The German-Americans and Their Rise to Prominence in the Early Civil War
When thinking of the Civil War, who do you assume to be involved? We know the narrative of the Union and the Confederacy, the battle for slavery, states’ rights, and unity — but do we truly know what kinds of Americans were the embodiment of this contention, who actively fought for these ideals?
With only my prior knowledge of the war I acquired from years of history classes, I would have concluded that soldiers were simply young Anglo-American men.
When given the objective to examine an archival object that revealed a facet of life for German immigrants in Missouri and to research their cultural history within the state, I knew what type of object I wanted to find: one that was created during the time of the Civil War, an era in particular I hoped to learn about through the lens of an immigrant.
While the Civil War holds boundless routes of research I could have pursued, the beginning seemed like the perfect place to start. And so I studied the Camp Jackson affair, which occurred less than a month after the war began, through the writings of a German-American soldier who resided in St. Louis — a man named John T. Buegel.
Buegel was not an anomaly among the soldiers at this time, as he was under the command of Captain Nathaniel Lyon in the Missouri Volunteer Infantry — and Lyon’s recruits in the regiments were mainly comprised of German immigrants. Buegel’s enlistment in the northern army was rather anticlimactic, however, and was not done in the name of patriotism or enthusiasm, like one may expect. Other work was nearly completely nonexistent, as all building operations had come to a standstill during this early-war period. Becoming a soldier was simply the sole option, but this does negate any significance of the immense German-American involvement in the war.
Camp Jackson was a US arsenal located in St. Louis, Missouri established by southerners — and was specifically situated at Twenty-second, Olive, Chestnut, and Market streets. With the beginning of the Civil War being in April of 1861, the pro-Confederate state militias were frequently seizing federal arsenals at this time. Ultimately, the affair at Camp Jackson was the product of the arsenal being deemed the “‘largest prize.”
The raid began the morning of May 10th — less than a month following the beginning of the war, and a mere few weeks after Buegel’s enlistment. Captain Nathaniel Lyon and Colonel Franz Sigel commanded marching orders, and because this Confederate raid had been largely expected and anticipated, the camp was surrounded on all four streets hours later.
The German soldiers were eager to fire, with their cannons loaded and aimed at the camp. This fact can be understood by Buegel’s statement that “and since we Germans at the time were looked upon as belonging to an unworthy nation, and Americans, old and young, looked at us with contempt and disdain, we decided…to sell our skins as dearly as possible.” The Germans strived to prove their worthiness as citizens of the nation, and if fighting as soldiers and defeating the Confederates was what was needed to accomplish that, they decided that was what they had to do.
The German soldiers were unquestionably unified in their fight. Along with Buegel’s note of them being perceived with contempt and disdain, these regiments have also been described as being united in the pursuit of fighting for the Union, and with unmatched enthusiasm. This unification and desire to gain the acceptance of the Anglo-Americans is, to me, one of the most prominent ideas of Buegel’s writing — and his claim of this is only further proved through other sources.
The Germans’ goal of gaining acceptance and being seen as worthy in their new country can also be explained by and interwoven with the ideas of nativism and the surge of immigrants arriving following the 1848 Revolution, who are infamously dubbed the “Forty-eighters.” Nativism, or the political movement that was characterized by not only the questioning of outsiders, but also by he condemning of them and perceiving them as a threat to American institutions, can certainly explain the way in which German-Americans were treated. The Forty-eighters, who were the vast group of German immigrants who were highly radical and were often highly educated freethinkers and atheists, only further provoked the nativist problems that were so prevalent at that time.
The rapidly rising nativist sentiment fostered a life of conflict for Germans in America, and it certainly persisted through the Civil War. The disdain by which the Anglo-Americans viewed them with perpetuated the clear sense of unity among the Germans, which they utilized to pursue proving their worthiness to not only reside in America, but to fight for the nation, as well.
With Buegel’s clear objective of revealing the divide between Americans and Germans during this time, paired with my research from supporting sources, I am left with the question of his intended purpose of his diary entries, and specifically the one regarding Camp Jackson. It is common for soldiers to write diary entries for cathartic reasons, to fight boredom, or to feel as though they are communicating with family and friends at home — but I believe Buegel was writing, at least partially, for a different reason.
What if these entries were directed towards Germans who did not reside in America at this time? I view Buegel’s writings as though he wrote with an intended divisive tone — and this can be seen through his definitions, such as “fine aristocratic Americans,” and “haughty young Americans…” These choices of diction, to me, establish a very clear sense of division he recognizes between the Anglo-Americans and German-Americans. This is partially because he merely regards them as Americans, and not Anglo-Americans — meaning that he may not perceive himself, and other German-Americans, as American at all. His choice in description of the Americans is definitely not positive, as well, and his aim may be to reveal the existing nativist, anti-German sentiment to German, non-American readers.
To me, it is also natural to make the assumption that he could be writing in the pursuit of ensuring that the immense German involvement in the fighting of the Civil War was recorded for future readers and future generations. This may be in the name of self-preservation, but applied to the group of German-American soldiers as a whole — because why would they want their contributions to the war to go unnoticed, or even disregarded by the prominent and overriding notion of nativism? I know that I, personally, was not aware of the heavy influence and involvement that Germans had in the Civil War before examining this manuscript — so to assume that Buegel would want to establish this in writing himself, as a German-American soldier, is definitely not unfounded.
Ultimately, Buegel’s provisions of his experiences as not only a Civil War soldier, but also as a German-American who faced the nativist-fueled consequences, left significant information and ideas for future readers to consider. The substantial German involvement in not solely the Camp Jackson affair, but future Civil War battles to follow, is indisputable — and Buegel’s writing has been an excellent source in depicting just how intertwined German-American history is and German immigrants are in such a crucial era of American history.
