Born: January 2, 1792, Stewkley, Buckinghamshire, England.
Died: May 1, 1858, New York City.
Buried: Ivandell Cemetery, Somers (now Heritage Hills), New York.
Converted at age 13, Coles began preaching at 22, and emigrated to America in 1818.
He edited the Christian Advocate and Journal for 12 years, and the Sunday School Advocate for several years. He was a musician of some ability, and a good singer.
Zion’s Herald said of him:
His fondness for the society of children, and his faculty of interesting and instructing them was extraordinary.
Wherever he went, after a short acquaintance, they clustered about him as a father, and, not by anecdote, of which he had no great fund, but by original conceptions and by questions and by quaint remarks fitted to their capacity, he always succeeded in controlling their attention.