The statue is approximately 9 foot tall and made of bronze. The horse is standing with four hooves on the ground facing to the east. The General is mounted atop the horse. The general is wearing knee-high cavalry boots with a full Confederate uniform. He is also wearing a large hat with a plume. There is a bedroll tied to the back of the horse.
From Wikipedia on General JO Shelby:
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"Joseph Orville "Jo" Shelby (December 12, 1830 – February 13, 1897) was a noted Confederate cavalry general in the Trans-Mississippi Theater of the American Civil War.
Shelby was born in Lexington, Kentucky, to one of the state's wealthiest and most influential families. He lost his father at age 5, and was raised by a stepfather. Shelby attended Transylvania University and was a rope manufacturer until 1852. He then moved to Waverly, Missouri, where he engaged in steamboating on the Missouri River and in running a hemp plantation. He was one of the largest slaveholders in the state. During the "Bleeding Kansas" struggle, he led a company on the pro-slavery side.
In 1861, Shelby formed a cavalry company and was elected its captain, leading it into battle at Wilson's Creek. Promoted to colonel, he commanded a brigade at Prairie Grove. Shelby led his "Iron Brigade" of Missouri volunteers on what was to be the longest cavalry raid of the war at that time, Shelby's Great Raid. Between September 22 and November 3, 1863, Shelby's brigade travelled 1,500 miles through Missouri, inflicting over 1,000 casualties on Union forces, and capturing or destroying an estimated $2 million worth of Federal supplies and property. He was promoted to brigadier general on December 15, 1863, at the successful conclusion of his raid.
In 1864, Union General Steele's failure in the Camden Expedition (March 23–May 2, 1864,) can in no small part be laid to Shelby's brilliant and determined harassment, though in concert with other Confederate forces. Ultimately that Federal force was forced back to Little Rock upon the final destruction or capture of its supply trains at Mark's Mill. Reassigned to the Clarendon, Arkansas area, Shelby accomplished the rare feat of capturing a Union tinclad USS Queen City, which was immediately destroyed to avoid recapture. As summer was ending Shelby then commanded a division during Sterling Price's Missouri raid. He distinguished himself at the battles of Little Blue River and Westport, and captured many Union held towns, including Potosi, Boonville, Waverly, Stockton, Lexington, and California, Missouri.
Shelby's adjutant was John Newman Edwards, who later as editor of the Kansas City Times was to almost single handedly create the anti-hero legend of Jesse James.
After Robert E. Lee's army surrendered in Virginia, General Edmund Kirby Smith appointed Shelby a major general on May 10, 1865. However, the promotion was never formally submitted, due to the collapse of the Confederate government.
In June 1865, rather than surrender, Shelby and approximately 1,000 of his remaining troops rode south into Mexico. For their determination not to surrender, they were immortalized as "the undefeated". A later verse appended to the angry post-war Confederate anthem, "The Unreconstructed Rebel" commemorates the defiance of Shelby and his men:
"I won't be reconstructed, I'm better now than then.
And for a Carpetbagger I do not give a damn.
So it's forward to the frontier, soon as I can go.
I'll fix me up a weapon and start for Mexico."
Their plan was to offer their services to Emperor Maximilian as a 'foreign legion.' Maximilian declined to accept the ex-Confederates into his armed forces, but he did grant them land for an American colony in Mexico near Veracruz. The grant would be revoked two years later following the collapse of the empire and Maximilan's execution. Reportedly, Shelby sank his battle flag in the Rio Grande near present-day Eagle Pass (TX) on the way to Mexico rather than risk the flag falling into the hands of the Federals. The event is depicted in a painting displayed at the Eagle Pass City Hall. The memory of Shelby and his men as "The Undefeated" is used as a distant basis for the 1969 John Wayne-Rock Hudson film by the same name.
The historian Edwin Adams Davis of Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge penned Fallen Guidon: The Saga of Confederate General Jo Shelby's March to Mexico, first published in 1962 and reprinted a year after Davis' death in 1995. Davis was a descendant of one of Shelby's men.
Shelby returned to Missouri in 1867 and resumed farming. In 1883, Shelby was a critical witness for fellow ex-Confederate Frank James at James' trial. He was appointed the U.S. Marshal for the Western District of Missouri in 1893, and retained this position until his death in 1897. He died in Adrian, Missouri, and is buried at Forest Hill Cemetery, Kansas City."
From the Lost Cause - a journal of the Sons of Confederate Veterans on the creation of the park and statue dated 7 July, 2009:
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"Twenty-six years of organizing, planning and selling of books culminated in a recent celebration of the life of Kentucky-born and educated Confederate Gen. Joseph Orville Shelby. The folks of little Waverly, Missouri, population 807, were determined to honor their hometown hero. They completed their long mission on Saturday, June 27, 2009 with the dedication of the first statue to honor General Shelby.
Jo Shelby was born in Lexington, Kentucky, on December 12, 1830. His father died when he was five years old and his mother then married Benjamin Gratz. Gratz ran a hemp operation. Mr. Gratz was a widower with several sons. He educated his stepson, Jo, at a school in Pennsylvania and then sent him to Transylvania College in Lexington.
Shelby was a friend of John Hunt Morgan and their Confederate military careers would have several similarities. After Shelby dropped out of Transylvania, he was employed for a time at his stepfather’s rope factory. At the age of twenty-one, he received funds from his deceased father’s estate and with one of his stepbrothers, settled in Waverly, Missouri. Located on the banks of the Missouri River, it was in this village that Shelby and his step-brothers began a farming operation involving growing hemp for rope. Their property included a wharf and Shelby also started a shipping and steamboat service.
Many Kentuckians migrated to Missouri in the 1820’s and 1830’s, and in 1858, Shelby married Elizabeth “Bettie” Shelby, a distant cousin whose family had likewise made the move to settle in Missouri. She was the daughter of a Shelbyville, Kentucky, native.
It was not long before Jo Shelby took part in the border war engagements in 1858 and 1859. His stepbrother wanted no part in the blood letting caused by the Kansas redlegs and returned to Lexington, Kentucky. Another step-brother, Carey, joined the Union forces and was killed in his first engagement.
Frank Blair, another Kentucky cousin (and brother of Lincoln’s Postmaster General, Montgomery Blair) was stationed in St. Louis. Blair offered Shelby a Union commission when the War started but Shelby refused the offer.
In 1861, at the Methodist Church located near his plantation, Shelby recruited hundreds of men to the Confederate cause in a matter of hours. He outfitted them with his own money. These men became the core of his famous Iron Brigade. Shelby’s adjutant was John Newman Edwards who wrote glowing accounts about the Missouri Confederate exploits during the War for Southern Independence (and, as a post-war newspaperman largely created the legend of Jesse James).
Yankee arsonists burned down the Shelby home along with all the outbuildings.
Captain Shelby led his newly-formed cavalry company into battle at Wilson's Creek, and then - having been promoted to colonel - he commanded a brigade at Prairie Grove. From September 22nd to November 3rd, 1863, Shelby led his Iron Brigade on what was until then the longest cavalry raid of the war. Shelby's Great Raid covered 1,500 miles through Missouri, inflicting over 1,000 Union casualties and destroying or capturing roughly two million dollars of Federal property. This feat only his friend John Hunt Morgan would be able to surpass. Shelby’s brigade played a large role in stopping the Union Camden Expedition in 1864, and after that he accomplished the unusual feat of capturing a Union tinclad (the USS Queen City). In the Summer of 1864, he commanded a division in Sterling Price's Missouri raid.
General Jo Shelby refused to surrender at the end of the War. He led the remnants of his men, about 1,000, across the Rio Grande River at Eagle Pass, Texas. There they buried the battle flag in that river. Shelby offered their services to Emperor Maximilian as a foreign legion, and though that was declined the emperor granted land for an American colony near Vera Cruz. Wife Bettie and her two young sons were reunited with Shelby there. For their refusal to surrender, these men were dubbed "the undefeated.” “The Undefeated” became the title of a 1969 John Wayne film loosely based on Shelby’s actions.
In 1867 Shelby and his family returned to Missouri and began a farming operation in Adrian, Missouri. In 1893, President Grover Cleveland appointed him as U.S. Marshal for the Western District of Missouri.
General Shelby died on February 13, 1897, and was buried at Forest Hills Cemetery in Kansas City, Missouri. He left behind a wife, seven sons and a daughter. Shelby became a folk hero to the people of the devastated Southland, and is still considered one of the greatest Confederate Cavalry leaders.
This former Confederate resident is the man Waverly citizens wanted so greatly to honor. The states of Kentucky and Missouri had both failed to raise a statue to their brave son and heroic figure. The Shelby marker which rests in Forest Hills Cemetery is rather insignificant considering the accomplishments of this brave leader of men.
W. L. Pointer and Keith Daleen of Waverly took out a loan in order to purchase 2,000 copies of the book entitled “Shelby and his Men.” These books were sold to help raise the necessary funds for a Shelby statue. It took twenty-six years of fundraising, but they did it. Many people worked on this project over the long years of fundraising.
On a blistering hot Saturday afternoon, a ceremony was held to unveil the General Shelby equestrian statute. There were flags, reenactors, singing groups, boy scouts and at least thirty Shelby family members in attendance from several states. Speeches were given by Jim Beckner, John Hinz, Col. James Shelby, Waverly Mayor Barbara Schreiman, U.S. Representative Ike Skelton, Jim England of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the Missouri President of the UDC.
Two notable no-shows were the key note speaker, our own Kentucky Governor Steve Breshear, and the Missouri Governor, Jay Nixon. Though long scheduled to speak, they both managed to come up with last-minute excuses as to why they could not attend this event. Likely the problem was a sudden appearance of untreatable large yellow streaks on each of their backs, since this Confederate memorial service did not fit the PC guidebook and some intrepid reporter just might have mentioned their attendance in the media.
The citizens of Waverly, Jim Beckner, John Hinz, Mary MaCoy, Cathy Gottsch, the sutlers, vendors and reenactors deserve our gratitude for a wonderful weekend event.
If you decide to visit Waverly, don’t miss a chance to see the only remaining original log home that stood upon the Santa Fe Trail. Apparently all the other homes on the old trail have been moved there from various locations. This house witnessed those first Santa Fe freighters, the Union and Confederate soldiers and even stood to attention during Jo’s day."