When Union Civil War veteran George Doty passed away in 1887, there was no money to pay his funeral or burial expenses. Doty was a member of Eugene Grand Army of the Republic Post 7 and the Post agreed to pay half of the $30 expense with Lane County picking up the other half of the bill. Thus, George Doty became the first person buried in what is now the GAR plot of the Eugene Pioneer Cemetery. Union veterans of the Civil War formed the G.A.R. in 1866 as a fraternal organization. The GAR became a powerful social and political force in America for decades.

In Eugene, veterans formed the General J.W. Geary, Post #7, of the GAR. The Geary post purchased a cemetery plot to provide for Post members and other Union veterans who needed burial space.

In 1903 Union veteran John Covell’s estate, valued at $2,500, specified that a monument be placed at the GAR plot where he was laid to rest. The bequest was challenged in court by Covell’s relatives, but a Eugene judge ruled in favor of the GAR. The result is the25-foot blue marble statue of a Union infantryman that stands guard over the soldiers who rest beneath it. The statue was carved in Vermont and shipped by rail to Eugene. The 8-ton statue was brought to the cemetery by an 8-horse team and raised by block and tackle.

In December 2001 vandals broke the head of the statue off and pulverized it. Local artist David Miller was commissioned to sculpt a replacement. An 800-pound block of blue marble was obtained from the same Vermont quarry where the original statue was carved one hundred years before. The new head was installed in February, 2003 and dedicated that Memorial Day.