Texas

Texas played host to mass immigration from the German states throughout the nineteenth century. As a result, persons of German descent make up the third-largest ethnic group in the state.

German immigration to Texas began at roughly the same time as Anglo immi­gration from the United States. In 1821 the provincial government of Spain negoti­ated with Empresario Moses Austin to es­tablish a colony in Texas. Spain was under tremendous pressure to secure the northern border of Mexico, protecting the frontier mining districts and preventing illegal col­onization of Texas by squatters from the United States. Spanish officials believed that controlled, legalized immigration was a means of protecting Texas from jingoistic filibusterers from the north.

Shortly after completing the negotia­tions over Austin’s colonization contract, the Spanish government of Mexico was toppled and replaced by a native regime. Moses Austin died at roughly the same time, passing responsibility for the colo­nization project to his son, Stephen F. Austin. The younger Austin, albeit reluc­tantly, moved the project forward, lobby­ing for the continuation of his father’s con­tract with the ascendant Mexican government. It was under the auspices of Stephen F. Austin’s colony that the earliest German settlers made their way to Texas.

The first true pioneer of German im­migration to Texas was Johann Friedrich Ernst. Ernst made his way to the United States, meeting another German immi­grant, Charles Fordtran, in New York. Fordtran and the Ernst family initially planned to settle in Missouri, but upon hearing news of Austin’s colony, they de­cided to sail for Texas. Arriving in Texas on March 9, 1831, Ernst was granted a league of land as his allotment from the colony.

Mexican dominion over Texas came to an end in 1836 as a result of the Texas rev­olution. A litany of issues, ranging from at­tempts to outlaw slavery in Texas on the part of the Mexican government to the des­potism demonstrated by President Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, contributed to the emergence of hostilities between Texans and the central government in Mexico City. Many German immigrants fought for the Texas cause. Notables included Johann Ernst Friedrich Gustav Bunsen, brother of the inventor of the Bunsen burner; photo­graphic pioneer William Langenheim; and Herman Ehrenberg, well-known survivor of the Goliad Massacre. Sam Houston’s vic­tory over the forces of General Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto, followed by adroit political machinations on the part of the Texans, helped to forge an independent Republic of Texas in 1836. German immi­gration played a significant role in peopling this new nation. Texas was widely adver­tised in Germany and the continual influx of settlers caused many in Germany to begin thinking about a more structured immigration policy.

In 1842 a group of twenty-one Ger­man noblemen met at Biebrich on the Rhine with the idea of creating a formal­ized organization designed to facilitate German migration abroad. The noblemen saw this as a way to enhance their personal fortunes while at the same time expanding the prospects of their subjects.

The Adelsverein was a financial fail­ure. Difficulties over rights to the colonial lands, as well as a lack of practical business acumen on the part of its leaders, caused the colony to fold under bankruptcy by 1853. Nevertheless, at the height of its success some 7,000 German immigrants made their way to Texas (Jordan1975, 45). Three major towns were established under the auspices of the society—the port of Indianola, New Braunfels, and

Funeral of German Union soldiers at Comfort, Texas, August 1865. (Library of Congress)

Fredericksburg. Several smaller villages were also established along the Llano River within the Adelsverein’s cession. In 1847 the society’s commissioner-general, John O. Meusebach, successfully negoti­ated a treaty with the Comanche that fur­ther expanded the settled frontier of Texas.

By the 1850s the majority of those coming to the New World were from Nas­sau, southern Hanover, Brunswick, Hesse, and western Thuringia. These were the home provinces of the aristocrats that cre­ated the Adelsverein and the principalities in which the majority of the society’s ad­vertising was targeted. Chain migration continued in these areas even after the Adelsverein folded, as exponentially greater numbers of letters and dispatches reached Germany.

Although disease and hunger were rampant during the first year of the Adelsverein’s experiment, the immigrants, primarily educated peasants, farmers, and skilled craftsmen, began work with all pos­sible diligence. The towns of Industry, New Braunfels, and Fredericksburg, the loci of German settlement in Texas, very quickly became some of the most prosperous vil­lages in the state. By 1860 the farms in the vicinity of New Braunfels alone were val­ued at more than half a million dollars (Biesele 1930, 137-138).

The Confederate blockade during the Civil War halted German immigration to Texas for a brief time. On the eve of se­cession, some 20,000 residents of Texas were German-born. Hill Country Ger­mans, who did not utilize slaves and relied heavily on federal government protection for their frontier settlements, tended to support the Union cause. Their counter­parts, clustered in the eastern half of the German Belt around Industry and more inclined to own slaves, leaned toward the Confederacy. While Germans fought for both sides during the war, the majority of the population either tacitly supported the United States or simply did not vocal­ize their opinion publicly. One notable group of German Unionists, calling them­selves the Union Loyal League Militia, or­ganized a fighting band with the purpose of taking up arms against the Confeder­acy. They were, however, unsuccessful in their first outing. Ambushed along the banks of the Nueces River by a Confeder­ate unit, many of the men were killed and the survivors were forced to flee for their lives.

The end of the Civil War saw the re­turn of German immigration to Texas. The end to hostilities and the lifting of the coastal blockade allowed the process of chain migration to continue. Further, the Reconstruction government of Texas pro­vided many German Union loyalists with important state jobs. Jacob Kuechler, a vet­eran of the Nueces River fight, and Johann Jacob Groos achieved the powerful office of Commissioner of the Texas General Land Office. During Reconstruction, Ger­mans played an important role in Texas government, in many cases turning their European education and training toward the benefit of their adopted homeland.

The period between the end of the Civil War and the 1890s saw the emer­gence of German enclaves outside the Ger­man Belt. German settlements such as Muenster appeared in north-central Texas, while Germans were some of the first Tex­ans to farm the High Plains and Trans Pecos regions. Greater migration from east German provinces, coupled with an influx of Germans from other parts of the United States, served to swell the ranks of this pop­ulation in Texas.

The advent of World War I finally brought an end to wholesale German mi­gration to Texas. The divisiveness of the war also forced Germans to assimilate into the broader culture, which to this point they had largely resisted. Enclaves such as Fredericksburg had remained relatively iso­lated, with German-language newspapers, schools, and church services continuing into the twentieth century. However, the war against Germany forced many Texas Germans to choose between loyalty to their adopted country and fealty to their native culture. Nonacculturated Germans were treated with suspicion; therefore, many made strident efforts to shirk the trappings of their Teutonic heritage.

The majority of the Germans who mi­grated to Texas were motivated by the promise of land and greater prosperity.

German immigrants made significant contributions to the tapestry of Texas cul­ture. German music and instrumentation, mixed with the native Tejano sound, helped give birth to the modern Tejano music tradition. Singing festivals and danc­ing clubs became a staple of German life

throughout Texas, many of which still sur­vive in 2005. The artists Hermann Lungk- witz, Richard Petri, and Carl Iwonski were among the earliest painters to capture the Texas landscape on canvas.

In the area of industry and technology Germans, through the likes of Adolphus Busch, brought the brewing industry to Texas and the greater Southwest. New Braunfels became an important industrial center, as Germans harnessed the flowing waters of the Comal River to construct mills and factories. Germans in Texas uti­lized important developments in agricul­ture, especially in the area of dry-land farming, before their counterparts in the rest of the United States adopted them. By the advent of World War I, German cul­ture had established itself firmly in Texas.

By the 1970s, with the shadow of two wars with the German nation fading, a new generation of Texas Germans began searching for the roots of their history. In places such as New Braunfels, Fredericks­burg, and Muenster a German cultural revival developed. Paradoxically, many of these descendants of German immi­grants, now unaware of the cultural tradi­tions of their predominately central and north German ancestors, adopted the trappings of south Germany as a compo­nent of this revival. Towns in the German Belt, as well as in other former German enclaves, began celebrating Oktoberfest and Weihnachten, decorating their streets with the blue and white colors of Bavaria. Few truly ancient German cultural tradi­tions, such as the Easter Fires Pageant in Fredericksburg, remain. Nevertheless, the modern Texas Germans have developed a powerful enthusiasm for their cultural heritage.

Jerry C. Drake

See also Adelsverein; Ernst, Friedrich;

Fredericksburg, Texas; Meusebach, John O.; New Braunfels, Texas; Nueces, Battle of the; Sorbs (Wends); Texas German Dialect; World War I and German Americans

References and Further Reading

Benjamin, Gilbert Giddings. The Germans in

Texas: A Study in Immigration. Austin, TX: Jenkins, 1974.

Biesele, Rudolph Leopold. The History of the German Settlements in Texas, 1831—1861. Austin, TX: Von Boeckman Jones, 1930.

Department of History, Southwest Texas State University. Fredericksburg: Guidebook to the Historic German Hill Country. San Marcos: Southwest Texas State University, 2003.

Jordan, Terry G. “The German Settlement of Texas after 1865.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 73 (October 1969): 207—211.

----------. German Seed in Texas Soil: Immigrant

Farmers in Nineteenth-Century Texas.

Austin: University of Texas, 1975.

King, Irene Marschall. John O. Meusebach:

German Colonizer in Texas. Austin:

University of Texas, 1967.

Underwood, Rodman L. Death on the Nueces.

Austin, TX: Eakin, 2000.