Charles O. Haller: Friedrich Gerstäcker's Secessionist Friend
2014; Arkansas Historical Association; Volume: 73; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2327-1213
Autores Tópico(s)American History and Culture
Resumoin early May 1861, charles O. haller, German immigrant and one of Friedrich Gerstacker's dearest friends in Arkansas, wrote particularly bloodthirsty letter to the Arkansas Gazette, adding his voice to the grow- ing chorus in favor of the state's secession from the Union. His reasoning was simple. Northerners were all Browns-fanatics dedicated to the abolition of slavery-and the recent election of Abraham Lincoln would help them achieve their goal. Only through secession could Arkan- sans be sure that slavery would be protected. If secession brought war, Haller continued, Arkansans should treat the invaders like they would the real John Brown: Hang them forthwith-without Judge or Jury, as fast as you can lay your hands upon them. He envisioned quick and glo- rious victory, predicting, Our Arkansas boys will give good account of themselves . . . execute[ing] more 'John Browns' than old 'Bull-frog Abe' (vide Sut Lovengood [sic]) and all of the Black Republicans adhering to him can possibly drive over the line.1Haller's support of secession runs counter to common understandings of during the sectional crisis and Civil War. In the free states, were among the most die-hard supporters of the Union. Look- ing at the rates at which different ethnic groups aided the Union war ef- fort, historians Walter D. Kamphoefner and Wolfgang Helbrich conclude, Germans were the most overrepresented group in the Union army. Ger- mans in several states, including Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio, and New York, formed their own volunteer regiments, and the Union officer corps was peppered with refugees of the Revolution of 1848.2Even in the slaveholding states, where German immigrants made up much smaller portion of the population, German Americans were generally associated with unionism and among the stoutest opponents of secession. In Kentucky, according to that state's foremost historian on the subject, the overwhelmingly supported the Union.3 Anne Bailey insists that a significant number of German Texans-especially in the hill country west of Austin-opposed secession.4 Most famously, Missouri Germans-especially the workingmen of St. Louis-have been credited with keeping that state in the Union.5The German immigrants' devotion to the Union-whether in free slaves like Ohio and Wisconsin or slave states like Missouri and Tex- as-should not be confused with abolitionism or even sympathy for the enslaved, however. Though some German Americans certainly thought slavery to be immoral, the vast majority voiced little concern about the pe- culiar institution as long as it was confined to the cotton and sugar fields of the South but saw its expansion as threat to their own economic well-be- ing. Like other immigrants from Europe, brought with them to the United States traditions that made them wary of both working along- side slaves and the men who held them in bondage. They feared that the labor of slaves could be used to undermine their crafts, drive down wages, and imperil their ability to establish stable households. Moreover, many German migrants celebrated the democratic spirit they found in the Unit- ed States and saw the growing political power and aristocratic pretentions of slaveholders as threat to that spirit.6The Arkansan Haller's ideas concerning slavery and slaveholders were not much different than those of his fellow immigrants in St. Louis or Milwaukee, and it was precisely these ideas that led him to embrace secession and the Confederacy. He spent at least fifteen years working to protect the economic prospects of Little Rock's workingmen against the threats posed by unfree and degraded labor and grew to fear both the labor of those enslaved and the power that slaveholding gave to the state's elite. But the setting in which these ideas played out led him to support secession. Slavery not only sustained the Arkansas economy, but it also kept nearly all African Americans out of Little Rock's labor market to the benefit of white artisans and mechanics. …
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