Richard Cordley,
Richard Cordley was an author and minister in Kansas.
Cordley was born in Nottingham, England, on September 6, 1829. He moved with his family to the United States when he was about four, settling in Livingston County, Michigan, where Cordley attended public schools. In 1850, he entered the University of Michigan and graduated with the class of 1854. He then worked his way through the Andover Theological Seminary, where he graduated in 1857.
On December 2, 1857, he delivered his first sermon at the Plymouth Congregational Church in Lawrence, Kansas. In May 1859, he married Mary M. Cox of Livingston County, Michigan. Cordley was living and working in Lawrence at the time of Quantrill’s Raid on August 21, 1863. His house and all its contents were burned, and he was one of the persons marked for death, but he managed to elude the guerrillas.
Lawrence Massacre, September 5, 1863, by Harper’s Weekly.
In 1875, he received a degree of Doctor of Divinity from the University of Kansas. That same year, he went to Flint, Michigan, for a while before returning to Lawrence and continuing as pastor of the Plymouth Church, a position he retained until his death. He served for some time as a regent of the Kansas Agricultural College and was president of the Lawrence Board of Education for several years. He was the author of “Pioneer Days in Kansas” and “A History of Lawrence,” as well as a regular contributor to magazines and church periodicals.
He died on July 11, 1904.
©Kathy Alexander/Legends of Kansas, updated September 2025.
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