Elliott D. Coleman
A cotton planter and law enforcement officer born in Waterproof, served from 1936 to 1960 as sheriff of rural Tensas Parish in northeast Louisiana. He was a State Police bodyguard for U.S. Senator Huey P. Long on September 8, 1935, the night of Long’s assassination. (He testified that he shot Baton Rouge physician Dr. Carl Weiss twice). At the age of 17, Coleman became a deputy sheriff and would also serve as a justice of the peace and police juror. He was a delegate to the 1921 Louisiana Constitutional Convention, a precursor to CC ‘73. After his victory as sheriff in 1936, he won reelection every four years until being unseated in 1960 at the end of age 79. Of note in that 1936 election, one of Coleman’s fellow bodyguards in the Long assassination, Larry Sale, was elected Claiborne Parish Sheriff.