Broadway begins at Lafayette Square, which has a history as old as the city, but is set apart as a memorial to men who died fighting for the Union cause during the Civil War. The Square is also hallowed because one night, the Great Emancipator himself walked alone in the little park that was there when he stopped in Buffalo on his way to the White House. Lincoln won by a scant majority in Buffalo and Erie County in the election which made him President. But the reception Buffalonians gave him must have assured him of their support in the polices he was to pursue in the coming four years. Walking alone in the little park, Lincoln could not have known that fourteen miles out Broadway from Lafayette Square was the tiny Hamlet of Town Line, who had a majority of residents who opposed him, his policies and the rest of the United States loyal to the Union.
Sympathized with Confederacy - Town Line had so many Southern sympathizers that it took action unparalleled in the United States north of the Mason-Dixon Line at the beginning of the Civil War. Town Line, by a majority vote of it's citizens, seceded from the Union. Almost 500 miles away from the nearest Confederate State, the obscure settlement was an isolated but loyal patch of the Confederate States of America. While the rest of Erie County sent thousands into battle for the Union, it is believed at least five men from Town Line went South and fought for the Bonnie Blue Flag of the Confederacy. In the files of an old Lancaster newspaper is the angry account of the meeting of "copperheads" who drew up the articles of secession and signed them.
More @ Buffalo History Gazette
No comments:
Post a Comment