Biography:

Nick Biddle, an escaped slave, settled in Pottsville, Pennsylvania around 1840.  Biddle joined the Union Army as the Orderly to Capt. James Wren of the Washington Artillery of Pottsville.  On their march south from Pottsville to Washington, D. C., the company passed through Baltimore.  It was here, during the Baltimore Riot of 1861, that Biddle was seriously wounded.  He suffered a head wound after being struck by a brick.  It is this wound that is believed to be the first bloodshed of the Civil War.  Biddle survived his wound, and the war, and lived out the rest of his life in Pottsville.
Nick Biddle, an escaped slave, settled in Pottsville, Pennsylvania around 1840.  Biddle joined the Union Army as the Orderly to Capt. James Wren of the Washington Artillery of Pottsville.  On their march south from Pottsville to Washington, D. C., the company passed through Baltimore.  It was here, during the Baltimore Riot of 1861, that Biddle was seriously wounded.  He suffered a head wound after being struck by a brick.  It is this wound that is believed to be the first bloodshed of the Civil War.  Biddle survived his wound, and the war, and lived out the rest of his life in Pottsville.