The Coleman-Stuart Papers consists of twenty-nine items, mostly bits of correspondence and other manuscripts of A.A. Coleman and W.S. Stuart. The public addresses in the collection, probably written by Coleman, reflect the local prominence of the speaker, as does his Colonel's commission in the 40th Alabama Infantry.
The items in the collection span half a century, and although there is little continuity in the correspondence, many individual items are of interest. Stuart discusses crop values, arrangements for selling slaves, and the Locofocos (#2), and in the post-war period, he discusses the difficulties of adjusting to free labor in Louisiana (#23). Coleman's correspondence includes a letter written by Eli Shorter, brother of the Alabama governor, discussing state politics in 1861 (#11) and another letter asking Coleman to discharge a young soldier (#12). A letter written by E. Simpson provides a lengthy and imaginative attack on the "Black Republicans" (#7), and there are important resolutions of support for the Nashville Convention favoring the extension of slavery into the territories (#6) and what appears to be a Democratic Party address lambasting abolitionism, while supporting the Union (#8).
During the mid-19th century, A. A. Coleman was a judge and well-respected planter in the black belt of west-central Alabama. Probably affiliated with the Whig Party when that party was still viable, Coleman associated himself with the Democratic Party in the late 1850s and sided with the forces of secession, serving for three years as colonel of the 40th Alabama Infantry Regiment before persistent illness forced his resignation. He saw little action due to his poor health.
W. S. Stuart, possibly a son-in-law to Coleman, was a physician, planter, and slave holder living in Monticello, Miss., southeast of Vicksburg. After the Civil War, both he and Coleman returned to farming, and Coleman may have engaged in a mercantile partnership.
