As we are all well aware, there are different varieties of crime. Serious events such as murder, home invasions, armed robberies, rape, and traumatic assaults. There are other categories we might consider to be less serious. They might not gain the same notoriety, merit fewer headlines, and are not compelling subjects for a TV series. In researching this series, we have found more of the dramatic type than anticipated, but some of the lesser crimes may also be of interest, depicting a different way of life long ago in Dover’s history, but still of interest to those directly involved. Let’s start with the story of Thomas Coleman.

Thomas Coleman was a serial horse thief. Here in Dover, the charge was that on the 30th of June, 1901, he did “steal, take, and carry away one mare, value of $100, belonging to James F. Seavey …”. It was a bad choice on Coleman’s part. Better known as J. Frank Seavey, the owner of the stolen mare was one of Dover’s major movers and shakers, the owner of a livery stable at 517 Central Ave. (most likely from whence the horse was stolen), but also of a lumber business, a “clothing and men’s furnishings” store at 456 Central Ave, and was one of the Directors of the Dover Navigation Company — one of the company’s 10 schooners bore his name. The theft of a 100-dollar horse, even if never recovered, would have likely been a minor inconvenience (although, in today’s money, that would have amounted to a value of over $3,700).

Coleman managed to leave the area without being apprehended and formally charged. He fled to Maine, “where he got in trouble”, and ended up doing some time in the Maine state prison in Thomaston. His sentence there was up in 1904. But when Strafford County Sheriff Parker went to take him into custody for the Seavey offense, he found himself second in line to the Sheriff from Rockingham County, who was there with an arrest warrant for Coleman, charging him with — you may have guessed it — stealing a horse.

So it was not until early May of 1907 that Coleman finished his sentence from Rockingham County in the NH State Prison. Deputy Sheriff Bert Wentworth traveled to Concord by train (there was a train from Dover to Concord!) and returned with Coleman in custody to answer to the now almost six-year-old criminal complaint. Finally, in December of that year, Coleman entered a guilty plea and was sentenced to another five years in NH State Prison, but presumably, in response to his recent lengthy residency in that institution, he was given a break. The sentence was suspended and held in abeyance pending good behavior and “until called for by the County Solicitor”.

Where he went following his release and by what mode of transportation was not recorded at the time.

An interesting sidelight: there was an article in Foster’s, with exaggerated headlines, one page following the report of Coleman’s being returned for trial in May, announcing the election of J. Frank Seavey to fill a vacancy as a Trustee of the Pine Hill Cemetery, a position he now shared with several other big names — former Gov. Charles Sawyer, Elisha Brown, and Henry Law — reflecting his standing in the community.