Ezekial Andrus Colman came to Kansas with the Third Emigrant Aid party, leaving Boston Massachusetts on September 26, 1854, and arriving October 18th of that year. For the first two years they lived on a farm three miles southwest of Lawrence, then moved into Lawrence to run a grocery store. In 1858, they purchased a farm just south of the California Road. Ezekiel erected a large house know as "Colman's Retreat." In the floor of the kitchen was a trap door or loose board that could be lifted, and escaped slaves could be hidden beneath. A slave by the name of Neely was reported to have spent considerable time in that hideout. Margaret Colman Wulfkuhle (great-granddaughter of Ezekiel Colman) wrote that "One fugitive named Neeley had been brought to Kansas by John Brown who was a frequent visitor in the Colman home. Southern sympathizers saw him working in the fields with other men and chased him into the basement of a stone barn on the Alvora Leonard property (Judson Heath's place), where he was captured. They started the march on foot back to Missouri to collect a $500 reward. Somewhere near the border, Neeley eluded his captors and was back at Colman's within a few days. During the Civil War, Lieutenant Charles Colman met Neeley again when both were serving in the Union Army in Arkansas."

Ezekiel Colman, like many other abolitionists of the area, enlisted in the Union cause and served during the Civil War. Ezekiel was Lieutenant of Campany A, 1st Kansas Colored Volunteers. His son, Charles Jackson Colman, joined Company C, 9th Kansas Volunteers on October 6 1861, and was promoted to 1st Lieutenant, Company H., 1st Kansas Colored Volunteers on May 1, 1863. Charles was killed in action on April 18k 1864 at the Battle of Poison Springs, Arkansas, while commanding a company of Negro troops. Charles was the second of Ezekiel and Mary Jane's fourteen children (six of whom died in infancy.)

(Notes taken from M. Parker's Angels of Freedom.

Ezekiel Andrus Colman was born Aug. 10, 1814 in Ashby, Massachusetts.