companion, Allen Hensley. They were riding along the Lemay Ferry Road in Mack's wagon. At a remote location on the route, a group of men stepped into the road and one of them fired a shotgun, killing Marsden with a blast to the head and torso. Hensley was hit with a second blast, but the horse ran away with the wagon, carrying him to safety in the next town, Antonia. Hensley survived for two days. As he lay dying, he named the men who killed him and Mack. They were finally brought to trial in 1886, but were acquitted. Fearing reprisals, the accused men all moved out of the state. The murders of Mack Marsden and Allen Hensley remained unsolved. Mack Marsden in Literature Matthew H. Marsden's story is told in The Mack Marsden Murder Mystery: Vigilantism or Justice?, published by the Missouri History Museum in 2011. The narrative history book, by journalist Joe Johnston, is the result of years of research into locations, newspaper accounts, books, and legal records, as well as oral family histories. It details the lives of Mack and many others who were part of his story, and unravels the question of who killed Allen Hensley and Mack Marsden. References Sources Civil Government and History of Missouri, The MacMillan Company, New York, NY, 1933 County Clerk, Jefferson County, Missouri DeSoto Public Library Festus Public Library Family interviews Firearms research: www.joesalter.com; Roy G. Jinks, Historian, Smith & Wesson Hallemann's Interpretation of the 1876 Historic Atlas, Dave Halleman, Jefferson County Historical Society Hillsboro 1839–1989, City of Hillsboro, 1989 Historic Sites of Jefferson County, Missouri Goodspeed's History Of Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Crawford, & Gasconade Counties, Missouri, Chicago: The Goodspeed Publishing Co., 1888* Jefferson Count Democrat, transcribed by Lisa K. Gendron Jefferson County Historical Society, www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~mojchs/index.html Jefferson County History Center, Jefferson College Library, Hillsboro, Missouri Jefferson County, Missouri 1876 Atlas, Brink, McDonough & Company, 1876 Jesse James research: The Old West, The Gunfighters, Time-Life Books; Wild West Magazine. Vol. 19, 4, Weider History Group Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/index.html Missouri Birth and Death Indexes, http://www.deathindexes.com/missouri/index.html Missouri History Museum, www.mohistory.org/ Missouri Secretary of State Archives, www.sos.mo.gov/mdh/ Our Jefferson County Heritage; Reminiscences of Early Missouri, Zoe Booth Rutledge, Ramfire Press, 1970 Our Missouri, E.W. Stephens Publisher, Columbia, Missouri, 1898 Railroad and depot history: Tim Jones and Jacob C. Jones, http://moshortline.com/ The Mack Marsden Murder Mystery: Vigilantism or Justice?, Missouri History Museum, St. Louis,