Note
John Wesley Cole was born sometime around 1835. Records indicate that he was a resident of a free black enclave near New Windsor, just over the Carroll County line in Frederick County at the intersection of what is now MD Routes 97 and 26. On August 4, 1863, Cole enlisted in the Union Army. His company descriptive book indicated that he was: 20 years old; 5 feet, 6 inches tall; of brown complexion; and a farmer by occupation. He served as a private in Company F of the 4th Regiment, United States Colored Troops (USCT). Cole was wounded several times, including a bayonet wound, two different wounds from shell fragments, and a bullet wound. One source indicates that Cole was “absent from wounds recd at Dutch Gap Va. August 28/64.” On June 8, 1865, Cole was mustered out in Baltimore.
Upon returning to Carroll County, Cole joined the Thaddeus Stevens Grand Army of the Republic Post in New Windsor. He married in January of 1868. His wife’s name was Charlotte. By the 1880s Federal Census, the 45-year-old veteran was a farm laborer, living in a rented house in Westminster on Charles Street. 20 years later, Cole’s census data indicated that he had his own income and that his wife was a laundress. He died on March 3, 1921 and was buried in Ellsworth Cemetery.