Hello there. My name is Alberta
Glass, I ran a store in downtown Minden for nearly 50
years, but most folks remember me for another reason. I
was the last veteran of the War Between the States in
Minden. I was born in old Claiborne Parish in 1845. When
I was 15 years old my parents sent me down to a new
school in Pineville called the Louisiana State Seminary
of Learning and Military Institute (you probably know it
better by the name it got later – LSU). There was a
really tough soldier as Superintendent at the school,
his name was William Tecumseh Sherman – yep, the famous
General Sherman. I had only been at the school a little
while when The War Between The States broke out. I went
back home and in March 1862, I joined Company G of the
12th Louisiana Infantry in the Confederate
Army. We went to the east and fought quite a bit in
Georgia and Tennessee. I even got wounded once at the
Battle of Atlanta. When it came time for us to surrender
in May 1865, I bet you can guess who our unit
surrendered to. It was the Army of that same General
Sherman who’d been head of my school. I came back to
Minden after the war and went to work as a store clerk.
Eventually I owned that store. By 1933, I was 88 years
old and the last Confederate veteran still living in
Minden. They had a big ceremony to dedicate that statue
in the park over on the next hill south of this
cemetery. Had a band and everything, they let me unveil
the statue. I only lived 4 years after that. I was going
on 92 when I finally died. I tell you, I saw a lot of
things change here in Minden and this country.
