Rufus Barringer

Rufus Clay Barringer (December 2, 1821 – February 3, 1895) was a North Carolina lawyer, politician, and Confederate brigadier general during the American Civil War. Early life Barringer was born in Cabarrus County, North Carolina, the ninth of ten children of Elizabeth Brandon and Paul Barringer. He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, graduating in 1842. He studied law in Concord with his older brother, Daniel Moreau Barringer, who would enjoy a successful law practice and serve two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Their brother, Victor Clay Barringer, like Rufus later served as officer in the Confederate States Army. Entering politics as a Whig, Rufus Barringer represented Cabarrus County in the House of Commons in the North Carolina General Assembly from 1848 until 1850. A Unionist in his political views, he represented his district as an elector during the 1860 presidential election. As a young man before he married, Barringer is known to have had a relationship with Roxanna Coleman, a young enslaved African-American woman held by planter Daniel Coleman, Sr. Barringer fathered two mixed-race sons with her, Thomas Clay and Warren Clay. Their son Warren Clay Coleman, born into slavery in 1849, after the war became a successful businessman in Cabarrus County, in part aided by his father's influence and expertise as a lawyer. In addition to owning stores and a rental company in Concord, Coleman was a founder in 1895 of the first African-American owned and operated textile mill.