THE TEXIANS
AND THE TEXANS
THE UNIVERSITY
OF TEXAS
INSTITUTE OF
TEXAN CULTURES
THE
GERMAN
TEXANS
AT SAN ANTONIO""""""""""""""""""""""""
THE GERMAN
TEXANS
THE TEXIANS AND THE TEXANS
A series dealing with the many peoples who have contributed to the history
and heritage of Texas. Now in print:
Pamphlets - The Afro-American Texans, The Anglo-American Texans, The Belgian
Texans, The Chinese Texans, The Czech Texans, The German Texans,
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The German Texans
Principal researcher: James Patrick McGuire
©1970: The University of Texas
Institute of Texan Cultures at San Antonio
John R . McGiffert, Executive Director
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 70-631080
International Standard Book Number 0-86701-037-1
Second, revised edition, 1987
This publication was made possible, in part, by a grant from Houston Endowment, Inc.
Printed in the United States of America
Cover: Carl Sachtleben, Blanco County
Back Cover: Carl Gaeth home, Cypress Mill, Blanco County, c. 1875
THE GERMAN TEXANS
Wanderlust - the adventurous
urge to see far places­brought
a few Germans to
Texas before 1800. Felip de Sando­val,
who explored parts of Texas in
1749, told of finding a German liv­ing
at La Harpe's trading post on the
. upper Red River in what is now
Bowie County. Later he came upon
a Comanche rancheria in the Texas
Panhandle, where he found "a Ger­man
hunter and French Protestant"
trading with the Indians.
THE LOUISIANA
PURCHASE
1804
Following the Louisiana Purchase,
a succession of filibustering expedi­tions
were mounted against Texas,
each of which included a few Ger­man
adventurers. A scattering of
German settlers, who had become
A view of Texas - Fredericksburg by Hermann Lungkwitz
Spanish subjects in Louisiana, also
moved into Spanish-held Texas after
the purchase.
THE GUTIERREZ-MAGEE
EXPEDITION
1812
Several German soldiers of fortune
were in the Gutierrez-Magee expe­dition,
which "liberated" Texas from
Spain in 1812-1813 and briefly estab­lished
The Republic of the West,
with its green flag flying over the
capitol at San Antonio.
THE LONG EXPEDITION
1821
Germans took part in Dr. James
Long's ill-fated expedition of 1821,
which declared Texas's indepen­dence,
set up a short-lived republic,
and occupied Nacogdoches and La
Bahia before the Spanish captured
most of the invaders. The same year
five German names appeared
among the original 300 families
brought to Texas by Stephen Austin.
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Roster of Dr. Long's expedition in 1821
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The Lone Star Flag oj the Long Expedition in 1819
J. VALENTINE HEeKE
Apparently the first known effort to
promote Texas as a possible area for
German settlement was in the book
Reise durch die ~reinigten Staaten von
Nord Amerika in den Jahren 1818 und
1819. Its author, J. Valentine Heeke,
had traveled in Texas. He urged the
Prussian government to buy the ter­ritory
from Spain as a colonial ven­ture.
He pointed out political, agri­cultural
and commercial possibili­ties,
and noted that it would provide
a solution to the problem of over­population
in Germany.
port died, leaving Durst his Texas
properties, the young man became
one of Texas's wealthiest citizens. He
operated from Davenport's head­quarters
in the Old Stone Fort at
N act)gdoches. He became active in
public affairs and was elected to the
Coahuila y Tejas legislature in 1835.
1\t Monclova, the capital, he heard
of Santa Anna's plans to. invade
Texas and, by an amazing horseback
ride, reached east Texas with the
report in 12 Y2 days. He commanded
troops in east Texas during the revo­lution
and was a leader in Indian
wars which followed.
The third brother, Jacob Darst,
THE DURST BROTHERS retained the original spelling of the
1830's
Early in the 1800's three brothers,
John and Joseph Durst and Jacob
Darst, entered Texas from Louisi­ana.
Born of German immigrant
parents in Spanish Missouri, each of
these men left a sharp imprint on
Texas history. Joseph, the oldest, was
alcalde (mayor) of Nacogdoches in
1826 and a member of the local
Committee of Safety and Corre­spondence
at the beginning of the
Texas Revolution. He was active in
Indian affairs of the republic until
his death in 1843.
John Durst became the protege
and heir of wealthy Peter Samuel
Davenport, merchant and landown­er
at Nacogdoches. When Daven- John Durst
4
family name. He was living in Gon­zales
at the outset of the Texas Rev­olution.
When Mexican troops de­manded
the return of a cannon, the
settlers buried it; later Jacob and two
other men dug it up for use against
the Mexican army. On March 1,
1836, Jacob Darst joined 32 Gon­zales
men who went to the relief of
the Alamo. He was killed in the
fortress six days later.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
SMYTH
George Washington Smyth, son of
a German millwright, came to Texas
from Tennessee in 1830. He settled
in Nacogdoches, taught school, be­came
a surveyor and attained wide
influence as a public figure. Smyth
was surveyor for Bevil's Settlement
on the Sabine and for the colonial
grants of Lorenzo de Zavala, Joseph
Vehlein and David G. Burnet, all in
east Texas. He represented his dis­trict
at the Convention of 1836,
signed the Texas Declaration of In­dependence,
then joined his family
in the Runaway Scrape. Smyth was
appointed to survey the line between
Texas and the United States in 1839;
the next year he was a member of
the commission to fix the boundary.
He served in the Congress of the
Republic of Texas, as commissioner
of the General Land Office and as
a member of the United States
Congress. He died while serving as
a delegate to Texas's Constitutional
Convention of 1866.
r; q - , 5(j Charles Fordtran
ERNST AND FORDTRAN
The beginning of German settle­ments
in Texas can be dated by the
arrival in 1831 of Friedrich Ernst
and Charles Fordtran. Ernst, former
head gardener and bookkeeper for
the Duke of Oldenburg, and Ford­tran,
a tanner from Westphalia, had
joined forces in New York in their
search for a new home. A married
man with a family, Ernst was eligi­ble
for a full league of land in Aus­tin's
colony. He selected a league 17
miles northwest of the colonial capi­tal
of San Felipe, astride the Gotier
Trace, main road from Austin's old
colony to his new one near Bastrop.
Fordtran, a single man, was eligible
for only a quarter league. The two
settled as neighbors.
FRIEDRICH ERNST
Ernst, who was to become known as
"The Father of German Immigra­tion
in Texas;' was ill-equipped for
pioneering. He did not know how
to build a cabin, hated guns and had
brought none of the necessary
equipment for clothing his family on
the frontier. Still, he had an un­bounded
love for this new country,
with its rich land, favorable climate,
political freedom and unlimited
opportunities. All of this he poured
out in an eloquent letter to a friend
named Schwartz back in Oldenburg,
urging him to come to Texas at once.
Schwartz sent the letter to the local
paper. It was published throughout
Oldenburg and many other German
principalities. Ernst's contagious
enthusiasm spread through the Ger­man
states, starting the first steady
stream of immigration to Texas.
GEORGE B. ERATH
George B. Erath was a well-educated
German youth, who had fled his
native Austria to evade compulsory
military service. He landed in Texas
in 18133 and soon was working as a
surveyor's helper. As a surveyor he
eventually contributed much to ex­Wlnding
the Texas frontiers, but he
is also frequently remembered as a
great soldier and Indian fighter of
daring and skill. Erath fought as a
private at San Jacinto and was a
member of the Somervell expedition
against Mier.
He laid out the towns of Waco,
Caldwell and Stephenville, as well as
many headrights along the Brazos
River. Erath served two terms in the
George B. Erath
Texas Congress and was twice elec­ted
to the legislature after statehood.
He rejoined the military during the
Civil War but soon had to resign his
commission because of poor health.
Back in Waco, he organized a com­pany
of Minute Men to guard
against marauding Indians. Erath
County, which he explored and to
which he led the first group of set­tlers,
is named for this vigorous and
wide-ranging immigrant.
Robert Justus Kleberg
ROBERT JUSTUS
KLEBERG
The German who established one of
the most famous Texas ranching
families, Robert Justus Kleberg, was
one of the thousands inspired to set­tle
in Texas by Friedrich Ernst's
glowing letter. A well-to-do young
lawyer, Kleberg left his native West­phalia
in 1834 with a group of im­migrants,
including many of his
wife's relatives, the wealthy and titled
Von Roeders. After being ship­wrecked
off Galveston Island, they
underwent numerous hardships be­fore
settling on a league 14 miles out
of San Felipe near Ernst and Ford­tran.
The settlement of Germans
which grew up around them IS
known today as Cat Spring.
5
At the outbreak of the revolu­tion,
Kleberg and his kinsmen
joined the Texas army and gave a
good account of themselves at San
Jacinto. Their women mounted
horses and drove their cattle to
Louisiana until the war was over.
After the war Kleberg served on the
Board of Land Commissioners for
Austin County and as justice of the
peace and chief justice. He moved
to DeWitt County in 1847 and
served as chief justice there in 1853
and 1855. He was a leading rancher
in that area until his death in 1888.
His descendants today own and
operate the famous King Ranch,
1,250,000 acres in Nueces, Kenedy,
Kleberg and Willacy counties.
1831-1848
From the coming of Ernst and Ford­tran
in 1831 to the beginning of or­ganized
immigration in 1845, many
Germans came to Texas, singly or
in small groups. They settled gener­ally
in Galveston or Houston or in
the fertile valleys between the Brazos
and the Colorado rivers where Ernst
had established a foothold. There
were only 218 Germans reported in
the Texas census of 1836, but by the
1840's there were thousands. Grad­ually
they moved into central Texas
seeking good farmland.
The reason that the Germans
came in such numbers went far
beyond the mere wanderlust of ear­lier
times. There was the desire for
economic and social improvement.
Many people believed that overpop­ulation
in Germany had produced
too much competition for available
job openings. Others were unhappy
over the extremely uneven distribu­tion
of wealth. Heavy taxation was
another complaint. Finally, there
was the prospect of cheap land and
higher wages in the New World.
Immigration was also stimulated by
political agitation in Germany. In
the 1840's university students were
demonstrating and sometimes riot­ing
in favor of more personal free­dom.
As violence spread, the gov-
6
ernment took oppressive counter­measures.
The climax came in 1848
when thousands of the better-edu­cated
people left Germany. Many of
these came to Texas.
TEXAS AND HER
REVOLUTION
One of the most colorful personal
accounts of the Texas Revolution
was first published in Germany. It
was the work of Hermann Ehren­berg,
a 17 -year-old adventurer who
landed in Texas in time to fight at
the siege of Bexar late in 1835. Early
the next year he and six German
friends were with Fannin's ill-fated
army at Goliad. Fannin's entire com­mand
was captured and condemned
to death. Three of the Germans,
including Ehrenberg, were spared
from the massacre and eventually
relea~ed by the Mexicans.
Ehrenberg returned to Germa­ny
in 1842 and became a teacher of
English at the University of Halle.
There he edited the journal of his
experiences in the Texas Revolution
and completed an account of the
founding of the Lone Star Republic.
His Texas und seine Revolution went
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into many editions in Germany and
has since been translated into Eng­lish.
Ehrenberg returned to the
United States and settled in Arizona
as a surveyor and mapmaker, road
builder and mining engineer. He
was reportedly slain by Indians at an
isolated stage stop east of present­day
Palm Springs, California, but a
strong suspicion persists that he was
slain by the stationmaster for the
large sum of money which he car­ried.
Ehrenberg was buried at the
scene by his close friend Mike Gold­water,
a noted Arizona pioneer who
subsequently named the town of
Ehrenberg for him.
William Langenheim
WILLIAM LANGENHEIM
An inventive young German who
helped develop one of the standard
parlor entertainments of the 1890's,
the stereopticon slides, almost lost
his chance for fame because of the
Texas Revolution. William Langen­heim,
who had been in Texas since
1833, was 20 when he was captured
by the Mexicans as a member of
Francis W. Johnson's scouting party
in the battle of San Patricio. When
he was released from a Mexican
prison in 1837, Langenheim went to
New Orleans and enlisted with the
United States forces in the Seminole
War. When his fighting days ended,
he settled in Philadelphia, opened a
photographic studio and experi­mented
with many of the new pro­cesses
being developed at that time.
Langenheim greatly improved the
crude stereopticon process for show­ing
scenes in three dimensions. He
became one of the principal creators
of the dual slides for viewers which
soon graced practically every parlor
table in the land.
FERDINAND
LINDHEIMER
Leaving Germany in 1833 for politi­cal
reasons, Ferdinand Lindheimer
came to America and spent time first
in Illinois, then in Mexico. In the
last months of 1835 he was caught
up in the Texas Revolution. H e
started out for Texas, was ship­wrecked
near Mobile, and so joined
Houston's army one day after the
battle of San Jacinto. Missing his
chance for military glory, he started
immediately on a course which
brought him international fame in
far different circles. A trained bota ­nist,
Lindheimer collected speci­mens
of Texas plants, identified,
dried and shipped them to leading
museums. Working in an area unex­plored
by scientists, he made many
valuable discoveries and was hon­ored
by having 20 species of plants
and one genus of Texas wildflowers
named for him. For 15 years Lind­heimer
roamed the coastal plains,
the Hill Country and other parts of
Texas with his dogs and botanical
cart, collecting specimens which he
sent to George Englemann of the
Missouri Botanical Gardens and to
Asa Gray of Harvard University. In
1852 he settled down at New Braun­fels
and started a new career as
editor of the Neu-Braurifelser Zeitung.
A scholarly, aggressive editor, Lind­heimer
made his newspaper a force
throughout the growing German
settlements of Texas. He was a lead­er
among the Texas Germans who
called for publicly supported educa­tion
in the state many years before
it was to become a reality.
INDUSTRY, TEXAS
1838
The 'first German town in Texas was
founded in 1838 by Friedrich Ernst,
who laid out the town of Industry
on his headright league. Having
learned that he could successfully
grow fine tobacco in the area, Ernst
planned to open a cigar factory that
would provide employment for the
residents. Ernst wanted his town to
have a German population and
therefore offered special induce­ments
to his countrymen to settle
there. It became a favorite stopping
place for immigrants on their way
from landings at Galveston and
Houston to their new homesites in
the interior.
LOUIS ERVENDBERG
Another immigrant who left a last­ing
imprint on the life of Texas's
German settlements was the Rever­end
Louis Cachand Ervendberg,
who arrived in Houston in 1839. He
settled at Blumenthal near Industry,
ministered to German congrega­tions
in that area and led a move to
establish a German-English univer­sity
there in 1844. The supporters
of this enterprise issued a charter,
, t -11 S Ferdinand Lindheimer sold stock, received a league of land
from the state and built a two-story
structure, but the school never
opened. Selected by Prince Carl of
Solms-Braunfels as minister for the
Protestants among his German im­migrants,
Ervendberg helped estab­lish
New Braunfels and built its first
church. In 1846, when hundreds of
immigrants became ill and died in
a trek from the coast, Pastor Er­vendberg
ministered to the sick,
then established an orphanage near
New Braunfels for the children of
those who had died on the way. In
1850 he secured a charter for a
Western Texas University, to teach
scientific agriculture, near New
Braunfels. When this plan failed, he
left for Mexico, where he was killed
by bandits.
THE GERMAN UNION
1841
The German Union, founded in
Houston in 1841, was the first of
many German fraternal, charitable,
singing, dancing, athletic, agricul­tural
and political societies to be
formed in Texas. It was chartered by
the Texas Congress to assist the sick
and needy among German ImmI­grants
to Texas.
7
Seal oj the Adelsverein
THE ADELSVEREIN
1842
German migration to Texas entered
a new phase in 1842, when a group
of noblemen met at Biebrich on the
Rhine near Mainz and formed a
society to promote German settle­ments
in Texas. This poorly orga­nized,
uninformed, badly underfi­nanced
organization had a number
of names but is best known as the
"Society for the Protection of Ger­man
Immigrants in Texas;' or the
Mainzer Adelsverein. In a series of
comic-opera business deals, the
naive noblemen were fleeced by sev­eral
sets of Texas scoundrels and
wound up with a tenuous claim on
vast but uninhabitable lands. De­spite
the great misery their bum­bling
caused thousands of immi­grants
under their "protection;' the
Adelsverein made the Germanic influ­ence
the most important European
factor in early Texas development.
LEININGEN AND
BOOS-WALDECK
1843
The Adelsverein sent Prince Victor of
Leiningen and Count Joseph of
Boos-Waldeck to Texas in late 1843
to seek grants for their settlements.
try, the prince went to Austin to seek
concessions from the Texas republic.
None were granted, but Prince Vic­tor
was so impressed with Texas that
he still made a favorable report to
the Adelsverein.
l)uke Adolf oj Nassau
Count Joseph, staying in In­dustry,
bought a league of land a few
miles northwest of the town on
Cummins Creek in what is now
Fayette County. He named it N as­sau,
in honor of Duke Adolf of N as­sau,
Protector of the Adelsverein.
Though it was never used for set­tlers,
Nassau Farm served as a rest
and recreation center for the noble
representatives of the Adelsverein
when they were in Texas. It was sold
to Otto von Roeder when the society
went broke.
BOURGEOIS AND DUCOS
1843
The first costly mistake of the Adels­verein
was the purchase of a worthless
grant near San Antonio from two
Texas Frenchmen, Alexander Bour­geois
and Armand Ducos. Bourgeois
was a typical early Texas wheeler­dealer.
Hearing of the society's inter­est
in Texas, he caught a boat for
Germany, added a touch of royalty
to his name by calling himself Alex­ander
Bourgeois, Chevalier d'Or­vanne,
and charmed the Germans
into buying a grant which had ex­pired
four months earlier. Not satis­fied
with this, he had himself named
an officer of the society, with salary
and expense account.
THE FISHER-MILLER
GRANT
1844
No sooner had the German noble­men
divested themselves of the
worthless Bourgeois-Ducos grant
After stops in Houston and Indus- Detail Jrom 1851 map oj Texas published in Wiesbaden, Germany
8
than they fell prey to another pair
of Texas con men. These were, at
least, of German origin. Henry
Francis Fisher (Heinrich Franz Fis­cher)
and Burchard Miller (Brukart
Mueller) had been in Texas long
enough to establish themselves as
land dealers and to secure a large
acreage in west Texas. Their land,
which lay between the Llano and the
Colorado rivers, was largely un­suited
to farming and wholly occu­pied
by hostile Indians. With only
ten months left before their conces­sion
expired, Fisher and Miller ped­dled
their white elephant to the
Adelsverein. There were more than
3,000,000 acres, the surveying of
which alone would take more than
the society's original capital of
$80,000. The society acquired no
title to the land, buying merely the
obligation to settle a number of im­migrants
on it.
"The folly and short-sighted­ness
that characterized the leaders
was almost puerile. They possessed
little business ability and were com­pletely
taken in by intriguing adven­turers."
- German quote of the time,
relating to the Adelsverein.
Prince Carl oj Solms-Braunfels
PRINCE CARL OF
SOLMS-BRAUNFELS
1844 ~
10- '5"~
CARLSHAFEN
(INDIANOLA)
1844
Indianola
Chosen by members of the Adelsverein
a~ commissioner-general for the col­ony,
Prince Carl arrived at Galves­ton
in July 1844 with Alexander
Bourgeois as his assistant. The dash­ing
nobleman was no match for the
myriad practical problems which
confronted him during his ten and
a half months in Texas. By the time
he had determined that the Bour­geois-
Ducos grant was worthless and
had dismissed Bourgeois, the prince
was faced with the second, equally
disastrous purchase by the society.
Knowing that the Fisher-Miller
grant could not be occupied until
something was done about the Indi­ans,
he started negotiating for lands
in a more settled region where the
onrushing immigrants might be
temporarily located. He bought a
tract on Lavaca Bay to use as a land­ing
place from which the new arriv­als
would be supplied and organized
for their journey to the interior. The
prince did his royal best to care for
the people entrusted to him. U nfor­tunately
he considered it beneath his
dignity to worry about money or
even keep an account of the obliga­tions
that he made.
Three shiploads of Germans arrived
on the Texas coast in December
1844. They debarked at the port
which Prince Carl had bought and
named Carlshafen (later known as
Indianola). A warehouse and other
facilities had been erected at Carls­hafen,
bu t there were no accommo­dations
for the hundreds of immi­grants,
weary and sick from a long
sea voyage. They had to camp on the
open beach in wet winter weather
and so were impatient to move in­land
to the homes which had been
promised them.
NEW BRAUNFELS
1845
While his restless charges waited at
Carlshafen, Prince Carl rode to San
Antonio and bought, from the Vera­mendi
family, a beautiful tract of
well-watered, wooded land on the
Comal River. This was intended to
serve as a temporary settlement for
the horde of immigrants and a way
station on the route to the Fisher­Miller
grant. On March 21, 1845,
the prince led his bedraggled party
9
Drawing of New Braunfels in 1870 by H. Brosius
onto the land and established a
town, naming it after his home prov­ince
of Braunfels. The temporary
settlement became permanent, and
the way station one of the most solid
German towns in Texas. New
Braunfels is still one of the most
charming of Texas towns.
1845
Along with the hard-working peas­ants
who made up the majority of
the Adelsverein immigrants, the Ger­man
influx brought many highly ed­ucated
intellectuals to Texas. These
people greatly enriched Texas in the
areas of music, science, art and lit­erature.
Probably the first German
poem written on Texas soil was by
Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels.
THE SOPHIENBURG
One of the most imposing buildings
in the new town on the Comal was
a fortified headquarters for Prince
Carl and his staff, built on a low hill
above New Braunfels. Named for
the Prince's fiancee, Princess Sophia
of Salm-Salm, the original Sophien­burg
blockhouse was completely
destroyed by a storm in 1866. On the
33rd anniversary of the founding of
had their picture taken in front of
the Sophienburg ruin.
JOHN O. MEUSEBACH
.Y\'hen affairs of the colony became
desperately muddled as a result of
Prince Carl's autocratic methods and
nonexistent accounting, the society
chose a well-educated, wealthy and
idealistic young jurist to succeed
him. Baron Ottfried Hans von
Meusebach was a perfect choice­intelligent,
learned and practical.
The day he sailed for Texas he
dropped his noble title and started
in the new land as plain John O.
Meusebach. Arriving at Galveston
in April 1845, he had spent most of
the society's available funds to free
Prince Carl from his creditors. At
every stop he found the affairs of the
colony in worse shape. The settlers
were disgruntled, unwilling to work,
poorly provisioned and inadequately
housed. And he knew more boat­loads
were on their way from Ger­many.
Meusebach straightened out
the tangled finances of the colony,
established credit in Texas and pre­pared
to expand Adelsverein holdings
to make room for the oncommg
flood of immigrants.
John 0. Meusebach
HERMANN F. SEELE
Soon after Commissioner-General
Meusebach's arrival, Hermann
Friedrich Seele opened at New
Braunfels the first German-English
the town, the surviving first settlers Original German settlers in front of the Sophienburg, c. 1878
10
Hermann F Seele
school in central Texas. Seele had
been in Texas since 1843. H e was
one of the first settlers at New
Braunfels and was a leader in social
and cultural activities. He later
served as county clerk of Comal
County, as Civil War mayor of New
Braunfels and as a member of the
Texas Legislature.
HOFFMANN VON
FALLERSLEBEN
1846
Early in 1846, when a group of Ger­mans
headed by Pastor Adolf Fuchs
of Mecklenburg were sailing for
Texas, the famous poet Hoffmann
von Fallersleben wrote a song, "The
Star of Texas;' in honor of the occa­sion.
Later he wrote a number of
other Texas songs, published them
in a small German songbook and
sent them to his Texas friends. His
Texanische Lieder became quite popu­lar
among settlers in the new coun­try.
Von Fallersleben is best remem­bered
as the author of "Deutschland,
Deutschland tiber Alles;' the Ger­man
national anthem.
FREDERICKSBURG
1846
With New Braunfels settled and
more immigrants on the way,
Meusebach sought land for another
way station nearer the Fisher-Miller
grant. He bought on credit 10,000
..
acres in the Hill Country 80 miles
northwest of New Braunfels. In May
of 1846 he led the first train of 120
immigrants to the site on which he
founded the town of Fredericksburg.
COMANCHE TREATY
1847
The immigrants' goal of settling on
the Fisher-Miller grant was blocked
by hostile Indians. John O. Meuse­bach
made peace with the less-war­like
Waco tribe, then set out to deal
with the fierce Comanches. InJanu­ary
1847 he left with 40 men for the
Comanche camps on the San Saba
River. When the time came for
negotiations to begin, Meusebach
rode into the Comanche camp emp­tying
his rifle so that the Indians
would know that he was unarmed
and unafraid. He won their respect
with his courage and their confi­dence
with his frankness. The Co­manches
agreed to allow the Ger­mans
to explore the territory and,
on March 2, 1847, signed a treaty
which allowed them to enter the
grant and make settlements. This
remarkable treaty was the only one
negotiated by white men and Indi­ans
in Texas which was kept rigor­ously
by both sides.
THE FREDERICKSBURG
EASTER FIRES
An enduring Hill Country tradition
came about as a result of the Meuse-
Signing of the Meusebach-Comanche treaty
bach-Comanche negotiations. While
Meusebach and his men were travel­ing
among the Indians, the Indians
themselves placed a watch on the
town of Fredericksburg to ensure
against treachery. They built signal
fires on the hills around the town.
As long as the fires blazed high,
tribesmen in the distant camps
would know that all was well. The
children in the German settlement
were frightened when they saw the
fires, but a pioneer mother made up
a story that it was only the Easter
Rabbit at work - cooking eggs in
great cauldrons and then dyeing
them with wildflowers gathered from
11
the hills. The pageant of the Easter
Fires has been continued at Fred­ericksburg
since that time.
BETTINA COLONY
1847
Opening of the Fisher-Miller Grant
allowed for rapid expansion of the
German settlements. The towns of
Castell and Leiningen were founded
within the limits of the grant. One
of the most interesting settlements,
at the junction of Elm Creek and the
Llano River, was the Bettina Colony.
It was organized along communal
lines by a group of German univer­sity
scholars and named for Bettina
von Arnim, a leading German intel­lectual
of her day. "The Forty" (Die
Vierziger) who made up the founding
group were brilliant professional
men, artists and musicians. None
were farmers or craftsmen. With
"too many chiefs and no Indians" the
venture soon failed, and much finely
trained talent was dispersed among
the German towns.
Bettina von Arnim
GUSTAV SCHLEICHER
Gustav Schleicher, one of the Bettina
founders, was educated in civil engi­neering
and architecture. When
Bettina collapsed he moved to San
Antonio, where he practiced law and
supervised construction of the San
12
Gustav Schleicher
Antonio and Mexican Gulf Rail­road.
He served in the Texas Legis­lature
before the Civil War, was an
engi;;'eer for the Confederacy and,
in the postwar period, served three
~rms in the United States House of
Representatives. Schleicher County
in west Texas was named for him.
DR. FERDINAND
VON HERFF
Another talented member of the
Bettina group was Dr. Ferdinand
von Herff, a highly skilled surgeon,
who had made a distinguished rec­ord
in the Hessian army. Although
the Bettina Colony soon failed,
Herff had one highly unusual expe­rience
there. Following a successful
cataract operation (the first such
surgery in the state) on the eye of
a Comanche brave, the patient
promised to bring Dr. Herff a young
girl as an expression of his gratitude.
The surgeon did not take the prom­ise
seriously until six months later
when the brave returned with a
Mexican girl. Not knowing what
else to do, Dr. Herff turned her over
to the only other woman in the colo­ny
as a cook's helper. Later the girl
married Hermann Spiess, who suc­ceededJohn
0. Meusebach as com­missioner-
general of the Adelsverein.
When the Bettina experiment
collapsed, Dr. Herff moved first to
New Braunfels, then to San Antonio,
where his office became a center for
advanced research in surgery and
pathology. Herff studied cures for
tuberculosis and performed plastic
surgery and the first hysterectomy in
this country. A man of great intellec­tual
force, he was influential in the
political and cultural circles of San
Antonio throughout his career. He
continued to practice medicine until
his late 80's. At his death he was one
of the most widely respected and
loved persons of his community.
NIMITZ HOTEL
A Texas landmark for many genera­tions,
the quaint Nimitz Hotel in
Fredericksburg was built and oper­ated
by Captain Charles H. Nimitz.
He had come to the town in 1847
after a career on the riverboats.
Nimitz built a series of hotels in the
town, each larger and more splendid
than the last. His establishment,
which included hotel, casino, saloon,
general store, brewery and stables,
became a favorite stopping place on
the main military road from San
Antonio to El Paso. Its register con­tained
the names of such famous
guests as Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S.
Grant, Rutherford B .. Hayes and the
I
infamous "Mr. Howard," better
known as Jesse James. Nimitz was
a genial host, a power in the German
country and a friend of many of his
distinguished guests.
VICTOR BRACHT
1848
Victor Bracht, a native of Dussel­dorf,
had genuine enthusiasm for
Texas and Texans. He arrived in
1845 as an employee of the Adels­verein.
Landing at Galveston, he
promptly headed for New Braunfels
Victor Bracht
Nimitz Hotel
and established a home. For the next
two years he traveled extensively in
the German areas on behalf of his
employer. Dissatisfied with existing
immigrant guidebooks, Bracht wrote
one of his own in which he at­tempted
to be realistic about the
adyantages and disadvantages of
moving to Texas. His book gave high
praise to the character of the people,
although he noted a talent for sharp
dealing among the menfolk. The
women, he said, liked nothing better
than to "sit unthinking and at ease
in their rocking chairs!' But he ad­mired
the confident attitude of the
people and the air of freedom ill
which they flourished.
OTTO MAR VON BEHR
1848
Pioneer of the Hill Country ranch­ing
industry Ottomar von Behr set­tled
near the village of Sisterdale in
1848. A scholarly sheepman, he
wrote a practical book on farming
and ranching in Texas, with empha­sis
on the advantages of sheep rais­ing.
Published in Leipzig and widely
circulated among prospective immi­grants,
his Good Advice for Immigrants
laid the foundations for stable
agricultural development among the
Germans of Texas.
FERDINAND VON
ROEMER
1849
One of the most valuable surveys of
Texas flora, fauna and geology, still
considered a classic, was published
in Germany in 1849. Texas by Ferdi­nand
von Roemer has since been
translated and republished several
times. The young German paleon­tologist
was sent by the Berlin Acad­emy
of Science to make a geological
survey of Texas and especially of the
area within the Adelsverein grant. Von
Roemer was a keen observer and a
diligent worker. In gathering his
scientific specimens, he was greatly
aided by the children of the German
settlements, who regarded him as
their friend. After two years of ex­ploration
he returned to Germany,
where he produced a book entitled
~« _ ~ ~ Lt Ferdinand von Roemer
Texas. This delightfully written
volume is important because of its
wealth of information about the
natural setting and its penetrating
insights into the social customs of
the times. Von Roemer's great affec­tion
for Texas is evidenced in the
concluding lines of his book: "Dur­ing
my stay of more than a year I
had grown to love the beautiful land
of meadows, to which belongs a
great future. It moved me to sorrow
that I must say farewell to the land
13
.,---- --
forever. To me there still remain rich
and pleasant memories; and from
afar I shall always follow with lively
interest the further development of
the country. May its broad, green
prairies become the habitation of a
great and happy people!"
Adolf Fuchs
PASTOR ADOLF FUCHS
1849
In 1849 Pastor Adolf Fuchs peti­tioned
the Texas Legislature for
financial aid to the Cat Spring
School. This was the forerunner of
another petition by Texas Germans
for general state support of public
schools. The Germans were among
the first to promote this practice in
Texas. Pastor Fuchs subsequently
left the ministry and tried farming,
then became interested in education.
He taught music at Baylor Female
College in Independence before
moving in 1853 to Burnet County,
near Marble Falls, where he died.
THE VON ROSENBERG
FAMILY: MAPMAKERS
Three generations of the Von Rosen­bergs
had distinguished careers as
mapmakers in Texas. Karl Wilhelm
von Rosenberg, a licensed surveyor
and architect, left Germany amid
political and economic turmoil late
in 1849. At age 28 he brought his
entire family-wife, parents, and
14
Karl Wilhelm von Rosenberg 10 -) It
eight brothers and sisters - to Texas.
They settled near Round Top in
Fayette County, where Wilhelm
bought a small farm. In 1856 he sold
the farm and moved to Austin to
work as a draftsman at the General
Land Office. By 1861 he was chief
araftsman. His career was inter-lkdttNd
(nmt dwil' urigtnall""l'''' lhtIo S1. le morl dn"",
b,
('1I.d.W.PJ~ft II I\.U.I"\l'It//:!IUfA.'IIl'/.
AVa<TUI'. T&XAS 1 • .,..
~lIf~ __ .D..otR4 .. M,
rupted by the Civil War, in which
he served as a topographical engi­neer
for the Confederacy. He re­turned
to the Land Office until Re­construction
began, then opened a
land agency of his own and pros­pered
until his death in 1901.
His son, Ernst, went to work as
a draftsman in the General Land Of­fice
in 1876 and eventually rose to
chief draftsman. Except for a two­year
interval, he continued there
until his death in 1915. Two of Ernst's
sons, Herman and Ernest, were
topographers with the old State Rec­lamation
Department when that
agency was consolidated with the
General Land Office in 1939. Her­man
resigned because of ill health
in 1952, and Ernest retired in 1954.
When the Red River boundary dis­pute
arose between Texas and Okla­homa
in the 1920's, the Von Rosen­bergs
and the Penick brothers did
the topographical work for the state
attorney general's office. Their work
was so outstanding that both the
State of Oklahoma and the federal
government discarded their own
- .. -- - . --..:--
Pocket map of the State of Texas by C. W Pressler
maps and asked permission to use
the Texas maps.
CHARLES WILLIAM
PRESSLER
1851
Charles William Pressler was an
exceptionally gifted cartographer,
who came from Germany in 1846
and first worked for Jacob de Cor­dova,
the "land merchant." He be­came
a draftsman for the General
Land Office in 1850, and the next
year, with W. Voelker, he produced
a Texas map which was published in
Germany. His later maps, published
in the United States, became stan­dard
Texas guides through the
1880's. A meticulous researcher,
Pressler did the basic work for the
first accurate maps of Texas counties.
In 1857 he discovered that the 100th
meridian, which Captain Randolph
B. Marcy had surveyed for the Unit­ed
States Government in 1852, was
one degree east of its true location.
On his calculations, Congress or­dered
the line re-run.
~~"-~qb Hermann Lungkwitz
HERMANN LUNGKWITZ
AND RICHARD PETRI
The influx of well-educated profes­sional
Germans into the Texas life
stream made a marked impact, not
only on the scientific potential in the
state but also in such artistic fields
as painting, lithography, sculpture
and music. Two competent painters
who immigrated were Hermann
Lungkwitz and Richard Petri,
brothers-in-law who settled their
families in the Hill Country in 1852.
Working in the New Braunfels and
Fredericksburg areas, they produced
fine paintings of Texas scenes and of
the Indians they encountered on the
frontier. Lungkwitz's landscapes and
Petri's Indians are prized collectors'
items today.
~~-~q1 Rudolph Melchior
RUDOLPH MELCHIOR
As they became prosperous, Ger­man
settlers in the older areas along
the lower Brazos River began to have
the ceilings and walls of their homes
decorated with colorful designs. A
number of artists did these striking
decorations, some with stencils,
some freehand. One of the finest was
Rudolph Melchior, a successful ar­tist
who had emigrated from Germa­ny.
Melchior lived at Latium, a
community of intellectuals in Wash­ington
County where classical Latin
was spoken regularly in debates of
the cultural society. The prime ex­ample
of his artistry in decoration
is preserved in the Winedale Inn,
restored by Miss Ima Hogg and
given to The University of Texas.
Other examples of his work are to
be seen in German houses in the
Round Top area.
CAPTAIN CHARLES
SCHREINER
When Charles Schreiner, a 19-year­old
native of AIsace-Lorraine, began
a small Kerr County ranch in 1857,
he entered a business that would
attract many German Texans. Active
in defense of his new home, Schrein­er
served with the Texas Rangers
and the Confederate army and as
captain of a post-Civil War home
guard organized to meet the Indian
menace. Surmounting extreme pov­erty
and hardship after the war,
Captain Schreiner secured a loan in
1869 to open a general merchandis­ing
store in Kerrville. The business
prospered with the town and ex­tended
its activities to include bank­ing,
ranching, wool and mohair
marketing. As the United States' first
enterprise to popularize mohair, the
company did much to launch Kerr­ville
as the "Mohair Center of the
World:' By 1900 Charles Schreiner
Company owned more than 600,000
acres of ranch land between Kerr­ville
and Menard. The general store
remains one of the largest in the
Southwest, and the Schreiner bank
stands as a cornerstone of Kerrville
solidarity. The endowment of the
Schreiner Institute was among Cap­tain
Charles Schreiner's philanthro­pies,
which exceeded a million dol­lars
at his death in 1927.
Captain Charles Schreiner
15
Besserer's "The Boys" band
MUSICAL ACTIVITIES
1850's
Characteristically the German towns
in Texas had singing and dancing
societies, chamber music groups­and
brass "oompah" bands. Typical
of the German bands popular
throughout Texas at this time was
one called "The Boys" from Austin.
MENGER HOTEL
1859
William Menger, who had operated
a successful brewery in San Antonio
since the mid-1840's, developed so
much business from Castroville,
New Braunfels, Seguin and Fred­ericksburg
that he needed a place to
house his customers overnight. In
1859 he built the Menger Hotel
adjacent to the Alamo. Later addi­tions
turned it into one of the city's
most famous stopping places. Offi­cers
of various military units head­quartered
in San Antonio prized the
fine food and excellent bar. Teddy
Roosevelt is said to have done his
most effective recruiting for the
Rough Riders at the Menger Bar.
CIVIL WAR
1860's
A majority of Texas Germans op­posed
secession and remained loyal
16
to the Union. Many lived in the
frontier counties, where most citi­zens,
regardless of national origin,
opposed secession because it would
leave them without protection from
the Indians. Most Texas Germans
-;'lso opposed slavery as a matter of
principle and wanted the institution
abolished. They believed, however,
that the states should be allowed to
solve the problem without federal
interference. The small farmers,
with modest holdings and capital,
had little use for slaves. The German
intellectuals liked neither slavery nor
the idea of disunion. Many of them
had left Germany disillusioned be­cause
of failure to create a union of
the principalities. There were, how­ever,
a few slave owners among the
wealthier Germans with extensive
landholdings. Some of these people
joined the Confederate cause. Sever­al
attained the rank of general in the
Confederate army, for example,
August C. Buche!. He had fought
for the American cause in the Mexi­can
War, at one point serving, with
commendations, on General Zach­ary
Taylor's staff. He rose quickly to
brigadier general in the Civil War
and was killed leading a charge in
April 1864.
In the decades following the
Civil War, German immigration to
Texas continued at a greater pace
than ever before. Predominantly
German communities began spread­ing
to south, north-central and
northwest portions of the state.
Organized colonization efforts were
taking place as late as 1920. Perhaps
the story of this second-generation
activity lacks the romantic appeal of
the earlier movement, but its sig­nificance
must not be overlooked. In
1860 nearly 20,000 Texans were
German-born. By 1890 this figure
had reached 48,000.
General August C. Buchel
HENRY GREENWALL
1869
German-born Henry Greenwall
opened a theater in Galveston in
1869. For the next 40 years he was
a leading figure in Texas theatrical
circles, with productions in Galves­ton,
Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth
and Waco. He brought hits of the
American and British stages as well
as the classical German repertoire to
appreciative Texas audiences.
THE GERMAN-ENGLISH
SCHOOL AT
SAN ANTONIO
1870
Drawing enrollment from distant
parts of the state, the German-En­glish
School at San Antonio ranked
among the outstanding cultural in-
stitutions of 19th century Texas. In
March 1858 the private school was
organized with two inviolable princi­ples
which were followed throughout
its 40-year life: religious instruction
was prohibited, and German and
English were taught in equal mea­sure.
The curriculum also included
Spanish, geography, writing, poetry,
history, algebra, arithmetic, sewing
and singing. Classes were moved
from rented quarters in 1860 to a
new stone structure on South Alamo
Street. A prestigious German social
club - the Casino Association­aided
building funds with a centen­nial
celebration commemorating
poet Friedrich von Schiller, to whom
the establishment was dedicated. In
1870 a two-story unit was dedicated
to Baron von Humboldt; two later
additions were also made. The
buildings, constructed by German­born
John Kampmann, were as
sturdy as the discipline and stan­dards
of the school, directed for
many years by Julius Berends. With
the development of free public
schools the German-English School
closed in 1897. The buildings, now
city-owned, were HemisFair head­quarters
in 1968.
burg area, were on their way to
Mexico. Camped near the Nueces
about 20 miles from Fort Clark, they
were charged by a force of 94
mounted men. Those who escaped
fled into Mexico or made their way
back home. The bones of the fallen
were not gathered and buried until
after the war. An impressive monu­ment
listing the victims and bearing
the legend Treue der Union (Loyal to
the Union) was erected in 1866. It
is today a well-preserved landmark
in the charming town of Comfort,
between New Braunfels and Fred­ericksburg.
Like "Loyal Valley" south
of Mason, it is one of the few re­maining
evidences of a group of
Texans who remained faithful to the
Union throughout the Civil War.
German-English School JACOB BRODBECK
BATTLE OF THE NUECES
1862
One of the tragic highlights of the
Civil War in Texas was the Ba,ttle of
the Nueces on August 10, 1862. It
was a massacre in which more than
half of an encampment of 65 Ger­man
Union sympathizers were
wiped out in a surprise attack by a
superior force of Texas state troops.
The Germans, from the Fredericks-
1865
An inventive German schoolmaster
living in Fredericksburg may have
solved many of the problems of flight
long before the development of the
internal combustion engine made
modern aviation possible. Jacob
Friedrich Brodbeck launched mod­els
of his flying machine at numer­ous
regional fairs in Texas between
1863 and 1865. His design had a
rudder, wmgs and propellers and
The Battle of the Nueces by G.H Clauss
17
IQnD8rtt~ Sl)or~-~-~--.--------. ------1
I 1 $ f. 25. San Antonio, T" June 27th 1865. I
I SIX mouths aftel' the sale of a U. S. patent right for au airship. inveuted I
I by me, I promise tc pay to v ,' . c;<v: L/,;.· ,.f : I
lONE DOLLAR and 'l'W ENTY FI Y E CEN1'§, together with his share of Oue
Fourth of the amount rec('i"cd by such ~ale, expenses deducted, or two months !
after the term for which a. U. 8. patent will be granted to me, together with a I
I yearly payment of his share of One Fourth of the profits accrued by the sale of such !
I airships, as the case may be, value received. (x, e.1J7 ;c~;';f? I
---------------~ .. -.-----------~-.
Brodbeck's certificate
was powered with coiled springs. In
San Antonio, in the summer of 1865,
Brodbeck announced plans to build
and fly a full-scale "air-ship." He
offered "certificates of interest" to
investors who would finance the trial
run. Certificates were bought by
leaders of the Texas German com­munity,
including Dr. Ferdinand
von Herff. There is a persistent story
that the full-scale air-ship was built
and flown by Brodbeck late in 1865.
The demonstration was said to have
been staged in a pasture near San
Antonio. According to an old ac­count,
the plane and pilot Brodbeck
soared to tree-top height, then
crashed - the spring-power he had
provided unfortunately could not be
rewound in flight. The ship was
Jacob Brodbeck
18
demolished and Brodbeck slightly
injured. This episode completely
scared off his backers. After several
years of touring the East in search
of support, Jacob Brodbeck gave up
and retired to his farm at Lucken­bach.
The Wright brothers' subse­quent
success in 1903 justified Brod­beck's
confidence in the feasibility of
manl}.ed flight.
~LISABET NEY
One of the most important persons
ih the development of the fine arts
in Texas arrived on the scene in 1872
when Elisabet Ney, with her hus­band,
Dr. Edmund Montgomery,
bought a plantation near the town
of Hempstead. Their home, Liendo,
was (and still is) one of the most
beautiful houses in Texas. Miss Ney
was already a famous sculptress in
Europe, with busts of Kaiser Wil­helm
I, Garibaldi, Ludwig II, Hum­boldt,
Schopenhauer and others to
her credit. Dr. Montgomery, a Scot,
was a highly respected physician,
naturalist and philosopher. Miss
N ey was commissioned by the state
to make statues of Stephen F. Austin
and Sam Houston for the Texas
exhibit at the World's Fair in 1893.
She built her studio, called Formosa,
in the area north of the university
in Austin and eventually produced
the two statues. Copies now stand
in both the National and the Texas
State capitols.
She also produced a full-length
reclining figure of General Albert
Sydney Johnston, which is mounted
over the hero's grave in the Texas
State Cemetery. Formosa is now pre­served
as a museum by the Texas
Fine Arts Association.
Elisabet Ney
HANK SMITH
Hank Smith broke the first sod,
planted the first crops and dug the
first well on the plains of northwest
Texas. He was born Heinrich
Schmidt in Rossbrunn, Germany,
on August 15, 1836. At the age of
14 he immigrated with two older
sisters to America. He worked brief­ly
as a sailor on Lake Erie, then in
1852 headed down the Santa Fe
Trail, bound for a life of adventure
on the frontier. He worked as a sur­veyor,
teamster and miner before
joining the Confederate ranks at the
outset of the Civil War. After the war
Smith resumed his career as a wag­onmaster
and teamster. At Fort
Griffin, Texas, in 1874 he met and
married a Scottish girl named Eliza~
beth Boyle. Three years later a
wealthy Philadelphian commis­sioned
Smith to establish a ranch
near the junction of Blanco Canyon
and the Salt Fork of the Brazos.
There the nearest neighbor was 50
miles away. When the Philadelphian
went bankrupt, Smith took charge
of the property, which included an
impressive stone edifice, soon known
far and wide as H ank Smith's Rock
House. The house also served as a
post office on a mail line between
Fort Griffin and Fort Sumner, New
Mexico. Smith's wife, fondly known
as "Aunt Hank;' was postmistress for
39 years. Smith himself spent the re­mainder
of his life experimenting
with new crops. Countless visitors
came to hear his stories of youthful
adventures in the Old West. He died
in 1912; Aunt Hank, in 1925.
THE SONS OF HERMANN
1890
The Order of the Sons of Hermann
was established in Texas by pioneer
settlers of San Antonio on July 6,
1861. John Lemnitzer, who had been
active in the Hermann Sons organi­zation
in New York, sought to form
a San Antonio chapter early in 1860,
but authorization from the National
Grand Lodge did not come until the
following year. The records show
that these early members had to
bring their own chairs to meetings
if they wished to be seated. Until
1921 the meetings were conducted
in German. The lodge staged or par­ticipated
in volksfests, concerts,
dances, parades, masquerade balls
and other public-interest events.
They also engaged in a wide variety
Hank Smith's Rock House
of charitable undertakings. A Grand
Lodge was organized at San Antonio
in 1890, with eight member lodges
across the state. The organization
has grown until it is represented in
practically all areas of Texas. In ad­dition
to its recreation and fellowship
activities, the Sons of Hermann
operate a summer youth camp and
a home for the aged, both in Com­fort
, Texas. The order is also well
known for its highly solvent life
insurance program. In 1987 there
were nearly 80,500 members, only
about half of which were Germans.
CIGAR MAKING AND
THE "TRAVIS CL VB"
1893
Friedrich Ernst, "Father of German
Immigration in Texas;' was a cigar
maker, and many of his countrymen
who came to the new land followed
that trade. Cigar factories in Texas
were nearly as numerous as phar­macies
in the late 19th century, but
only one-the Finck Cigar Com­pany-
remained in the 1980's. San
Antonio alone had 18 other cigar
manufacturers in 1893 when H .W.
Finck, son of a German immigrant,
located there. His family lived up­stairs
over the small business. By
1910 the company was flourishing,
and Finck was among the socially
prominent citizens who formed the
Travis Club and built an elaborate,
many-storied clubhouse. For mem­bers
only, Finck prepared a special
"Travis Club" cigar. Patriotically the
club opened its doors to World War
I servicemen, who moved in en
masse, leaving little room for the
membership. Out of the habit of
attendance, members failed to come
back after the war and the club
folded - but not its namesake cigar.
Former soldiers from various states,
who had sampled the aromatic
product in Texas, flooded the firm
10 _~.$'" First meeting of the Grand Lodge, San Antonio, 1890
19
HW Finck
with orders, ensuring a future for
the "Travis Club" smoke. Today a
greatly expanded company isoper­ated
by a third-generation Finck
with the same initials as its founder.
WILLIAM GEBHARDT
1894
Chili making-with the right combi­nation
of spices mixed with extracted
and ground pulp from the chili
pod -was difficult for the American
William Gebhardt (center)
20
housewife until German-born Wil­liam
Gebhardt came to her aid. In
1892 Gebhardt opened a cafe in the
back of Miller's Saloon in New
Braunfels. He soon found that chili
was a favorite dish in that German
community. He also discovered that
it was a seasonal food, since home­grown
chilies were available only
once a year. By importing ancho
chili peppers from Mexico, he could
serve the spicy concoction year­round.
In 1894 he developed the first
commercial chili powder by running
pepper bits three times through a
small home meat grinder. Two years
later Gebhardt established a factory
for the product in San Antonio. At
the beginning, he could make five
cases of chili powder a week. He
would place these on the back of a
wagon, drive around town until all
were sold and then return to his
grinder. Ultimately Gebhardt in­vented
and patented 37 machines for
his factory. Following an expansion
in 1911, the company put out the first
~anned chili con carne and tamales.
FRANK VAN DER
STUCKEN JR.
1895
Frank van der Stucken Jr. was the
first Texas musician to achieve inter­national
fame. Born in Fredericks-burg
in 1858, he was the son of a
German mother and a Belgian fa­ther.
His family took him at the age
of eight to Europe, where he studied
under some of the greatest musi­cians
of the day. As a young man he
gained wide fame as both a conduc­tor
and a composer. In 1895 he
became director of the Cincinnati
Conservatory of Music and conduc­tor
of the Cincinnati Symphony
Orchestra. He worked diligently to
popularize American music with
concert audiences on both sides of
the Atlantic. Van der Stucken died
at Hamburg, Germany, in 1929.
Frank van der Stucken JT.
OSCAR FOX
1920
Oscar Fox was the first Texas-born
songwriter to achieve fame through
the use of his native background.
Born in 1879, Fox was a grandson
of Adolf Fuchs, the minister, farmer
and educator who had once taught
music at Baylor College in Indepen­dence.
Educated in San Antonio,
Texas, and Zurich, Switzerland,
Oscar Fox was an organist, choir­master
and teacher in various Texas
cities before winning national recog­nition
with his musical settings of
cowboy songs collected by John
Lomax. Fox continued to compose
- , .
\ .
)
music for other people's lyrics from
1922 until his death in 1961. Lyrics
for "The Hills of Home:' his best­known
composition, were written by
Floride Calhoun, who, at the time,
was living in San Antonio. She was
referring to the hills of New York
State, but, when Oscar Fox set the
poem to music, he was thinking of
the hills of Burnet County, Texas,
where he was born.
ADMIRAL CHESTER
W. NIMITZ
1941
After Pearl Harbor President Frank­lin
D. Roosevelt promoted a Texan
of German ancestry to be com­mander
of the Pacific Fleet. Chester
Nimitz was born in Fredericksburg
in a house still preserved on the
main street. He was the grandson of
Captain Charles Nimitz, pioneer
hotelman and one-time boatman.
The younger Nimitz grew up in
Fredericksburg and Kerrville and
went to the U.S. Naval Academy as
a cadet in 1901. Chester Nimitz
graduated with distinction from the
academy in 1905 and rose steadily
in rank until 1944, when President
Roosevelt chose him over 28 senior
flag officers to be Fleet Admiral, one
;.
Oscar Fox
of the most difficult assignments of
World War II. His task ended on
U.S.S. Missouri when he accepted the
Japanese surrender. Nimitz served
as Chief of Naval Operations until
hi; retirement in 1947. Since his
deilth in 1966 the citizens of.Fred­ericksburg
have developed a muse­um
in his honor on the site of his
grandfather's famous old hotel.
CONCLUSION
More than 750,000 persons ofGer­man
descent were estimated to be
living in Texas in 1980. Excepting
the large Anglo element in the pop­ulation,
German Texans are out­numbered
only by Afro-American
and Mexican Texans. In medicine,
in engineering, in ranching and in
many other fields , German Texans
are heavy contributors to the state's
general prosperity. Their distinctive
architecture - including Catholic,
Lutheran and Methodist churches­dominates
the land in a large area
of central Texas. While melding into
the general pattern of Texas life, they
retain in a number of regions the
traditional German customs of oom­pah
bands, singing societies (Miinn­erchore)
and marksmanship contests
(SchutzenJeste). Most Texans enjoy
German sausage and the special
German touch on meat, dairy and
pastry delicacies. And most have
incorporated into their Yuletide ob­servance
the Christmas tree, which
German settlers brought to Texas in
the 1840's. Today German Texans
continue with the constructive hand
of their forebears .
Admiral Chester W Nimitz
21
....
"Going Visiting" by Richard Petri
22
PHOTO CREDITS
All photos are from the collection of The University of Texas Institute of Texan Cultures at San Antonio, courtesy of the following
lenders. Credits from left to right are separated by semicolons and from top to bottom by dashes. Copies of these photographs may
be obtained from the ITC Library.
Cover
Page 3
Page 4
Page 5
Page 6
Page 7
Page 8
Page 9
Page 10
Page 11
Page 12
Mrs. Alton Schwarz, New Braunfels.
The Institute of Texan Cultures-Archives
Division, Texas State Library, Austin.
Garland Roark, The 25 Flags oj Texas (Houston:
Houston Chronicle, 1962)-Unknown; Archives
Division, Texas State Library, Austin.
Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin;
Unknown; Lewis E. Daniel, Personnel oj the Texas
State Government with Sketches oj Representative Men
oj Texas (San Antonio: Maverick Printing
House, 1892).
Barker Texas History Center, The University of
Texas at Austin; FD. Langenheim Estate,
Philadelphia, Pa.
Lillie E. Simon, New Braunfels; Carl Roeper,
Eagle Pass.
Rudolph Biesele, The History oj the German
Settlements in Texas (Austin: R.L. Biesele, 1964);
Sophienburg Museum and Archives, New
Braunfels - Barker Texas History Center, The
University of Texas at Austin.
Sophienburg Museum and Archives, New
Braunfels; Library of Congress, Washington,
D.C.
Barker Texas History Center, The University of
Texas at Austin; The late Irene Marschall King,
Waco - Frontier Times Museum, Bandera.
Mrs. Claude Aniol, Dallas - De~tsche
Literaturgeschichte; Gillespie County Historical
Society, Fredericksburg. .
Historical Portrait Archives, Berlin, Germany;
Archives Division, Texas State Library, Austin;
Dr. and Mrs. August Herff, San Antonio.
Page 13
Page 14
Page 15
Page 16
Page 17
Page 18
Gillespie County Historical Society,
Fredericksburg- Barker Texas History Center,
The University of Texas at Austin; FW.
Simonds, "Dr. Ferdinand von Roemer, the
Father of the Geology of Texas, His Life and
Work," The American Geologist, vol. 29 (March
1902).
Frieda Fuchs, Fredericksburg; Austin History
Center, Austin Public Library-Archives
Division, Texas State Library, Austin.
Source unknown; Barker Texas History Center,
The University of Texas at Austin; Lewis E.
Daniel, Personnel oj the Texas State Government with
Sketches oj Representative Men oj Texas (San
Antonio: Maverick Printing House, 1892).
Krueger Family, Austin; Barker Texas History
Center, The University of Texas at Austin.
San Antonio Light Collection, The Institute of
Texan Cultures - Comfort Historical Museum,
Comfort.
The Institute of Texan Cultures-E.E.
Brodbeck, Austin; Ney Museum, Austin.
Page 19 Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum,
Canyon - Hermann Sons Lodge, San Antonio.
Page 20 Hazel Ledbetter, Round Top - Gebhardt
Mexican Foods, San Antonio; Pioneer Museum,
Fredericksburg.
Page 21 Unknown-Admiral Nimitz Center,
Fredericksburg.
Page 22 . Gillespie County Historical Society,
Fredericksburg.
Page 23 Mrs. Ernest A. Guenther, Austin.
Back cover Mrs. Ernest A. Guenther, Austin.
Log house oj Carl Goeth jamily, Cypress Mill, Blanco County, c. 1874-1875
2.'3
INDEX
Italic numerals identify illustrations.
Adelsverein 8, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13
Bettina Colony 12
Boos-Waldeck, Count Joseph of 8
Bourgeois, Alexander 8, 9
Bracht, Victor 13, 13
Brodbeck, Jacob Friedrich 17-18, 18
Buchel, August C. 16, 16
Carlshafen see Indianola
Cat Spring 5, 14
Civil War, Germans in 16
see also Buchel, August C. 16; Erath, George B. 5;
Schleicher, Gustav 12; Schreiner, Charles 15; Smith,
Hank 18; von Rosenberg, Karl Wilhelm 14
Counties named for Germans: Erath 5; Kleberg 6;
Nassau 8; Schleicher 12
Darst, Jacob 4
Durst, John 4, 4
Durst, Joseph 4
Easter Fires 11
Ehrenberg, Hermann 6
Erath, George B. 5, 5
Ernst, Friedrich 5,7,19
Ervendberg, Louis Cachand 7, 7
Fallersleben, Hoffmann von 11, 11
Finck Cigar Company 19
Finck, HW. 19, 20
Fischer, Heinrich Franz see Fisher, Henry Francis
Fisher, Henry Francis 9
Fisher-Miller Grant 8, 8, 9, 11, 12
Fordtran, Charles 5, 5
Forty, The see Vierziger, Die
Fox, Oscar 20-21, 21
Fredericksburg 11, 12, 15
Fuchs, Adolf 11, 14, 14
Gebhardt, William 20, 20
German-English School in San Antonio 16-17, 16
German Union 7
Goethe, Carl, home Back cover
Good Advice for Immigrants by Ottomar von Behr 13
Greenwall, Henry 16
Gutierrez-Magee expedition 3
Heeke, J . Valentine 4
Herff, Ferdinand von 12, 12, 18
Hermann Sons see Sons of Hermann, Order of the
Immigration see Organized immigration
Indianola 9, 9
Industry 7
Kleberg, Robert Justus 5-6, 5
Langenheim, William 6, 6
Latium 15
Leiningen, Prince Victor of 8
Lindheimer, Ferdinand 7, 7
Long, James, expedition 3, 3, 4
Lungkwitz, Hermann 15, 15
Maps 8, 14, 14, 15
Melchior, Rudolph 15, 15
Meusebach-Comanche treaty 11, 11
24
Meusebach, John 0. 10, 11
Menger Hotel 16
Menger, William 16
Miller, Burchard 9
Mueller, Brukart see Miller, Burchard
Nassau, Duke Adolf of 8, 8
Neu-Braunfelser Zeitung 7
New Braunfels 9-10, 10, 11, 15
Ney, Elisabet 18, 18
Nimitz, Charles H. 12-13
Nimitz, Chester W. 21, 21
Nimitz Hotel 12, 12
N ueces, Battle of 17, 17
Organized immigration 6, 8, 9, 10, 12
Petri, Richard 15, 22
Pressler, Charles William 15
Promotional literature see Settlement
Republic of Texas, Germans in: Erath, George B. 5;
Kleberg, Robert Justus 6; Smyth, George
Washington 4
Revolution, Texas see Texas Revolution
Roemer, Ferdinand von 13-14, 13
Sachtleben, Carl Front cover
Schleicher, Gustav 12, 12
Schmidt, Heinrich see Smith, Hank
Schreiner, Charles 15, 15
Seele, Hermann F. 10-11, 11
Settlement, promotional literature: Bracht, Victor 13;
Ernst: Friedrich 5; Heeke, J. Valentine 4; Roemer,
Ferdinand von 13; von Behr, Ottomar 13
Smith, Hank 18-19, 19
Smyth, George Washington 4, 4
Societies 7, 16, 19, 21
Solms-Braunfels, Prince Carl of 7, 9, 9, 10
Sons of Hermann, Order of the 19, 19
Sophienburg 10, 10
Spiess, Hermann 12
Texas by Ferdinand von Roemer 13
Texas Revolution, Germans in: Darst, Jacob 4; Durst,
John 4; Durst, Joseph 4; Ehrenberg, Hermann 6;
Erath, George B. 5; Kleberg, Robert Justus 6;
Langenheim, William 6; Smyth, George Washington 4
Texas und seine Revolution by Hermann Ehrenberg 6, 6
van der Stucken, Frank, Jr. 20, 20
Viewger, Die 12
von Arnim, Bettina 12, 12
von Behr, Ottomar 13
von Meusebach, Baron Ottfried Hans see Meusebach,
John O.
von Roeder family 5
von Roeder, Otto 8
von Rosenberg family 14
von Rosenberg, Ernest 14
von Rosenberg, Ernst 14
von Rosenberg, Herman 14
von Rosenberg, Karl Wilhelm 14, 14
One oj a series
prepared by the staff of
THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS
INSTITUTE OF TEXAN CULTURES
AT SAN ANTONIO
a