Sigel, Franz b. November 18, 1824; Sinsheim, Baden d.August 22, 1902; New York City
One of the most controversial figures in German America. His biography is almost impossible to write. Contemporary accounts of his actions, notably during the Civil War, were contradictory from the very beginning.
Together with their interpretations they generate a strongly divided image with hardly any middle ground. To the German Forty-Eighters and their supporters, Sigel was a hero. To conservative circles and nativists, he was never more than a bungling foreigner.Sigel started a military career in Baden, but left the army after a duel. Studying law in Heidelberg, he came in contact with republican circles, and in 1848 commanded a column of volunteers. Defeated on the outskirts of Freiburg, Sigel escaped. He returned for the revolutionary campaign of 1849 to command the army in Baden. He also served as minister of the (provisional) War Department for some time. Defeated at Laudenbach and Waghausel, Sigel led a successful retreating campaign, bringing most of his men safely to Switzerland. Via France, he fled to England, where he earned money playing the piano in the Chinese pavillon in the Crystal Palace exhibition. He emigrated to the United States in 1852 and entered his brothers’ tobacco business, at the same time renewing associations with other exiled revolutionists as well as joining the Turnerbund. He also received a New York militia commission as a major. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Sigel was superintendent of the German schools in St. Louis, Missouri. His first command was the 3rd Missouri Volunteer
regiment of infantry, which had many veterans of his revolution forces in its ranks. His record during the war is mixed. His popularity won thousands of volunteers for the Union. Where his military skills coincided with luck, as they did during the retreat from Carthage, Missouri, in July 1861, and at Pea Ridge, Arkansas, in March 1862, he was highly successful. More often, however, bad timing, ill luck, and—as before in Baden—disloyal officers under his command led to defeat as at Wilson’s Creek (August 1861) and New Market (May 1864).
Growing more and more irritable, and (not unjustifiably) perceiving himself in a constant quarrel with General Henry Wager Halleck, Sigel resigned from command in 1861 and again in 1862, receiving new commands in turn. In the summer of 1864 he was shelved for good.His postwar career included being copublisher and editor of the Baltimore Wecker (Alarm Clock), the designer of an elevated railway, and holder of a political position as internal revenue collector and later as registrar in New York—appointments he received for supporting Ulysses S. Grant in the 1868 and 1872 presidential elections. Sigel and Frederick Douglass accompanied President Grant to Santo Domingo, and lobbied against its annexation.
In the 1880s Sigel changed his politics and received patronage positions from the Democrats. When he died, he had not finished his autobiography, though many of his articles and letters discuss his role in the revolutions of 1848/49 and the American Civil War. To his German veterans and to the German element in the United States, he always remained their most popular general, who in two wars had fought for liberty.
Wolfgang Hochbruck
See also American Civil War, German
Participants in; Forty-Eighters
References and Further Reading
Engle, Stephen D. Yankee Dutchman: The Life of Franz Sigel. Fayetteville: University of Arkansas, 1993.