I recently discovered and joined this group and am amazed at the amount of conversation going on here. I am in Ohio and have made trips to North Carolina - the Hillsborough area and to libraries in Raleigh. I found court records that show that a James COLEMAN lived in Orange County (possibly Person and Caswell) in the late 1700's. Verbally it has been passed down that he and several siblings arrived in this country from Ireland and travelled to the Orange Co., NC area. There James supposedly married a NC born girl, Nancy Ann __?__. The rest of the siblings went on "west" and James and Nancy stayed in Orange Co. In 1799 they had a son, also named James COLEMAN. When he was 5 yrs. old (according to his obituary) they moved west to Knoxville, TN. Unfortunately, I can find no birth or marriage records in NC. I also find no other records of the father, James - not even in TN. His wife possibly was in the Knoxville area. The son, James COLEMAN, shows up in Knoxville records around 1820 as a young adult and lived there his entire life - with no evidence of any brothers or sisters. Any COLEMAN records would be appreciated. I have run across other Coleman's in Orange, Caswell, Person area at same time period - Daniel, John, Spillsby, Richard, Alexander, etc. but have no idea if they are related. (COLEMAN seems to be a very, very common Irish or Scotch-Irish name!) Sorry this is lengthy. Even the tiniest bit of information would be appreciated. Thank You, Linda Coleman lcoleman@infinet.com