The Ouachita Telegraph - Ferd Bynum Murdered

Date: Jul. 2000
Submitted by: Lora Peppers <lpeppers@ouachita.lib.la.us>

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The Ouachita Telegraph
Friday, November 24, 1876
Page 3, Column 1

        Ferd. Bynum, a well-known, harmless old colored man, left Monroe on
the 4th to visit his wife in the Island, and has not been seen since.  Tuesday, 
Bill Thomas, the colored coroner, held an inquest on the body of a dead man 
found in the river some six or seven miles above here, which he identified as 
the remains of old Ferd.  Thomas says there was no physician present, but that
he found the holes of 8 buckshot in Ferd’s back and a wound in the back of
the head.  It is hard to believe that any one would murder old Ferd, for he
was perfectly inoffensive, a vagabond and a notorious drunkard.  All the
other traits he possessed, if not commendable, were tolerable.  He will be
missed about Monroe where he has long been the target for jests and runner
of errands.

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