Roxanna Coleman (slave)

Roxanna Coleman was a slave owned by Daniel Coleman, Sr., of Concord, North Carolina. Prior to her marriage to John F. Young, a household slave and blacksmith, Roxanna had two sons, Thomas Clay and Warren Clay, by Rufus Clay Barringer, afterward a Confederate general. A third illegitimate son, Joseph Smith, followed Roxanna's break with Barringer. When slaves married, it was generally accepted that the man's master would purchase the woman; contrary to this usual practice, Roxanna's husband became a slave on the Coleman estate, and the black family was maintained there as a unit.

Rufus Barringer was the descendant of French Huguenots who migrated from France during the early seventeenth century to England and Germany. His grandfather, John Paul Barringer, settled in Dutch Buffalo Creek, now a part of Cabarrus County, North Carolina. Rufus Barringer attended The University of North Carolina, read law under Chief Justice Richmond M. Pearson, and represented Cabarrus County in the House of Commons from 1848 to 1850. He provided inspiration and financial assistance in his son, Warren Clay Coleman's, early business ventures and in his establishment of a cotton mill. He also guided Coleman's early development. By 1895, Warren Clay Coleman was considered one of the South's richest African-Americans. He helped found the National Negro Protective Association and assisted African-American education at Howard University, Livingstone College, and Shaw University. He supported the North Carolina Oxford Orphans' Home and aided Professor R. M. Alexander in developing the Coleman School in Welford, S.C. His philanthropy extended to the Zion Hill Church and Price Memorial Temple in Concord.