Civil War Confederate Partisan Fighter. He received notoriety during the American Civil War as the Confederate leader first of the Missouri Partisan Rangers, then by August 15, 1862, the "Quantrill's Raiders" guerillas. As a soldier, he was known for possessing excellent leadership skills, unmatched horsemanship capabilities, and a knowledge of unique warfare tactics learned from Native Americans, yet he broke from the Confederate Army, becoming an independent guerilla fighter with his own agenda. Born the oldest of 8 children who survived infancy, his father labored as a tinsmith. He was educated at Canal Dover Union School, where his father was later a director and, afterward, superintendent. After the untimely death of his father in 1854 from tuberculosis, Quantrill became a teacher in one of the lower grades, helping to support the family that was living in near poverty. Following a brush with the law in an 1856 man's death, he left Dover and traveled to Fort Wayne, Indiana, to further his education, studying Latin, trigonometry, philosophy, and surveying. Politically, he supported slavery. On returning to Dover a year later, his journey to the free state of Kansas was consummated by his mother, who arranged for neighboring farmers to purchase a Kansas claim in his name and then accompany them west. He traveled as far west at Colorado and had brushes with the law along the way. Upon the start of the Civil War in April of 1861, Quantrill joined the Confederate Army. When the defeated Confederate Army left Kansas, he stayed behind and formed his own band of at least 400 guerrilla fighters, which became outlaws. Among them were teenager Cole Younger and Frank James, the brother of Jesse, along with "Bloody Bill" Anderson. On August 23, 1863, and at his order, a revenge raid on the Union-supporting town of Lawrence, Kansas, made history after his guerilla outlaws killed, depending on the source, between 150 to 200 civilian men and boys while burning and looting. With his famous order: "Kill every man and burn every house," the total destruction of the town was done with only four of the 180 commercial buildings in town surviving and leaving hundreds of widows and fatherless children. The raid became known in history books as the Lawrence Massacre. Following the raid, the resilient citizens of Lawrence buried at least 150 of the victims in old Oak Hill Cemetery and erected a freestanding monument in 1895. On October 6, 1863, he and several hundred of his men masquerading as Union soldiers made a surprise attack on a Union camp, killing almost all the soldiers and capturing the remaining few; this was later called the Baxter Springs Massacre. After four years of his rogue operations and the end of the Civil War, Quantrill and remnants of his raiders were cornered on May 10, 1865, in a barn in Spencer County, Kentucky, by a detachment of United States Cavalry. While attempting an escape on horseback, he was shot with the bullet hitting his spine and paralyzing him from the waist down. He was transferred to the Federal military hospital in Louisville, then to a Catholic Hospital. Lingering for a month, he died at age 27. Following converting to Catholicism and receiving last rites in the days prior to his pending death, he made arrangements with the hospital priest to purchase a plot with a marker for burial in St. Mary's Cemetery. The priest, fearing vandals, ordered the grave restored to a natural condition without a marker, yet this would not be his final resting place. Some twenty years later, the strange odyssey and the disbursement of his bones began. A request was made by his mother and his childhood friend to take his remains back to Ohio, but this was refused. However, the grave was opened upon his mother's agreement and the contents viewed. His friend removed the skull, and his mother identified the remains based on a chipped tooth in the skull. Under cover of darkness, the entire casket was stolen. Upon return to Dover, his remains were interred in the family plot in the Dover 4th St Cemetery, minus the skull and various bones the unscrupulous friend had removed and kept. Eventually, some of the bones were archived at the Kansas State Historical Society, and the skull at the Dover Museum until buried in a separate container in the family plot. Finally, the last of the stolen bones were repatriated by the Missouri Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and interred at the Old Confederate Veteran's Home Cemetery in Higginsville, Missouri. While some attempt to show Quantrill as a chivalrous Confederate hero of the Civil War, history paints his portrait as an outlaw and mass murderer of civilians. Located in the town of Lawrence is a museum and various historical markers telling the story of the Lawrence Massacre.

Additional Burial Locations:

Confederate Cemetery

Fourth Street Cemetery