Samuel J. Jones was an entrepreneur who constructed Constitution Hall in 1856, now a National Landmark. Appointed sheriff of Douglas County, Kansas, in 1856 by Territorial Governor Daniel Woodson, he enforced the laws of the Kansas Territorial Legislature, causing much hardship and anguish on Free-State settlers. After Free State and abolition forces shot him in the back in Lawrence, he retaliated by sacking many buildings there in 1856. Following a disagreement with Governor Geary in 1857 over the treatment of Free State prisoners, he resigned and moved to La Mesilla, New Mexico. After his death in La Mesilla in 1885, he was buried in the IOOF Cemetery in Las Cruses. In 1935, his body was moved to the Masonic Cemetery and a new tombstone was installed, while the original tombstone was left in the abandoned cemetery.