improved agricultural methods, pioneering the introduction and breeding of superior grades of livestock. Samuel Colman subscribed to the Genesee Farmer, which promulgated new methods of agriculture.

At the annual town meeting in Otsego in 1817, Samuel was named School Commissioner with Oliver Cory and Abraham Van Horne (Otsego Herald 6 March 1817.)

Parts of Otsego were annexed to the Town of Springfield in 1825. The description of wards 30 and 31 reference the “School House by Samuel Coleman’s.”

Education was important to the Colmans. Son Anson received medical training under a Dr. Palmer in Richfield Springs. He settled in Rochester, NY, marrying a daughter of founder Nathaniel Rochester. He studied in Boston, Philadelphia, London, and Paris; was instructed in the treatment of cholera in Montreal; lectured at the Geneva NY Medical College for two years (Rochester Historical Society, Publications, 1943).

On July 2, 1830 his youngest child, Parker Dole Colman was drowned in Rochester, NY at the age of 17. He may have been studying there and living with Anson.

Son Hamilton taught school as a young man. He worked a dairy farm near his father’s farm. In 1838 he was Commissioner of Deeds for Otsego County, and he served as town supervisor for Richfield Springs in 1858. His son Norman became the first Secretary of Agriculture under U.S. President Grover Cleveland in 1889, having been commissioner since 1884. He was a teacher, a lawyer, and lieutenant governor of Missouri.

Charles was a lawyer. In 1845 he was "admitted as attorneys and counselors of the Supreme Court" with a list of others. He lived in St. Louis, MO in 1860 and Ann Arbor, MI in 1870.

Between 1841 and 1846 Samuel transferred land to his son Homer. The 1850 census lists Samuel living with Homer. A letter from son Franklin to Horace in 1853 expresses outrage that Homer and his wife “have succeeded in their knavery, they have stealthily and deceitfully taken from Father every vestige of his title Deeds, they have stolen a sacred contract entered into for the support of Father & Mother. They have abused & maltreated our Father & Mother & finally to cap the climax of iniquity they have turned my dear enfeebled Parents out of their own house & taken possession themselves.” The 1855 NY state census lists Samuel and Nabby living with Horace and his wife Nancy.

Of his children, Horace, Homer and Hamilton remained nearby. Franklin, Nelson and Charles went west. A record of Caroline's marriage or death has not yet been found. She will require more research.

Samuel Colman died in Springfield on 22 December 1857 and was buried in Richfield Springs with Masonic Honors. His obituary in the Freeman’s Journal states: “He has held various offices of trust and responsibility, which he discharged with strict fidelity, and now in his 90th year, is ‘gathered to his fathers’ in perfect charity with all mankind, and in the confident hope of a glorious immortality.”

Nabby Colman died less than two years later, on 6 May 1859. She was 85.