University of Virginia Library

FREDERICK WILLIAM COLEMAN

Frederick William Coleman, third son of Thomas Burbage
Coleman and Elizabeth Lindsey Coghill, was born on his father's
estate—"Concord"—in Caroline county on August 3, 1811. He
was sprung from the best English blood in Virginia, and from an
ancestry noted for intellectuality. His grandfather, Daniel
Coleman, who had been an officer in the Revolution, presided for
many years over a school at Concord, and was succeeded by his
son Thomas Coleman, father of Frederick William, who, in turn,
was succeeded by his sons Atwell and James.

Frederick William Coleman received his preparatory training
in his father's school, and, when twenty-one years old, entered
the University of Virginia. At that time he was described as
"an almost perfect type of Herculean young manhood—six
feet, two inches in height, deep of chest and long of limb—a
fellow of infinite jest, the soul of every company with his
quaint flahes of merriment, yet withal possessed of a strong

passion for scholarship." Before matriculation in the University,
he had settled upon teaching as his profession, and it was to
better qualify himself for his chosen calling that he went to the
University. So assiduous was he in his studies that within a
short time he was in all his classes a man of mark, and, after
three years of unbroken success, was graduated Master of Arts.

During his residence at the University political excitement
was running high in Virginia, and, although eager student that he
was, Frederick Coleman, like the majority of Virginians, was
borne along on the crest of the wave. His father, Thomas
Coleman, who represented Caroline for years in the Virginia
Assembly, was a "Jeffersonian Democrat" of the strictest sort,
and a firm believer in John Taylor's "strict construction" of
the Constitution, and naturally the son had been bred in
the faith of "States Rights doctrine." "Nullification," "the
Force Bill," "Compromise Tariff," and "the Removal of
Deposits" were among the great questions which threatened
to rend asunder the nation in '32 and '33, and not even in 1860
was there fiercer contention in Congress or more bitter animosity
in humble debate than everywhere prevailed at this time.

Professor John A. G. Davis, a man of notable ability, was
the head of the Law School during these times, and taught law
as a code of principles rather than a line of precedents. Davis
was an ardent States Rights advocate and in his classes in
Constitutional Law argued eloquently, on historical premises,
that the United States Courts had no right to fix by construction
the rights of a State. As in the stirring autumn of 1860 students
"cut" their lectures in the Academic Department to throng the
lecture-room of James P. Holcombe, so, in the exciting days of
'33, was Davis's lecture room crowded with eager students, who
came to hear him discuss the question which Calhoun and Webster
were debating on a larger field—namely, whether the Constitution
were a simple compact or a fundamental law; and, among all his
enthusiastic listeners there was no keener listener than Frederick
Coleman. At that time he became what he remained to the
end of his days—an enthusiastic politician and States Right
advocate.

On graduating, in 1835, he joined his brother, Atwell Coleman,
in the conduct of the school in Caroline, and called it "Concord
Academy," the name by which it afterward became so famous
throughout the entire South.

When, a year or two later, Atwell Coleman removed to
Alabama, Frederick Coleman became the sole proprietor of
Concord Academy, a new order was at once inaugurated. In
his extreme iconoclasm every vestige of the traditional methods
was swept away. His experience at the University of the evils
resulting from multiplicity of rules and regulations, added to
his inbred impatience of all conventionality and restraint, determined
him to try the bold experiment of giving his pupils such
freedom as no school boys had ever known before, and to make
the unwritten law of personal honour, and not the fear of punishment,
the controlling power of the school.

This honour system was as new as it was bold. The Yankee
school masters who had come down in swarms from New England
to Virginia between 1810 and 1830 brought with them all of the
traditions of the colleges in which they had been trained. They
prided themselves on their slyness in espionage, and put a premium
on lying by attempting to compel a boy when "caught in a scrape"
to "peach" on his comrades. They delivered themselves of long
homilies on the sinfulness of fighting and other boyish mischief,
to which the boys listened demurely but with inward rebellion
and contempt. These were the days of "barring out" and "cold
water traps" cleverly set for the deluging of the teacher in his
sudden nightly raids into dormitories, whereby they made
wretched the hapless New England pedagogue, who commonly
revenged himself for the contemptuous insubordination of the
older boys by unmercifully thrashing the smaller ones.

The late Professor Edward S. Joynes, M. A., LL. D., of the
University of South Carolina, in a sketch of his schoolboy life
at Concord Academy, says:

"Concord Academy was a massive brick building, surrounded
by a few log cabins, situated absolutely in the `old fields'—no
enclosure—no flowery walks—no attractions for the eye, such as
I had been accustomed to in the academies I had attended at
the North. Within, all was rude and rough, the barest necessities
of decent furniture—the table abundant, but coarsely served—the rooms devoid of all luxury or grace—no trace of feminine art—nor sound of woman's voice to relieve the first attacks of home-sickness—everything
rough, severe, masculine.

"I looked and inquired after the `Rules and Regulations' of
the School. I found there were none! To my horror I felt

deserted even by the eye of discipline. It seemed to me the
reign of lawlessness with utter desolation and loneliness.

"But I soon found that there reigned at Concord the one
higher law—Be a man! That what I thought solitude and
helplessness was the lesson of individuality: Be yourself. As
for discipline there was none in the usual sense of the term.
Be a man—be a gentleman—nothing more. Far too little, indeed
nothing at all of those rules, those proprieties, those methods
that belong to the well-regulated school.

"Obedience and truthfulness were the only virtues recognized
or inculcated at Concord—obedience absolute to Frederick Coleman—his
will was law, was gospel, was Concord. There was not
a boy, even those who loved him most, who did not fear him
absolutely. And truthfulness with courage. All else was forgiven
but lying and cowardice. These were not forgiven, for they were
impossible at Concord."

Not less extraordinary was the absence of all rules in regard
to the preparation of tasks and hours of recitation. The boys
studied when and where they chose, and the length of time given
to a class varied from thirty minutes to three hours, according to
the judgment of the instructor. The boys were often aroused
in the night, sometimes long after midnight, and summoned to
the recitation room by "Old Ben," the fathful negro janitor, who
equally feared and worshipped his master. A sharp rap at the
door, and the familiar cry, "Sophocles, with your candles, young
gentlemen," would send the youngsters tumbling out of bed in
the long winter nights, and each fellow, with his tallow dip, would
sit until the small hours of the morning, and never a sleepy eye,
while "Old Fred" expounded Antigones or Ajax.

Professor Gray Carroll, who took a brilliant Master's degree
at the University of Virginia in 1855, relates the following: "On
one occasion, Coleman, in giving out the lesson, inadvertently
announced the wrong day for the next recitation. The class
determined to take advantage of his absent-mindedness and go
fishing. Silently and swiftly they sped away to the fishing hole,
two miles distant, and were just casting their line, with many a
chuckle over their prospective holiday, when their blood was
frozen by the terribly familiar cry: "Ripides, young gentlemen,
right away; Mars Fred is waitin'."

The law of place, continues Professor Carroll, was as uncertain
as that of time, and in the long summer days, "Old Fred," in

shockingly scanty attire, surrounded by his eager pupils in like
scanty raiment, would lie on the soft sward under the great
trees and "hold high converse with the mighty dead."

Governor John L. Marye, who entered Concord in 1838, writing
to W. Gordon McCabe, said: "My schooling, up to the time I
entered Concord, had been under the tuition of old-fashioned
teachers, chiefly imported from the North. Going from a town
and having been for five years under the instruction of what was
dubbed `The Classical and Mathematical Academy of Fredericksburg,'
I entered Concord with some complacent idea as to my
comparative scholarship with that of the average boy. You will
not doubt that my first experience as a pupil under Mr. Coleman
was a startling and humbling revelation to my young and callow
mind. My recollection is that he succeeded on the very first
day of my appearing in class before him in convincing me that
much which I valued as my acquirements had to be summarily
unlearned. Then followed day by day that exhibition by him of
the elevated, enlightened and philosophical method of instruction,
which marked his teaching and made his school the pioneer in the
grand line of academies, which followed in Virginia."

Professor Edward Joynes further says: "I cannot analyze or
describe Frederick Coleman's teaching. I only know that I
have seen no such teaching since, and I have sat at the feet of
Harrison and Courtney and McGuffey at home, and Haupt and
Boeckh and Bopp abroad. It was just the immeasurable force of
supreme intellect and will, that entered into you and possessed
you, until it seemed that every fibre of your brain obeyed his
impulse. Like `The Ancient Mariner' he `held you with his
glittering eye' and like him `he had his will' with you. If I
should try to define its spirit, it would be by the word of self-forgetfulness.
If I should try in a word to define its method,
it would be concentration. But, indeed, Frederick Coleman's
teaching cannot be analyzed except by saying that it was Frederick
Coleman himself. He was a man of massive power of body,
mind, will. Through this power he dominated his boys—impressed
himself upon them—wrought himself into them—controlled
them by his mighty will-power—roused them by his mighty
sympathy. As a teacher, he was the greatest of his age—there
has been no other like him."

Coleman's temper, says McCabe, was furious when aroused,
and the stoutest lad quailed before it. Against anything that

savoured of baseness or meanness, his indignation knew no
bounds. Two things he would never forgive—lying and cowardice.
He accepted a boys word implicity, and if he deceived him he
must go. Fighting he allowed, but he was always ready to
mediate, and, if that failed, he was equally ready to see that the
fight was a fair one. Bullying he would not tolerate. If, after
the fight, anything remained unforgiven, he would adjudicate,
and the boys were required to shake hands.

The whole nature of the man was instinct with honesty and
truth, and his high personal courage was proverbial. One of the
traditions gloried in by Concord boys was of the day, famous
in the annals of Caroline, when he vanquished single-handed
six strapping bullies who had long been the terror of the court
green.

Lewis Coleman, a nephew of Frederick Coleman, came to
Concord in 1846 as Assistant Master, and, under his guidance,
regularity, method and conventionality, with which the Master
was so impatient, came to have a larger place in the school.

In 1849, after fifteen years of phenomenal success, he suddenly
decided to close the school. He urged many reasons for the
step to his intimates, who remonstrated against his purpose,
chief among which was his plan to further the fortunes of his
nephew, Lewis Coleman, who had determined to establish a
school of like grade in Hanover. In this plan he was successful,
for the year in which Concord closed its doors, saw the establishment
of Hanover Academy, which was simply a removal of Concord
to Hanover. This new institution flourished, as had Concord.
In 1859, Lewis Minor Coleman accepted the chair of Latin in
the University of Virginia. His service in the University was
brief. He entered the Confederate Army as captain of a light
battery and rose to be Lt. Colonel of Artillery. He was killed
on the historic field of Fredericksburg. Upon the retirement of
Coleman, Hillary P. Jones became Head Master of Hanover
Academy and remained in this position until Virginia seceded and
actively entered the Civil War, when he, and the majority of
the students, joined the Confederate forces.

The Old Master of Concord Academy retired with an easy
competence, but after a brief period of leisure his energetic spirit
called him again into action. He entered the political arena and
was elected a member of the State Senate, but at the end of his
first term he declined to stand for re-election. Being an ardent

State Rights advocate he championed the cause of the South
and confidently believed in success of her cause. He did not
live to see that cause lost at Appomattox for he died in Fredericksburg,
Va., in November, 1860.

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