This large historic cemetery was founded in 1870, with the reinterrment of civil war soldiers from the Battle of Baxter Springs in 1863. On October 6, 1863, William Quantrill and his band of guerrilla raiders, fighting on behalf of the Confederacy, attacked the Union outpost of Fort Blair. Quantrill's forces numbered about 400 and were divided into two groups. On their approach to the fort, the first group, led by David Poole, was held at bay. However, the second group, led by Quantrill himself, happened upon Union troops escorting Major General James G. Blunt to Fort Smith, Arkansas. Only Blunt and a handful of his cavalry survived what came to be known to the Union as the "Baxter Springs Massacre."
When the Federal Governement planned to reinter the victims from the battlefield to Springfield National Cemetery in Springfield, Missouri, the citizens of Baxter Springs petitioned to bury them locally instead. The city then agreed to donate land for the burials and to maintain the grounds in perpetuity. Plots within the City Cemetery were donated piecemeal from 1869 to 1887, when the Soldiers' Lot reached its current size. Today, the lot sits just north of the cemetery's entrance, enclosed by a simple post-and-chain fence. A flagpole marks the entrance.
The first burials in the Soldiers' Lot were 132 Union soldiers killed during the Battle of Baxter Springs. After receiving a petition from more than 7,000 members of the local Grand Army of the Republic posts in support of a memorial, the United States dedicated the Battle of Baxter Springs Monument on Decoration (Memorial) Day in 1886. Featuring the names of 163 Union soldiers and officers involved in the battle, the 20-foot-tall granite monument is surmounted by a statue of a soldier standing at parade rest. Four 24-pound cannons, dating to 1853, are set upright on granite bases near the monument.