Why they fought: the initial motivations of German American soldiers who fought for the Union in the American Civil War

ABSTRACT

German immigrants who came to the American North prior to 1861 volunteered en masse once the Civil War began, and they became the largest group of foreign fighters in the Union Army during the war. The initial motivations of German immigrant soldiers in the Union Army have been misunderstood by many historians who look at Germans as Hessian mercenaries in the Union ranks – who fought purely for money –and historians who focus too heavily on the failed 1848 German Revolution as the basis of German immigrant involvement in the war. Both answers are correct to some degree, but neither fully explains the initial motivations of 190,000 German immigrants and 56,000 German Americans who volunteered to fight for the Union. This paper asks the question: what were the initial motivations of German immigrants who fought for the Union? The answer is much more complex than any one historian has presented prior, and only by exploring the full range of their initial motivations can we understand their sustained motivations for remaining in the Union Army.

To demonstrate its argument, the paper utilizes sources ranging from English- and translated German to English-language newspapers, personal letters, soldiers’ memoir s and manuscripts in American archives. The paper traces German soldiers in the army from 1861 through the entirety of the war, and it explores the significance of their reenlistment in 1864. It concludes that German immigrant soldiers’ commitment to the Union was rooted in numerous intertwined situations that existed in the years prior to and during the American Civil War, especially their desire for liberty and a new home.

KEYWORDS:

• German American Immigrants
• American Civil War
• nineteenth-century immigrants
• Germans
• War of Rebellion
• immigrant motivation

Acknowledgements

I want to thank all of those who have provided aid in completing this work. My professors at the University of Maryland, Jon Sumida, Leslie Rowland and Michael Ross, all of whom helped immensely in my Master’s thesis of which this paper is a part. In addition, my colleagues at the Center of Military History, Stephen Lofgren, William Donnelly, Mark Bradley and Edward Bedessem, all of whom read multiple drafts and were more than helpful to a new historian who asked a lot of questions and needed guidance. Finally, I wish to thank Steven O’Connor and his team at Sciences Po Centre d’histoire for organizing the ‘Foreign Fighters and Multinational Armies: From Civil Conflicts to Coalition War, 1848–1999’ conference; the feedback I received was invaluable in improving this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Any and all information presented in this paper is the express opinion of the author, and is in no way a reflection of the United States Army, the Department of Defense, or the United States government.

Notes

1. “The War Spirit Among the Germans,” Chicago Daily Tribune, 24 April 1861.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.

4. Ibid.

5. McPherson, For Cause and Comrades, 12. Numerous historians have grappled with the question of soldiers’ motivations to fight in a war. John A. Lynn was the first historian to classify the motivations of soldiers into the three used in this study: initial; sustaining; and combat motivation. James M. McPherson in For Cause and Comrades and Ilya Berkovich in Motivation in War followed in Lynn’s footsteps and expanded upon what motivates a populace to volunteer or support a nation during war. What they both found is that motivations are interchangeable for any populace because of the diversity any group would have because of economic, political or social standing within that group. This thesis expands on their findings, and focuses on how they apply toward German Americans who fought for or supported the Union during the Civil War.

6. Andrews, Diary of W. H. Andrews, 99.

7. Rhodes, History of the Civil War, 302.

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid.

10. Mahin, The Blessed Place of Freedom, 63–5.

11. Burton, Melting Pot Soldiers, 13–14, 16.

12. Burton, Melting Pot Soldiers, 16, 36–7.

13. Doyle, The Cause of All Nations, 19–22.

14. Levine, The Spirit of 1848, 15–17; Doyle, Cause of All Nations, 92; U.S. Bureau of the Census, Population of the United States in 1860, xxi.

15. Levine, The Spirit of 1848, 15–19; Gutman, “Class Composition and the Development of the American Working Class,” 382–91; Doyle, Cause of All Nations, 173; U.S. Bureau of the Census, Population of the United States in 1860, v. The 35% gain includes immigration, and that is because the census data does not differentiate between born in the United States and immigrated to the United States. The Census states on page v – ‘That the whole of this gain is not from natural increase, but is, in part, derived from the influx of foreigners seeking here homes for themselves and their children’ – meaning that the data is an aggregate of total gain during the decade. Excluding the 2,467,309 reported immigrants from all countries, from the 8,251,445 gain reported for all persons during the 1850s, the percent of increase for this decade from persons born and living in the United States prior to 1850 is 25%. That percentage includes children born to immigrants that were the cultural other and not American, but there is no way to differentiate any further with the data available.

16. Keegan, The American Civil War, 9. Many poor German immigrants served as substitutes because the amount of money offered to take someone else’s spot could be more than they could make in a year. The monthly income of a Union soldier was higher than the monthly income of a day labourer, and many Germans understood that if the worst should happen, Union pensions would take care of their families for the rest of their lives. For more information regarding conscription and its effect on immigrants, see Geary, We Need Men, and Anbinder “Which Poor Man’s Fight?,” 344–72. On German substitutes who took wealthier men’s positions in the Union army, see Mack Walker, “The Mercenaries,” 390–8.

17. Victor Klausmeyer to his family, 4 April 1865, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 239.

18. Emile Durpre to his mother, 7 July 1863, in ibid., 55.

19. Regina Kessel to her father, 11 January 1867, in ibid., 392.

20. Friedrich Schmalzried to his brother, 4 March 1863, in ibid., 93.

21. There are multiple examples of German Americans who were not highly political or did not want to engage with the entirety of American culture. Many of them moved to areas that were reminiscent of their native Germany, areas they could farm and live in a small community, versus large cities and manufacturing jobs. Historians have attempted to understand these groups, and how their communities formed and existed during the nineteenth century. Many of those historians track these communities from before the Civil War, through the end of the century. For more information regarding this historiography, see Barkai, Branching Out; Frizzell, Independent Immigrants; Goyne, Lone Star and Double Eagle; Burnett and Luebbering, German Settlement in Missouri; and Keil and Jentz, eds., German Workers in Industrial Chicago, 1850–1910.

22. Wilhelm Francksen to his father 1 March 1863, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, trans. Vogel, 141.

23. Ibid.

24. Goyne, ed., Lone Star and Double Eagle, i.

25. Townsend, Yankee Warhorse, 44; Work, Lincoln’s Political Generals, 48.

26. Kamphoefner and Helbich, eds., Germans in the Civil War, 487. The Turner movement originated in the early nineteenth century within the German states as an effort to liberate the area politically from Napoleon’s rule, and unify the German states into one nation. Jahn’s teachings were the foundation of the Turner Movement, and the movement was focused on liberal principles of social equality and physical training. In America the movement was also anti-slavery. See Hofmann, ed., Turnen and Sport. On working-class whites’ concerns with economic competition against slave labour, see Smith, Freedom’s Frontier; Way, Common Labor; and Boswell et al., Racial Competition & Class Solidarity; “Political,” Orleans Independent Standard, 31 August 1860. The article demonstrates one example of a German convention changing its flag from Douglas to Lincoln, but many other examples could be listed. On middle class whites, specifically German immigrants, see Shorter, “Middle-Class Anxiety in the German Revolution of 1848.” Shorter’s  article summarizes why so many of the middle class Germans both fled the country and supported many ideals typical of the American paradigm.

27. Quoted in Efford, German Immigrants, Race, and Citizenship in the Civil War Era, 53.

28. Bedford Gazette, 21 September 1860, in Carl Schurz Papers, Library of Congress, Washington DC (hereafter cited as Schurz Papers).

29. “Who is Carl Schurz,” Lewiston (NY) Gazette, 17 October 1860.

30. Townsend, Yankee Warhorse, 146; “Schreckenzeiten,” Lewiston (NY) Gazette, 1 November 1860; Engle, Yankee Dutchmen, 41–3. The Know-nothings were an anti-immigrant political party of the early 1850s. For further information on the Ethnic vote in Lincoln’s first election, see Swierenga, “The Ethnic Voter and the First Lincoln Election.” The article explores multiple immigrant motivations in voting for Lincoln in his first election.

31. There has been a long debate in German immigrant historiography regarding the German vote, and it centres on if they were responsible for the election of Abraham Lincoln. This argument began with Dodd’s article “The Fight for the Northwest, 1860,” 774–90, and historians are still undecided if the German vote was decisive or not in Lincoln’s election. Historians have resorted to individual case studies to argue their side of the debate, and depending on the location of the study, the answer differs greatly. George Daniels argues in his paper, “Immigrant Vote in the 1860 Election: The Case of Iowa,” 146–62, that immigrants were a deciding factor, but Jay Monaghan proves in his own article, “Did Abraham Lincoln Receive the Illinois German Vote,” 133–9, that Germans did not overwhelmingly vote for Lincoln. There are studies that examine education, region, class and voting percentages spanning years to extrapolate a difference in voting behaviour for Lincoln, and the historiography still does not have a unified answer regarding the German vote. This work is of the school that Germans did see something special in Lincoln, and German immigrants supported him through two elections based on the belief Lincoln would bring equality to the white working class.

32. “Hon. Abraham Lincoln. All About Him and His . …, ” New York Herald, 13 August 1860.

33. “Germans for Lincoln,” Highland (IN) Weekly News, 5 July 1860.

34. Ibid.

35. New York Herald, 6 November 1860; Civilian & Telegraph (MD), 19 July 1860; “The German Press,” Evansville (IN) Daily Journal, 10 July 1860.

36. John Dieden to his cousin, Christian Dieden, 29 November 1860, and 31 May 1862, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 302–3.

37. Otto Albrecht to unknown, 11 November 1860, in ibid., 37.

38. Efford, German Immigrants, Race, and Citizenship, 82–3.

39. Knorr, The War Potential of Nations, 43.

40. Engle, Yankee Dutchman, 46–7. On Lincoln’s decision to give these men the rank of general, see Work, Lincoln’s Political Generals.

41. Brownlow, “Southern Confederacy,” Pomeroy (OH) Weekly Telegraph, 2 November 1860.

42. Ibid.

43. “Attitude of England,” Watertown Republican (WI), 23 August 1861; “English Editors and American Affairs,” New York Herald, 15 October 1861; “Social Revolutions – Advent of the Shoddy Aristocracy,” New York Herald, 6 November 1861.

44. “Ovation to an America Embryo Ambassador,” New York Herald, 16 March 1861; “Speech of E. G. Abay,” Chicago Daily Tribune, 28 July 1862.

45. Ibid.

46. “A Lincoln Minister,” (Richmond) Daily Dispatch, 10 April 1861, in Schurz Papers.

47. Ferri Pisani, “Prince Napoleon in America, 1861,” in Europe Looks at the Civil War, ed. Sideman et al., 86–7 (emphasis added).

48. Ibid.

49. Dietrich Gerstein to his brother Ludwig Gerstein, 28 April 1865, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 285.

50. August Horstmann to his parents, 18 September 1863, in ibid., 124.

51. August Laugel, n.d., in Europe Looks at the Civil War, ed. Sideman et al., 89.

52. Ibid.

53. Ludwig Kuhner to his brother Gottlieb Kuhner, 22 December 1861, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 294.

54. Hermann Nagel to his brother, 28 April 1861, in ibid., 396.

55. Anton Herman Bullenhaar to his brothers and sisters, 27 December 1861, in ibid., 373.

56. Cooper, “Die Freie Gemeinde,” Minnesota History Magazine 41 (January 1968): 53–60; on the diverse religious beliefs regarding slavery, see Miller, et al., eds., Religion and the American Civil War.

57. Barkai, Branching Out, 1–2, 79, 109.

58. List, “A Society for the Preservation of the Jewish People (1819),” 209.

59. Ibid.

60. Barkai, Branching Out, 79–80, 109.

61. Lincoln to Sigismund Kaugmann, ESQ. 24 December 1986. Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress, Washington DC. Linfield, Statistics of Jews and Jewish Organizations, 29; Barkai, Branching Out, 118–19.

62. Maxwell, Slavery and the Catholic Church, 107–8.

63. To further understand the role of Catholicism during the Civil War, see Randall M. Miller et al. eds., Religion and the American Civil War, and Stogre, S.J., That the World May Believe; Curran, Shaping American Catholicism, 106. While Pope Pius later attempted to retract his support for the American Confederacy to European monarchies, he did not retract anything in America or the media, leaving the impression of his support for Davis.

64. “The Catholic Church,” The Democratic Press, 3 April 1862.

65. “A Catholic View,” and “Dr. Brownson on the War!”, Chicago Daily Tribune, 14 January 1862.

66. Dietrich Gerstein to his brother, 1 October 1862, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner et al., 281 (emphasis added).

67. Townsend, Yankee Warhorse, 20.

68. Noll’s “The Bible and Slavery,” 43–73, and Wyatt-Brown’s “Church, Honor and Secession,” 89–109. Both articles describe the dispute Christian congregations had over the Bible and slavery, and they are useful for anyone interested in the complicated way religious groups examined slavery. Fredriksson, “The Coming of the Lord,” 111, 118. On Catholicism’s influence over immigrants’ decision to fight for the Union, see Curran, Shaping American Catholicism.

69. Levine, The Spirit of 1848, 48; Bernice Cooper, “Die Freie Gemeinde: Freethinkers on the Frontier,” Minnesota History Magazine 41 (March 1968): 53–4. Members of the Gemeinden were not atheist. Instead, they believed in God, but they also believed in consideration of human elements, specifically human nature and human morality.

70. Reinhart, Two German in the Civil War, 67, 73.

71. Merritt, Masterless Men, 264; Peter Klein, quoted in Mahin, The Blessed Place of Freedom, 12.

72. On the possibility of working-class whites becoming economic slaves, see Merritt, Masterless Men, and Bolton, Poor Whites of the Antebellum South.

73. Gustav Keppler to his parents and brothers, 3 August 1862, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 186–7; Burton, Melting Pot Soldiers, 55.

74. Eduard Treutlen to his parents, 7 May 1865, in ibid., 231–5.

75. Christian Bonsel to his parents, brothers and sisters, 29 January 1865, in ibid., 329.

76. Christian Harring to his parents and sister, 30 August 1863, in ibid., 220.

77. Ibid.

78. Burton, Melting Pot Soldiers, 210–11. Sigel often threatened to or actually did resign from the Union army whenever he felt he deserved a certain promotion or command. He knew his position influenced the will of many Germans, and he would use the threat of the Union losing German support to ensure his own political fortunes. On Lincoln’s political generals, see Work, Lincoln’s Political Generals.

79. Cincinnati Ohio German Workmen to Abraham Lincoln, February 1861, in Lincoln Papers.

80. Quoted in Mahin, The Blessed Place of Freedom, 11–12.

81. Ibid.

82. Ibid.

83. Ibid.

84. Friedrich Martens to his father, 24 August 1861, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 319.

85. Albert Krause to his family, 11 September 1862, in ibid., 198.

86. “Foreign Immigration,” Burlington Free Press, 19 July 1861.

87. Efford, German Immigrants, Race, and Citizenship in the Civil War Era, 43. On immigrant assimilation, see Anderson, Immigration, Assimilation, and Cultural Construction of American National Identity. For specifically European immigrant assimilation, see Mahin, The Blessed Place of Freedom.

88. Gottfried Rentschler, Letter 8. Reinhard, ed., Two Germans in the Civil War, 68.

89. Karl Adolph Frick to his mother and sisters, 29 September 1862, in Germans in the Civil War, ed. Kamphoefner and Helbich, 349.

90. Ibid.

91. Schurz, The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz, vol. 3, 1863–1869, 268.

92. On the unification of Germany, see Showalter, The Wars of German Unification. Showalter makes a convincing argument regarding the effect of the American Civil War on German unification.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Anthony J. Cade

Anthony J. Cade II is a retired United States Marine, Ph.D. student at the George Washington University and military historian who works for the U.S. Army Center of Military History, located in Washington, DC, USA. His specialization is nineteenth-century American military history, specifically the American Civil War.