Robert Henry Harrison, M.D.

Harrison repaid a debt in 1900. When yellow fever struck Columbus in 1873, Galveston had sent aid, and after the Galveston hurricane he set up a temporary hospital in the Columbus city hall. A Tennessee doctor and mill owner before the war, he had organized a Confederate artillery company in 1861 and spent twenty-one months as a prisoner. In Texas he also bred horses: his Beacon Hill Blood Stock Farm near Columbus covered 2,000 acres, with fine stables and a 200-acre racetrack complex.

What the plaque says

Robert Henry Harrison, M.D. (November 13, 1826 - October 17, 1905) A Georgia native and a doctor's son, Robert Henry Harrison received his medical degree in Ohio in 1846. He married Martha V. Towell in 1856, then served as a colonel in the Confederate Army. He moved to Columbus with his family in 1869, lived in a home at this site, and opened a doctor's office on the town square. He was a founding member and president of The State Medical Association, helped establish Texas' Board of Health, and was a prolific medical journalist. He built a hospital in Columbus in 1880 for railway employees. He left a legacy of civic leadership and volunteer medical service. (1994)

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Joseph Jefferson Mansfield — steps away
• The Columbus Tap Railway — steps away
• William Menefee — 0.2 mi
• Colorado County, City of Columbus — 0.2 mi