DESTINED FOR TROUBLE
Outlaw Lincoln Waggoner terrorized north Louisiana

By Wesley Harris
Claiborne Parish Library Historian

The decades after the Civil War spawned more than its share of outlaws in Louisiana. None became so reviled by the public as the killer Lincoln Waggoner.

Linc Waggoner was born in 1865 on a small farm in a part of Claiborne Parish that later became northern Webster Parish. As a youngster he attended school in the area and worked on the farm of his prominent and hard-working father, John Waggoner. With a childhood as normal as any north Louisiana boy could experience, no one could have predicted Linc Waggoner’s future as a bloodthirsty killer.

Waggoner’s first connection with murder arose from retribution for a perceived injustice to his family. Linc's brother Matthew had been killed in a quarrel at the home of a cousin, Tud Grider. A jury acquitted Grider, finding he acted in self-defense. Grider moved away, but a few months later he was shot and killed while plowing his field. Witnesses placed Linc Waggoner and his brothers at the scene. The brothers were tried and Linc was acquitted, but “Spank” Waggoner was found guilty and sentenced to life in Louisiana’s state penitentiary.

Linc's next known brush with the law occurred in 1890. Linc was with some friends, including Mun Newsom. A quarrel broke out and Linc pulled his pistol and fired at Newsom several times, killing Newsom's horse. Linc was arrested and tried, but the jury acquitted him.

The two men agreed to leave each other alone but with a caveat. If either man spoke to the other under any circumstances, such conversation would constitute a declaration of war, freeing either man to shoot the other on sight. In late 1890, nearly two years later, Waggoner and Newsom met at a country store. Newsom was drinking and offered Linc a drink. Waggoner responded with a .45 Colt revolver. He fired quickly, missing Newsom who ran out the back door. Linc charged around the building and confronted Newsom. The two men fired several times, resulting in a serious wound to Newsom's jaw.

Cain Broomfield, a witness to the shooting, was murdered, followed by his father-in-law Wesley Wortham. Then Waggoner was implicated in the murder of Ephragm Dickinson in January 1891. Waggoner fled to Arkansas with brother Spank who had escaped from the penitentiary. Authorities captured them in February and jailed them in Homer. Spank was returned to prison to wear chains for the remainder of his sentence. The citizens of Claiborne Parish had experienced enough of Waggoner’s transgressions and plotted to break in the Homer jail and lynch him.

Late one night, a mob knocked a hole in the jail wall to get at him. With warning of the impending raid, friends had smuggled two revolvers to Waggoner. The prisoner greeted the would-be lynchers with a hail of gunfire, leaving several attackers fleeing with serious gunshot wounds. The sheriff moved Waggoner to the more secure Monroe jail. After winning a change of venue to Lincoln Parish, Waggoner was tried and once again acquitted.

One member of the Homer mob was outlaw Tom Kinder. For unknown reasons, Kinder was dedicated to killing Waggoner and the feeling was mutual. Waggoner tacked a note to a tree in the center of the community bearing the following message: "I am not here to harm a living soul, except Tom Kinder...if he continues to haunt me, I will make it lively for him as I stand six foot in my stockings, wear a number nine shoe, and cover every inch of ground upon which I stand."

During the feud with Kinder, Waggoner was blamed for several unsolved killings in north Louisiana and south Arkansas. Evidence of Linc's role in most of the killings was sketchy. However, he was definitely guilty of one well-known crime. William Holland was home sitting by the fire, holding his baby in his arms, when Linc Waggoner fired a shotgun from a wooded area nearby, striking Holland in the shoulder and arm. Eventually, Holland lost the arm. A huge contingent of armed citizens scoured the countryside searching for Waggoner without success.

After shooting Holland, Waggoner fled to Texas. His haven was discovered and Webster Deputy Sheriff Reagan captured Waggoner and returned him to Louisiana in 1894. While Linc was in the Minden jail, his enemy Tom Kinder was brought in for killing Henry Tuggle as part of the ongoing Ramsey-Tuggle feud, a local dispute that surpassed the infamous Hatfield-McCoy feud in the number of bodies it produced. The sheriff placed them in adjacent cells where they could see and talk with one other. Waggoner suggested the jailer give each man a Winchester and save the parish the cost of trials. But Kinder died suspiciously from a dose of morphine. Concerns for Waggoner’s safety led the sheriff to again transfer him to the Monroe jail.

While Linc Waggoner awaited trial, citizens warned the Webster sheriff that Waggoner would be killed when returned to Minden for trial. On Saturday, September 8, 1894, Waggoner was transferred back to the Minden jail for his scheduled trial on Monday. The following account of a mob of men forcing their way into the jail appeared in the Shreveport Times on Tuesday, September 11, 1894:

When citizens started out of their houses toward the jail they were met by armed sentries and forcibly driven back. On all sides the jail was guarded by armed men, who had taken possession of every avenue that led to it. One man, Mr. John Sandlin, avoided the sentries and went to the Presbyterian Church and rang the bell to arouse the citizens. He also fired his pistol several times. Deputy Sheriff Reagan was a mile away at his home and heard nothing of it. Before the Sheriff could be appraised of what was going on the mob had accomplished its horrible and most cowardly work.

“A Times representative, who went to Minden yesterday, interviewed the three men who were in the cell with Waggoner, and learned from their own lips the story of the most brutal assassination it has ever been his misfortune to record.

“After the mob had cut its way through the brick wall of the jail, six or seven masked men came through the aperture, all heavily armed, and made their way upstairs to the upper tier of cells. The attackers were led by a man who appeared to be perfectly familiar with the interior of the jail. In this cell, as in others, there was a triangular ventilation flue in one corner, which was constructing by riveting a heavy piece of iron across the closed corner of the cage. This piece of iron extended from the ceiling of the cell down to within 12 or 15 inches of the floor. Into this flue, Waggoner had squeezed himself and by standing erect and reaching up could get his fingers into some openings above that enabled him to pull himself up until his feet were almost out of sight.

“The men, who had lanterns, flashed a light into the cell and asked for Linc. The other prisoners told them he was not in there. They went farther, and moved everything to show that Linc was not in there. The lynchers swore that they knew he was in there and threatened to shoot or dynamite the whole outfit if they did not produce him. Frightened to death, one of the prisoners gave away Linc's hiding place.

“The prisoners were ordered, under pain of death if they refused, to drag Linc down, out of the flue. This, two of them proceeded to do, grasping him by the feet and by main strength pulling him until his finger holds above gave way. When they had him partially out, one man shot at Waggoner legs, and missed him. Waggoner exclaimed: "Lord have mercy on my people, gentlemen let me talk." One man said: "Yes, if you will call no names on the outside." Another man objected to any talk."

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