By Jessica Gorman

Thomas R. Martin wasn’t the only member of his family to be shot and killed. He wasn’t even the only one to be shot and killed in downtown Minden. His older brother, Alex, met the same fate 32 years earlier. Just as Tom Martin’s death stemmed from a long-standing feud with a neighbor, his brother’s death was said to as well.

It was a Saturday afternoon, 25 April 1874, and Minden was busy. Alex Martin encountered Joseph B. O’Neal on the street. One account says that O’Neal insulted Martin’s mother, another says his wife. Whatever the case, Martin is said to have whipped O’Neal with his cane. As O’Neal retreated from the attack, he pulled out a revolver, a “navy-six.”  Martin tried to escape into S.B. Miller’s store, but he didn’t make it. O’Neal fired twice, the second shot struck Martin in the back of the head and exited above his right eye. Alex Martin was killed instantly. J.B. O’Neal surrendered. Within a week and a half, the trial was held, and O’Neal was found guilty of manslaughter.

Joseph B. O’Neal is believed to be the same Joseph B. O’Neal who was, the following year, appointed constable of the eighth ward of Bossier Parish, served as sheriff of Bossier Parish in 1877 and 1878, and was appointed postmaster at Red Chute in 1879 where he also owned a store.

Like his brother, W.A. “Alex” Martin is buried in the Martin family plot in the Minden Cemetery. The Martin plot is one that is in desperate need of repair. Buried there are Tom and Alex Martin as well as their father, William Z., who also died in 1874. A double headstone marks the graves of brothers Sammie, who died in 1871 at the age of 18, and Eddie, who was almost nine years old when he was bitten by a dog and died of rabies in 1875. Mollie Hinson, their sister, is also buried in the family plot. Their mother, Melissa, died in 1899 at Bartlesville, Oklahoma. While the newspaper indicates that her body was returned to Minden for burial, her grave seems to be another for which no marker has been found.

(Jessica Gorman is Executive Director of the Dorcheat Historical Association Museum, Webster Parish Historian, and an avid genealogist.)