(MILITARY SPANISH AMERICAN WAR) Papers of Lieutenant James

Sale 2471 - Lot 273

Price Realized: $ 5,500

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 1,500 - $ 2,500

(MILITARY--SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR.) Papers of Lieutenant James B. Coleman as a soldier and educator. Many hundreds of items in one box (1 linear foot); some items with moderate to heavy wear, approximately 10% of the collection on fragile paper and not examined. Vp, 1896-1938

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James B. Coleman (1858-1935) was an 1889 graduate of Lincoln University and a teacher from Moberly, MO who served as first lieutenant of the 7th and 48th United States Infantry Regiments in the Philippine theater of the Spanish-American War--the first in which African Americans served as company officers on a large scale. This collection includes hundreds of items from Coleman's war service, including his cabinet card portrait, 48th Infantry pin, lieutenant shoulder strap, 28 letters to his wife from training camp in 1898, 17 letters from his wife, 1899-1901, troop rolls, personnel papers, official reports and correspondence, 3 manuscript maps of patrols in the Philippines, and more. In 1900, he acquired an unpublished 35-page manuscript on the Philippines' third-most common language, Ilocano, titled "Breve Compendio de Gramatica Yloco-Castellano" by Tranquilino Pagadiaro (included here).
After the war, Coleman returned to Columbia, MO, where he operated Coleman's Hand Laundry and served as president of the Fred Douglass School. He was active in fraternal organizations, serving as a grand officer of the United Brothers of Friendship and Sisters of the Mysterious Ten. All of these activities are reflected in his papers, as well as correspondence of his wife Julia F. McWhorter Coleman (1866-1935), who was also active in the school. Closing out the collection is a manuscript eulogy delivered at his funeral.