General McPherson Memorial Statue

This bronze rider honors a Union general who never once set foot in Kansas. James Birdseye McPherson commanded the Army of the Tennessee during the Civil War. At the Battle of Atlanta on July twenty second, eighteen sixty four, he was killed, making him the second highest ranking Union officer to die in the entire war.

Six years later, when this county and its county seat were organized on the open Kansas plains, the settlers named both after the fallen general. To complete the tribute, they raised this equestrian statue and unveiled it in a day long ceremony on the Fourth of July, nineteen seventeen. Drawing thousands of people, it is said to be the first life sized equestrian statue erected in the state of Kansas. It still stands in the city park, across from the county courthouse.