Editing Coles County, Illinois (section)

==History==
Coles County was organized by on December 25, 1830, from [[Clark County, Illinois|Clark]] and [[Edgar County, Illinois|Edgar]] counties. It was named after [[Edward Coles]],<ref>{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_9V1IAAAAMAAJ | title=The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States | publisher=Govt. Print. Off. | author=Gannett, Henry | year=1905 | pages=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_9V1IAAAAMAAJ/page/n86 87]}}</ref> the second governor of Illinois, from 1822 to 1826. The majority of the American settlers who founded Coles County were either from the six [[New England]] states, or were born in [[upstate New York]] to parents who had moved to that region from New England shortly after the [[American Revolution]]. They were part of a wave of farmers who headed west into the frontier of the [[Northwest Territory]] during the early 1800s. The completion of the [[Erie Canal]] led to an increase in such migrants heading west. When these settlers originally reached what is today Coles County, they found dense virgin forest and prairie.

The New England settlers laid out farms, constructed roads, erected government buildings and established post routes. They brought with them many of their "Yankee" values, such as staunch support for [[abolitionism]] as well as a passion for education. They quickly established schools in their communities. They were mostly members of the [[Congregationalist Church]], though some were [[Episcopal Church (United States)|Episcopalian]]. As a result of the [[second Great Awakening]], many had become [[Baptists]] or switched to Protestant denominations such as [[Methodism]] or [[Presbyterianism]] before moving to what is now Coles County. The prevalence of settlers with New England heritage resulted in their establishing a culture that was continuous with that of New England for the first several decades of its history. As a result of this, county residents largely supported abolitionism in the antebellum period, and also the Republican Party as of the 1850s and 1860s.

Beginning in 1849, numerous German immigrants arrived in Coles County, refugees from the rebellions the year before in various principalities. This population overwhelmingly supported the abolition of slavery.

Irish Catholic immigrants who had fled the famine in their country also settled here. Illinois Democratic Senator [[Stephen Douglas]] was extremely popular amongst Irish Catholic immigrants in Coles County at this time. During the Civil War the Irish Catholic community of Coles County would overwhelmingly be [[Copperhead (politics)|Copperheads]].<ref>''The Yankee Exodus: An Account of Migration from New England'' (1968) by Stewart H. Holbrook</ref><ref>''The Yankee West: Community Life on the Michigan Frontier'' (1996) by Susan E. Gray</ref><ref>''Yankee Colonies across America: Cities upon the Hills'' (2015) by Chaim M. Rosenberg</ref><ref>''Bonds of Loyalty: German-American and World War I'' by Frederick C. Luebke, Northern Illinois University Press, 1974 - {{ISBN|9780875800455}}</ref>

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File:Coles_County_Illinois_1830.png|Coles County from the time of its creation to 1843
File:Coles County Illinois 1843.png|Coles County between 1843 and 1859
File:Coles County Illinois 1859.png|Coles County reduced to its current size in 1859 by the creation of Douglas County
</gallery>