Born on January 8, 1826, to Rufus and Clarissa (St. John) Freeman, Westfield Township, Medina County. He remained at home until he was twenty-eight years of age, and located in Scott County, Iowa, where he engaged in farming and stock raising on a tract of 360 acres. While thus engaged, in 1861, he enlisted in Company C, Second Iowa Cavalry, and was afterward promoted to be adjutant of the regiment in which he conducted himself with bravery and good judgment. At the conclusion of the war he returned to his Iowa farm, but when his father died in 1875 he sacrificed his interests in that state, again located on the home farm in Westfield Township and thus prevented the property from passing into outside hands. He there continued to farm and raise livestock especially of the Durham breed until his retirement from active agriculture and his change of residence to the village of Leroy. Captain Freeman was originally a Whig and a Republican before he became a Union soldier. He was a member of the Grand Army and of the First Baptist church. In 1872 he was elected to the Iowa legislature from Scott County for two years. His wife, who died in October, 1905, was formerly Miss Caroline Wilcox.