John E. Coffee (December 3, 1782 – September 25, 1836) was a military leader and a United States Congressman for the state of Georgia.
Early life
He was born in Prince Edward County, Virginia and was a grandson of Peter Coffee, Sr. (1705-November 1771) and Susannah Mathews (1701–1796). He is sometimes confused by researchers with his first cousin John Coffee, a general in the Tennessee militia.
John E. Coffee moved with his parents and family to a plantation near Powelton in Hancock County, Georgia, in 1780. Coffee later settled in Telfair County, Georgia in 1807, where he developed his own plantation.
Military career
During the Creek War (1813 to 1814) he served as a General in the State Militia, and the supply problems he encountered along the Georgia and Florida frontiers led him to propose the construction of a road linking the two. Old Coffee Road, as it is now known, was built under the supervision of Coffee and Thomas Swain and opened in 1823. It ran southwest from Swain's Ferry at the Ocmulgee River near Jacksonville, Georgia to Tallahassee, Florida, and as the region's first vehicular route it was of great aid to settlers.
Political career
John Coffee's grave at the Congressional Cemetery. John Coffee served as a member of the Georgia Senate from 1819 to 1827. He was elected as a Jacksonian Democrat to the Twenty-third and Twenty-fourth U.S. Congresses and served from March 4, 1833, until his death on September 25, 1836. He was reelected to the Twenty-fifth United States Congress on October 3, 1836 after his death; the announcement of his death not having been received.
Coffee died on his plantation near Jacksonville, Georgia, on September 25, 1836, and was buried there. In 1921 his remains were reinterred in McRae Cemetery, McRae, Georgia. There is also a cenotaph for him at Congressional Cemetery in Washington, DC.
Legacy and honors
In addition to Old Coffee Road, Coffee County, Georgia and General Coffee State Park are named in honor of John E. Coffee.
John E. Coffee is my 1st cousin 6X removed – David Arthur