Colonial Circle -  Table of Contents

Gen. Daniel Davidson Bidwell
1819-1864
TEXT Beneath Photos


Two Photographs


Photo source: The Generals of the Civil War  (online Jan. 2015)


Photo source: The Generals of the Civil War  (online Jan. 2015)


See also:
Benjamin Maryniak, Soldiers Circle, Bidwell Parkway and Chapin Parkway Essay, illustrations


Colonial Circle Statue
Unless indicated otherwise, 2015 Photos


Pre-1924 postcard
The original name of Colonial Circle was Bidwell Place.




By Sahl Swarz
10/19/1924
Bronze Statue on White Limestone Base with Bronze Plaque
 Statue height - 8' / Base height 7.667'
Subject dressed in Civil War uniform sits astride a stallion.  He holds a sword low in his proper right hand and the horse's reins in his proper left hand. Horse has proper left front hoof raised.
-
City of Buffalo: Gen. Daniel Davidson Bidwell (online Jan. 2015)




"The General Daniel D. Bidwell Memorial Association provided funds for the statue. A grandniece of the general took charge of unveiling the effigy, which was the creation of the little-known Polish-American sculptor Sahl Swarz. Swarz, whose studio was in New York, based his design on Andrea del Verrocchio's late-15th century statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni, one of the masterpieces of Italian Renaissance art."
- Francis R. Kowsky, "Buffalo's Olmsted parkways: A Pioneering example of Commemorative Street Naming," pub. in Western New York Heritage , Summer 2016, p.11



Plaque on plinth
Plaque on base reads: "General Daniel Davidson Bidwell commanding the Third Brigade, Second Division, Sixth Corps. was killed at Cedar Creek, Virginia October 19, 1864. This statue was erected and presented to the city by the General Daniel Davidson Bidwell Association."
























2004 photo











































Forest Lawn  Monuments



Two details below:





Draped urn



















Two high-ranking Buffalo Civil War heroes were general Daniel Davidson Bidwell and Colonel Edward P. Chapin. Young Chapin, a Buffalo lawyer, was slain tin the fighting in Louisiana. Chapin Parkway is a double-barreled salute to the young lawyer-colonel, Edward Chapin, and the old doctor-colonel, Cyrenius Chapin.

Bidwell, astride his horse, took a bullet at Cedar Creek in the late days of the war. Bidwell was brought home for a civic funeral, first at City Hall and then beneath the dirgeful pealing bells of St. Paul's Church. Bidwell's name is remembered in one of Buffalo's residential avenues, Bidwell Parkway.

Source: Buffalo: Lake City in Niagara Land,by Richard C. Brown and Bob Watson. USA: Windsor Publications, 1981


Daniel Davidson Bidwell was born during 1819 in Black Rock NY, heir to the lucrative commercial interests of Benjamin Bidwell, who founded Buffalo's Banta & Bidwell Shipbuilding Company.

Active in Buffalo's prewar militia and instrumental in organizing the city's first police force, he helped to raise the 49th NYV and was named its colonel October 21, 1861.

General Meade personally recommended his promotion to brigadier general, which took effect August 11, 1864.

Bidwell was mortally wounded in action October 19, 1864, at the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia.

Source: Soldiers Circle, Bidwell Parkway and Chapin Parkway, by Benedict R. Maryniak


Pre-War Profession: Police justice.

War Service

Source: US Civil War Generals


49th New York Volunteers

The regiment participated in fifty-four skirmishes and engagements. Its greatest losses during the war occurred at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, where it lost 45.9 percent of the number engaged; and at the Battle of the Wilderness, where it had lost 20.5 percent of the number engaged."

Total killed and wounded were 141 men out of 1,312 men enrolled. 179 men died of disease, accidents, and prisons in addition.

The 49th New York Volunteers suffered a severe and unusual loss in the number of field officers killed in action:


See also:



Color photos and their arrangement © 2004
Chuck LaChiusa
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