West Feliciana ex-coroner Alfred Gould dead at 84

Dr. Alfred Gould, who practiced medicine in St. Francisville for more than 50 years, died Saturday.

Gould, 84, served as West Feliciana Parish coroner for 28 years until he decided not to seek re-election in 1987. In 2000, he again became coroner when his predecessor moved out of state, and he held the post through 2006.

He suffered from Alzheimer’s disease before he died in his sleep, his son, Ray Gould, said Monday.

“He was a good and faithful man who touched the lives of so very many people as a healer and caretaker in the town of St. Francisville … for over 50 years. He practiced medicine in his own way — slowly and thoroughly, getting to know his patients and their physical, spiritual and emotional health,” his family said in a Facebook tribute.

During his tenure as coroner, Gould was responsible for investigating the deaths of numerous Louisiana State Penitentiary inmates slain by other prisoners during the Angola prison’s bloody era of the early 1970s.

As required by law, Gould also witnessed executions at Angola after Louisiana reinstated the death penalty in 1979.

But it was his service as a family doctor to generations of West Feliciana Parish residents that he will be most remembered for, said Ray Dreher, a retired parish sanitarian, who added that Gould saved his son’s life when the son was an infant.

The West Feliciana Parish Civic Club named Gould as its “Citizen of the Year” in 1997 for his service to the community and for pushing for a hospital in the rural parish, a goal that was reached in 1969.

He was a graduate of the University of Illinois and Tulane Medical School. The family is planning a memorial service.