Nicholas J Sandlin

Biography

Though born in North Carolina, Sandlin was reared on the Sunnyside Plantation near Dubberly in south Webster Parish owned by his uncle, Calvin Leary (1811–1882), who had taken in Sandlin's parents, Henry Sandlin and the former Ann Civil Leary. He lived among cousins who regarded him as a brother.

In the American Civil War, Sandlin advanced from a private with the "Minden Blues" infantry regiment at Camp Moore in Tangipahoa Parish to first lieutenant in the Army of Northern Virginia under Generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. He was wounded in 1863 and held as a prisoner of war until he was paroled at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on April 10, 1865. Upon his discharge, he walked his way back to Webster Parish.

Sandlin, who had been admitted after self-study to the practice of law, was involved in the overthrow of the Carpetbagger government with the election of in 1876 of Francis T. Nicholls as the Redeemer governor over the Republican Stephen B. Packard. Sandlin was appointed the district attorney of territory in North Louisiana stretching from the Red to the Ouachita rivers at the time Webster Parish was created in 1871 from neighboring Claiborne Parish. He published for a time the newspaper The Minden Advertiser, one of several weeklies in circulation long before the Minden Press-Herald became the daily newspaper for the region. He established a model farm at the McIntyre Community west of Minden and was active in the Farmers' Alliance as a traveling speaker on farm issues.

Sandlin represented Ward 3 on the Webster Parish Police Jury, the parish governing body, from 1877 to 1888. He represented Webster Parish in the Louisiana House of Representatives from 1892 to 1893 and worked with State Senator G. L. P. Wren, his former colleague in the Minden Blues and his House predecessor as well, to abolish the Louisiana State Lottery Company. He stepped down after a year to accept appointment from U.S. President Grover Cleveland as the postmaster at Minden.

In 1869, Sandlin wed the former Irene McIntyre (1840–1922), a Louisiana native and the daughter of Dr. Alexander McIntyre, one of the first physicians in Minden. Her brother, John D. McIntyre also fought in the Civil War with the Minden Blues. Sandlin and his cousin, William Penn Leary, Sr. (1847–1930), married Flavia R. McIntryre (1846–1934), sister of Irene Sandlin. Alexander McIntyre Leary, the son of W. P. and Flavia Leary, was the mayor of Minden from 1903 to 1905 and a businessman in Minden and later Shreveport.

The older son of Nicholas and Irene Sandlin, McIntyre Sandlin, was mayor of Minden from 1894 to 1896, a decade before his cousin A. M. Leary held the office. McIntrye Sandlin was also a member of the Louisiana House from 1896 to 1900, and the assessor of Webster Parish from 1908 until 1937. Younger son John Sandlin was like his father a district attorney but also a state court judge and a member of the United States House of Representatives for Louisiana's 4th congressional district from 1921 to 1937, having unseated John T. Watkins, also of Minden. John Sandlin was a political ally of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and House Speaker John Nance Garner. Mayors McIntyre Sandlin and A. M. Leary were hence maternal first cousins and paternal second cousins.

When Sandlin died, his younger son, John, had just been admitted to the bar. Sandlin is interred with other family members in the original section of the historic Minden Cemetery. The former Nicholas J. Sandlin Camp near Minden was named in his honor by the organization, Sons of Confederate Veterans./>