The Wittenberg History Joumal Wittenberg University • Springfield, Ohio Volume XXX Spring2001 From the Editors: The 2001 WittenbergUniversity History Journal contains a wide variety of papers in many styles and covering very different subject matters. These papers were the cream of the crop from an exemplary group of papers and selecting these few was a strenuous decision for the editorial staff. The staff enjoyed reading the submitted papers; this Journal would not be possible without such quality student submissions. Gratitude is extended to the members of the Department of History, with a special thanks to department secretary Margaret DeButy, for ali of their support, advice, and guidance. We would especially like to thank our advisor, Dr. Jim Huffrnan, for all of his assistance over the last few months. Finally, a resounding thank you to our editorial staff, who worked tirelessly to make this Journal the fine piece of work we present to you. It is the dedication of all these individuals working together that allows the History Journal to become a reality every year. We hope you enjoy this year's Journal and appreciate the support we have received from the Wittenberg comFnurlJ.ty, Melinda Scott Josh Guerrieri Jeff Lewis

The Wittenberg University History Journal 2000-01 Editorial Staff

Co-editors ...... Melinda Scott, Josh Guerrieri, JeffLewis

Editorial Staff ...... Kristen Baughman, Lucas Clarkson, Dustin Plummer, Jessie Zawacki

Advisor ...... Dr. Jim HufDnan

The Hartje Papers The Martha and Robert G. Hartje Award is presented annually to a Senior in the spring semester. The History Department determines the four finalists who write a 600 to 800 word narrative essay dealing with a historical event or figure. The finalists must have at least a 2.7 grade point average and have completed at least six history courses. The winner is awarded $400 at a spring semester History Department colloquium and all four entries are included in the History Journal. This year's Hartje Paper award was presented to Jamie Chope.

On the Cover This year's cover features a photo of a member of the Iron Brigade in the Civil War. The Iron Brigade was a regiment of Union soldiers from Wisconsin who were noted for their bravery on the battlefield. To read more about the Iron Brigade, please turn to Adam Ruschau's paper "Those Damn Black Hats: The Iron Brigade in the Civil War." Table of Contents

The Philosopher-King: Vaclav Havel and the Veivet Revolution in Czechoslovakia by Lucas Clarkson Wittenberg University Class of 2002 ...... 7

A Plight Forgotten: An Argument for Viewing Indentured Servitude as White Slavery by StephenScott Doucher Wittenberg University Class of 2001 ...... 13

Munster as the New Jerusalem by Amanda Kutz Wittenberg University Class of 2002 ...... 22

Anastasia or Anna Anderson: The Truth Revealed by Amanda Oleson Wittenberg University Class of 2002 ...... 30

Those Damn Biack Hats: The Iron Brigade in the Civil War by Adam Ruschau Wittenberg University Class of 2001 ...... 37 HARTJEPAPERS

July 1967 Detroit Riots: A Culmination of Economic Frustration byJamieChope Wittenberg University Class of 2001 ...... 50

Fashoda: The Pitfaii of Imperial Policy and a Possible War Avoided by StephenScott Doucher Wittenberg University Class of 2001 ...... 52

The Most Famous Gunfight by Nick Long Wittenberg University Class of 200t ...... 54

From Florida Swampiand to Magic Kingdom by MelindaScott Wittenberg University Class of 2001 ...... 56

Contributors ...... 58

Address correspondence to: Editor The Wittenberg University History Journal Department of History Wittenberg University P.O. Box 720 Springfield,OH 45501-0720

wt • 7

The. Philosopher-King: Vaclav Havel and the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia By Lucas Clarkson WittenbergUniversity Class of 2002

Above all, any existential revolution political power. Beginning in 1918 and until the should provide hope of a morai years preceding Worid War II, Czechoslovakia reconstitution of society... A new would remain a democratic state. However, in experience of being, a renewed 1938 President Emil Hacha acquiesced to the rootedness in the universe, a newly demands of Adolf Hitler and Czechoslovakia grasped sense of 'higher responsibility,' a became a German Protectorate. The new-found irmer relationship to other Czechoslovak experience under German rule people and to the human community...1 was that of widespread persecution and stifled speech, conditions eerily similar to what they As a playwright, author and political would undergo under Communist rule. dissident, Vaclav Havel had the largest Ultimately, more than fifty thousand individual impact on Czechoslovakia's Velvet Czechoslovaks would die as a result of German Revolution of 1989. Through his popular occupation. Following Germany's defeat in advocacy of human rights, freedom of speech, 1945, Czechoslovakia was to fall into the hands and freedom of expression, Havel set the stage of the U.S.S.R., ushering in a new era of political for what would be one of history's most oppression. Stalinization, the term used to peaceful revolutions ever. Although Havel was describe Czechoslovakia's forced movement continually at the forefront of the Czech from "bureaucratic centralism" to communism, dissident movement throughout the sixties and would remain in effect for two more decades. seventies, he was never considered its "leader" Years of economic stagnation and political until he was thrust into that role late in 1989. It oppression led to a reform of Stalinistic policies was then that the people of Czechoslovakia during the 1960s. The program, spearheaded by raised their voices in the remarkable, yet still liberal members of the CPC and with the unfamiliar spirit of democracy and freedom, and support of the people, had begun to gain chose Havel to be their president. They momentum. Alexander Dubcek, a moderate remembered what he had done as a playwright, reformist appointed to become the new chair of providing them with thought-provoking plays the CPC in 1968, would push the movement aimed at awakening their long-oppressed minds. further along by proposing 'a new model of Furthermore, they knew him as the author of socialism,' profoundly 'democratic' and countless dissident writings, including the 'national.'2 Eventually, Moscow took the side of infamous Chatter 77, one of the first attempts by the antireformists and in August 1968, Soviet Czech citizens at having open discussion with forces entered Prague, effectively ending the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia Dubcek's "Prague Spring."3 Although the (CPC)J Despite numerous attempts by movement towards democracy was abruptly put government officials to stifle Havel's to a halt, the events surrounding Prague in 1968 revolutionary inclinations, he eventually would be used as a rallying cry for student emerged as both the voice and the conscience of demonstrators in 1989. a new, free Czechoslovakia. Normalization, the process whereby all In the decades prior to Havel's rise to reformist elements of the CPC were purged, national prominence, Czechoslovakia had immediately followed Prague Spring. Dubcek, undergone a number of shifts in the balance of 8 ° The Wittenberg History Journal along with many other reformist leaders of the in cultural and civic politics-and it ultimately ied CPC, was ousted from his position.4 Students to my becoming a 'dissident.''ul As an editor of demonstrated in opposition to the Soviet Tvar, HaveI would continually encounter presence, and one young man would perform a resistance from the government as to what could public suicide to condemn Soviet aggression.5 be published and what couldn't. He would One of the main foundations the new regime remain a part of the controversial journal until rested on was the "strict control over the spread 1969, when it was officially banned by the of ideas, invoDing a purge of all institutions government.12 engaged in the dissemination of knowledge and In addition to his forays into the dissident culture."6 This new policy would have a movement, Havel was also a prominent debilitating effect on many writers and artists, playwright whose work was considered integral especially those from the theatre. Many would in redefining the citizen's role in society. He flee the country in the years following its began his career at the ABC Theatre in Prague, inception in order to work in "free" countries. where he learned just how much power the Among the more adversely affected was Vaclav theatre possessed. Biographer Michael Simmons Havei, a playwright and political dissident who, described Havei's theatrical education this way: during the Prague Spring, had initiated efforts to "Social and political points, he realised, could be bring democracy to the Czechoslovak made in an oblique way, even in a surrealist government.7 While many of his colleagues way, using faraway or even non-existent were leaving the country in hopes of acquiring settings for a very apposite argument."la their freedom elsewhere, Havei decided to Moreover, Havei realized that he could now remain in Czechoslovakia and fight on. It would give life to what had previously been inanimate ultimately be his contributions to the dissident thoughts and ideas. Actions on the stage would movement that would help lay the foundations represent events from real life, thereby offering of the revolution in 1989. audience members the chance to view their Before he emerged at the forefront of the everyday lives in a stark, new light. Through the Czech dissident movement, and throughout his theatre, Havel could "strip away illusions, and life, Havel was involved in a number of reveal an authentic, vital 'truth' which, without dissident groups. Early on, at the age of fifteen, further meditation, holds equally within and Havel helped found the "Thirty-sixers," a group outside the theatre."14 The enormous of young intellectuals, all born in 1936, that production of works that followed would would meet regularly and engage in heated ultimately lay the foundation for an upheaval - debates over political issues,a Years later, HaveI the type the world had never seen. would look back on those meetings and fear In The Garden Party, Havei utilized the what could have happened, "If we'd been five themes of repetition and predictability to create years older, we'd have almost certainly ended an atmosphere similar to what his audience up in Mirov [a Stalinistic concentration camp]; experienced on an everyday basis. After a great in those days, you could easily get twenty years deal of practice, the main character, Hugo, for that kind of thing."9 This reluctance to yield discovered a way to control others where they to authority would present itself time and again, had once controlled him. After this achievement, as Havel would become an active member of however, Hugo's life became inundated with the Czech dissident movement. predictability and repetition. At the time that Havei took his largest step into the The Garden Party premiered in 1963, these same movement in 1965 when he became one of the themes were prevalent in Czechoslovak society. editors of Tvar, a literary magazine intended for Thus, audience members were forced to regard young people.1° It was at this time that Havel their society in terms of its inherently disordered first considered himself a member of the nature. The CPC had repeatedly broken underground movement. "It was a step that promises to end Stalinization, and the public had turned out to be far more important in my life grown weary. Havei was merely imitating the than it first appeared to be...it was the government's own ineptitude, and at the same beginning of something deeper-my involvement time, offering opposition to it. The PhilosopherKing: Vaclav Havel and the VelvetRevolution in Czechoslovakia ° 9

Various other absurdist themes presented of freedom and power. Havel begins the essay themselves in Havel's plays that, in turn, by justifying the then-current dissident represent opposition to the CPC. The movement growing within Czechoslovakia. He Memorandum, produced in 1965, was an writes that, "It [the dissident movement] is a Orwellian play that focused on the problems natural and inevitable consequence...of the that a new, bureaucratic language called system," and that the CPC "can no longer base Ptydepe introduced to society. The play was itself on the unadulterated, brutal, and arbitrary meant to mock the government's often- application of power."19 Moreover, Havel incomprehensible language. In The Increased provides an all-out attack on the failure of the Difficulty of Concentration,produced in 1968, a government to provide truthful information to man is imprisoned by a machine, although in a its citizens: "quasi-homely setting." Here, Havel compared Because the regime is captive to its own lies, "the system" to a manipulative machine, and it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. members of society are its victims.15 Although It falsifies the present, and it falsifies the Havel did not actually attempt to incite future. It falsifies statistics. It pretends not to rebellion through themes in his plays, he did impose an omnipotent anal unprincipled succeed in forcing audience members to see police apparatus. It pretends to respect things as they truly are. Havel himself expressed human rights. It pretends to persecute no one. It pretends to fear nothing. It pretends this desire in Disturbingthe Peace: A Conversation to pretend nothing.2° withKarel Hvizdala: Further incidents of the CPC unjustly My ambition is not to soothe the viewer prohibiting the right of free speech and violating with a merciful lie or cheer him up with a false offer to sort things out for him. I other basic human liberties compelled Havel and wouldn't be heiping him very much if I did. a small group of dissidents to create Charter77, I'm trying to do something else: to propel an attempt to establish open dialogue with the him, in the most drastic possible way, into Czechoslovak governmentY The incendiary the depths of a question he should not, and event that caused the creation of the Charter cannot, avoid asking; to stick his nose into was the trial for the Plastic People of the his own misery, into my misery, into our Universe (PPU), a Czechoslovak rock band. The common misery, by way of reminding him band had allegedly created "a public that the time has come to do something disturbance" by offering "coarse indecencies" about it. 16 and was also indicted for "propagating nihilfsm For years, Havel was able to take advantage and decadence."22 Although everyone who was of the freedom the theatre gave him. The familiar v lth the band knew that the charges Prague Spring, however, had frightened the were unsubstantiated, the trial went on. leadership of the CPC enough that they began Eventually, the members of the PPU were found to crack down with their method of guilty and subsequently sentenced to prison "normalization." In 1971, the government terms. forbade publication and production of any of Havel, however, could not sit idly by as Havel's plays, and eventually, all his works fellow artists were persecuted. He began to were prohibited from being accessedY organize meetings with fellow dissidents Ailthough the CPC was somewhat successful in immediately following the trial in order to form stopping the production of his plays, Havel was a consensus on what needed to be done. Charter able to find an alternate medium through which 77, its founders maintained, was not a political his dissident opinions could be expressed. Havel organization, nor was it an attempt to would go on to produce a number of essays, overthrow the CPC. It was a "free, informal and letters, and writings attacking the absurdity of open association" and "everyone who accepted the Communist system. its basic ideas, or took part in its work, was a This method becomes clear in Havel's The member."23 It outlined a number of grievances Power of the Powerless,written in 1978.18 The towards the CPC, including examples of human essay itself is a discussion on the merits of the rights violations, as well as infringements upon current Communist system and on the concepts tO ° The Wittenberg History Journal various other freedoms74 Fellow Chartists and published under the name LettersTo Olga.s° decided it appropriate to appoint three The correspondence revealed a man, who, while spokesmen that would help proliferate the under extreme personal duress, could still document, two of which were Havel and a philosophize on subjects of importance to the philosopher named Jan Patocka.25 It was a bold world at large. Freedom, truth and democracy move by both men to accept being spokesmen, were reoccurring themes in these letters, and considering that incidents of brutality were not once did he mention regret of any sort. widespread throughout Czechoslovakia at the Upon his release from prison in 1983 until time. the beginning of the revolution in 1989, Havei Charter 77 created a stir almost immediately continued to produce plays and essays meant at upon its formal declaration in January i977.26 keeping discussion alive. Temptation,a play that Some disagreed with it while others signed it utilized the Faustian theme but was set to the without a second thought; the CPC, for obvious trappings of normalization, was completed in reasons, condemned it. Signatories were 1985.3I In 1989, Havel wrote "Testing Ground," harassed by the police and some even received a short essay that comments on the CPC's failed death threats as a result of their involvement. attempts at implementing perestroika and Havel would fare no better; his house was democratization. In the essay, Havei also refers searched and he was subjected to police to a petition called "A Few Sentences" which he questioning on a daily basis. Despite being sixty- helped to initiate and which played a role in nine years old and in the middle of a severe bout bringing dissidents and normal citizens of the flu, fellow spokesman Jan Patocka was together.32 Soon thereafter, Havei's dream of a also thorougt ly interrogated. He, however, was democratic Czechoslovakia would become not as physically resilient as his colleagues were; reality as artists, students, and citizens united Patocka died of a stroke following one of these and changed the political system within their sessions.27 Country once more. Although Patocka would be sorely missed, The months prior to revolution in Havel felt that the Charter had ultimately November 1989 were very tense; and there was prevailed and would serve a meaningful purpose a general consensus among many for years to come. "The moment it emerged, the Czechoslovaks that something vast was interplay of different relationships came alive looming on the horizon. In January of that year, again. A body that had been thought dead Havei was once again imprisoned, this time for suddenly showed signs of life. The future was laying flowers at the spot where Jan Palach had an open book once more."28 The "body" that performed self-immolation in protest to the HaveI describes here was the Czechoslovak civic Soviet invasion in 1968.33 Mass demonstrations body, and even more significant, the young followed, and the atmosphere began to grow people who had the power and the numbers to more anxious. After a petition was sent to effect change. The revolution would take twelve HaveI's captors demanding his release, his years to surface, but its origins were further sentence was lessened by one month, and on 17 reinforced with the production of Charter 77. May he was freed.34 "A Few Sentences" was For his involvement in the writing of Charter released soon thereafter, and the floodgates 77, along with other nonconformist activities, were opened. The fall of the Berlin Wall in early Havel was imprisoned on three different November would only add fuel to the fire as occasions from 1977-1983, the longes term Czechoslovakia's dissidents would look to East lasting from October 1979 until February Germany as a testament to the weakening of 1983.29 Whereas the CPC had hoped to stifle Communism's hold in Eastern Europe. On 17 thought through imprisonment, it instead November 1989, close to twenty thousand allowed Havel to collect his thoughts and hone students marched on Wenceslas Square waving his writing skills. Between June 1979 and banners and shouting slogans of a "general September 1982, Havel managed to send a large political nature."35 Protestors met with number of unedited letters to his wife Olga, scattered resistance, and the only bloodshed to which were in turn smuggled out of the country come out of the revolution occurred as security The Philosopher-King: Vaclav Havel and the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia ° t ! forces intervened with limited displays of quiet when we were frightened to speak out. violence. Now it's our turn."4° Throughout December, Once the uprising had become official and countless CPC officials quit their posts, realizing the older dissidents knew they had the support the imminence of their collapse. And on 10 of the people, steps were taken to ensure that December, Gustav Husak, the president of the none of it would be in vain. On 18 November, Czechoslovak Socialist Republic resigned, the Civic Forum, made up of varied political paving the way for Havel's ascendancy. On 29 groups, was formed,a Its demands included, December, with the support of the people, "The removal of the architects of the post-1968 Vaclav Havel became his country's first normalization, likewise those responsible for democratically elected president in decades.4I ordering the breakup of peaceful Vaclav Havel was able to masterfully link his demonstrations.., and the release of all prisoners roles as playwright, author, and political of conscience."s7 Havel was soon named the dissident, redefining the relationship between leader of the Civic Forum, having been actively citizen and state. By providing his audiences involved in events to that point. He would later with commentary on the oppressive world that remark on that moment: "I was on stage for the surrounded them, he was able to keep free first time...on the very stage where I used to thought alive. At the same time, he was actively work as a propman, assistant director, and as a participating in measures meant to undermine playwright...3s I was for the first time on a real those that would prefer to keep freedom stage...and that was the beginning of the suppressed. Truth was a prevailing force in both revolution."a9 his art and his politics, and it was this virtue that The Civic Forum inspired the multitudes of contributed to the demise of the Communists in Czech citizens that had been static since the Czechoslovakia. Havel's rise to the presidency Prague Spring to shed their fears and was indeed an example of the effect he had on demonstrate on a large scale. As citizens were events at the close of 1989. His wisdom lives on: marching through the streets of Prague, the "Let us teach both ourselves and others that impact dissidents such as Havei had on current politics does not have to be the art of the events became quite clear. One slogan used for possible...But it can also be the art of the barmers during the revolution demonstrates impossible, that is the art of making both Havei's influence explicitly: "Havei didn't keep ourselves and the world better."42

Endnotes

9 Vaclav Havel, Dislurbing the Peace: A Conversation with t Rosalyn Unger, "Historical Setting" in Czechoslovakia: A KarelHvizdala, trans. Paul Wilson (London: Faber, 1990), 24. Country Study, ed. Richard F. Nyrop, oh. 1, 0Nashington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1982), 58. 10 Kriseova, Vadav Hovel, 57-58.

2 The events surrounding Czechoslovakia's occupation by la Hovel, Disturbing the Peace, 77. German forces can be found in Unger, Czechoslovakia, 735-40. Any subsequent information concerning incidents prior to the t2 Kriseova, Vadav Havel, 66. Prague Spring can be found onpages 41-52 of the same work. t3 Michael Simmons, TheReluctant President: A PolitiealLife a Bernard Wheaton and Zdenek Kavon, The Velvet of VadavHavel, (London: Methuen, 1991), 60-61. Revolution: Czechoslovakia, 4988+t991, (New York: Freedom House, 1991), 3. 14Jeremy AdleG "The Role of the Theatre in Czechoslovakia's 'Velvet Revolution" in Violence in Drama, ed. 4 Ibid., 5. JamesRedmond (Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1991), 295. 5 Ibid., 5. 15 Descriptions of the three aforementioned plays appear. Ibid., 6. in Simmons The RehtctantPresident, 65-68.

z Ibid., 224. 16 Havel, Disturbing the Peace, 199.

B!ida Ktiseova, VaclavHaveh TheAuthorized Biography, 17Wheaton and Kavan, The Velvet Revolution, 224. trans. Caleb Crain (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1993), 3. 42 ° The Wittenberg History Journal

32 Hovel, Open Letters, 373. t8 Havel, Open Letters, 125. 33 Kriseova, Vaclav Hovel, 234 36. 19 Ibid., 127. 4 Ibid., 239. 20 Simmons, The Reluctant President, 134. 35 Wheaton and Kavan, The Velvet Revolution, 42. 2x Unger, Czechoslovakia, 58. 86 Wheaton and Kavan, The Vdvet Revolution, 56. 22 Simmons, The Reluctant President, 116-17.

7 Ibid., 56. 2 Ibid., 121. s8 The Civic Forum was founded on the stage of the 24 The manifesto of Charter 77 can be found in Unger, RealisticTheatre in Praguewhere Havel had worked as a young Czechos!ovakia, 309-13. man,

25 Simmons, The Reluctant President, 120. a9 Daniel Sargent Moore, The Artists" Revolution: 40 Days in Prague (Cinema Guild, 1995), videocassette. 26 Kriseova, Vadav Have!, 114. 40Wheaton and Kavan, The Velvet Revolution, 115. 27 Details of abuses against Charter 77 signatories come from Simmons, The Reluctant President, 123-126. 4XIbid.,The final days of the CPC's domination can be traced throughout pages 108-115. 28 Ibid., 123• a2Peter C. Newman, USalutingthe PlaywrightWho 29 Wheaton and Kavan, The Velvet Revolution, 224. Became President," lldaclean's 111, no. 33 (1998): 52.

0 Simmons, The Reluctant President, 142.

al Ibid., 157.

Works Cited

Moore, Daniel Sargent. The Artists" Revolution: 40 Days in Adler, Jeremy. "The Role of the Theatre in Czechoslovakia's Prague. 30 rain. Cinema Guild, 1995. Videocassette. 'Velvet Revolution.'" In Violence in Drama, ed. James Redmond, 291-314. Cambridge: Cambridge Newman, Peter C. USaluting the Playwright Who Became University Press, 1991. President." Maclean's 111, no. 33 (1998): 52.

Have[ Vaclav. Disturbing the Peace: A Conversation with Karel Simmons, Michael. The ReluctantPresident: A PoliticalLife of Hvizdala. Translated by Paul Wilson. London: Faber, Vaclav Hovel. London: Methuen, 1991. 1990. Unger, Rosalyn. Historical Setting." In Czechoslovakia: A . Open Letters: Sdected Writings, t965-1990. Selected Country Study, ed. Richard E Nyrop, 3-59. and Edited by Paul Wilson. New York: Random Washington, D.C., U.S. Government Printing Office, House, 1991. 1982.

•The Garden Partyand OtherPlays. Translated by Vera Wheaton, Bernard, and Zdenek Kavon. The Velvet Revolulion: -- Blaekwell, George Theiner, and JanNovak. New Czechodovakia, 4988-4994. Boulder: Westview Press, York: Grove Press, 1993. 1992.

"Kriseova, Eda. Vadav Hovel: The Authorized Biography. Whipple, Tim D., ed. After the VelvetRevolution: Vaclav Havel Translated by Caleb Crain. New York: St. Martin's and the New Leadersof CzechoslovakiaSpeak Out. New Press, 1993. York: Freedom House, 1991. • 13

A Plight Forgotten: An Argument for viewing indentured servitude as white slavery; a comparison with the African- American experience of enslavement.

By Stephen ScottDoucher WittenbergUniversity Class of 2001

From Viking raids to the repulsive prostitution form of bondage. Caudii1 writes of trade in Eastern Europe in recent years, the impoverished and often dispossessed peoples in history of slavery in Western Civilization has sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries many fascinating and tragic stories. The Britain being imprisoned, abused, and worked experiences of African-Americans, whose mercilessly. He tells of people iiving in English history is an epic of the heights a people can urban slums of the aforementioned periods and carry themselves from is the itself a mass of supporting their families through crimes, such as truly interesting, sometimes tragic and thievery.2 sometimes inspiring, stories. But these are not Caudill informs the reader that men, women, the only stories of forced labor in American and children of varying ages were taken, in history. numerous waves, to the British colonies in the In the year 1962, a book called Night Comes To New World. There, in the colonial lands of the The Cumberlandswas published. This particular 1600s and 1700s, they would be made to do work's author was Harry M. Caudill, a Kentucky often brutal labor for no pay, had no rights, and raised lawyer and ex-Iegislator. Caudill wrote were, in many cases, subjected to numerous the work in order to expose to the general types of abuse and debasement. These men, population of America the poverty and women, and children were to become known in hopelessness that had been, and was in 1962, popular American history as indenturedservants. prevalent among the majority of the inhabitants He also recounts that many of these of the Cumberland Plateau in Eastern Kentucky. impoverished and deported people were coerced Caudillhad hoped that his book would, with its into signing "indentures," or contracts on their accounts of unemployed starving families and freedom, in order to pay debts they had no hope serf like conditions for those who possessed jobs of ever repaying in order to avoid execution for in mining, lead the Federal Government to pass varying types of criminal offences. Some of social legislation to help the struggling populace them were simply orphans with nowhere to go, of the Cumberlands. Early in his work, CaudilI and others were abducted and completely forced notes of the people of Eastern Kentucky, of into unfree labor without ever signing an which he was a part, that "their past created the "indenture. ,,3 modem mountaineers and the communities in This paper is about these people and about which they live, and resulted in a land of slavery. Perhaps it would be of assistance to economic, social and political blight without define slavery and to further discuss the parallel in the nation."1 dimensions of this report. The third edition of Night Comes To The Cumberlandstraces much The AmericanHeritage Dictionary defines slavery of the tragedy of modern Southern Appalachia's as "one bound in servitude as the property of a poverty to that past; this he does by telling the person or household."4 This is a rather general tale of how many of the Scotch-Irish and English definition which can be more properly and descended people of the Cumberlands, and profoundIy illustrated through an examination other regions of Southern Appalachia, had of the enslavement experienced by imported ancestors who were held in a cruel and unjust African and African-descended people. 14 • The Wittenberg History Journal

The system of "indentured servitude" is brutai system of African based slavery, which comparable to the system of black enslavement indentured servitude was a form of white that existed in Colonial America. Although there enslavement. Indentured servitude thus can be are similar stories of abductions and loss of seen in the context of a British upper class that freedom in archives of numerous library held no value on the British poor and did not institutions throughout the United States, it is hesitate to strip them of their freedom. uncommon for the layman to think of the two In the records of seventeenth century slave systems as being similar in their manifestations. ships that delivered captured Africans, the Through a comparative study it can be shown enslaved were referred to as "servants," and not that "indentured servitude" often differed little slaves,s It is also worth noting that some from the collective African-American experience modem scholars have argued that the first of enslavement• imported Africans in bondage in British North The analysis of white "indentured servitude" America were thought of as "indentured will cover the dates roughly between 1600 and servants."6 Given the unlikelihood that the 1760s and focus on Britain and its North imported Africans were allowed to sign American colonial empire• Practices of indentures it can be reasonably be argued that imprisonment for debt, in and of itself, and other the two terms were not seen by seventeenth activities, such as the merciless factory labor of century people as having incredibly different the nineteenth century, will not be discussed meanings. because they fail outside the specified realm of Furthermore, it must also be stated that in analysis and deserve more focus, than can be 1659, the English parliament debated the merits given here. H wever, debtor's prisons will be of the then long existent system of deporting the mentioned in their context as institutions that British Isles' impoverished inhabitants (as well • gave accessory to the continuation of the as political prisoners) to the colonial New indentured servitude system, through depriving World. This discussion focused largely on seventeenth century and eighteenth century marginalized Scots, Irish, and English. However, Britain's destitute of options in the face of the term "indentured servants" was never used economic helplessness. in this debate. Rather, the members of The issue of the meaning of words is parliament simply referred to these expunged mentioned in this debate for the simple fact that people as slaves.7 In language that is reminiscent terminology plays a central role in the of the enslavement of Africans and African- controversy over British indentured servitude. descended peoples, the South Carolina When one uses the term "slavery" a much Assembly in 1717 considered ownership of a different mental image is conjured than when white man as being a possible requirement for the term indentured servitude" is used. Yet such eligibility to vote.8 As with the English terms, especially in another age, could have been parliament in 1659, the topic of conversation viewed as synonymous or near synonymous. was indentured servitude. When one examines the greater collective Starting in the early sixteenth century (if not institution of indentured servitude or the earlier), Sub-Saharan Africans captured by individual cases, from records still available, one enemy tribes or nations of the coastal regions may think of similar stories of abduction and were routinely placed into a status of slavery loss of freedom that are associated with the and then often subsequently sold to European African-American experience of enslavement. It and Euro-Colonial slavers, who transported appears that much of what is stated today in them in ships of bondage to New World history classrooms across America on the system colonies? Entire "trading" companies were of indentured servitude has been to varying established for the purpose of procuring and degrees simplified and even undiscussed. The transporting enslaved Africans, as well as "free purpose of this work is to tell some of the story agent" private traders.1° The Africans that were of those men, women, and children who forced onto slave ships met with Spartan persevered under indentured servitude and to conditions, since they were viewed by their prove, through a comparison with the highly importers as cargo. The death rate during these A Plight Forgotten: An Argument for viewing indentured servitude as white slavery . 45 voyages of African enslavement appears to have And carried me over the waters been as high as 20% during the entire To iabor for seven years long.18 eighteenth century.11 James Aimesley, a disinherited member of the British "indentured servants" were also often Anglo-Irish nobility, was kidnapped in 1727 by brought to the New World colonies 'against their the captain of an impressment ship for will. Seventeenth century English governments indentured servants, who was in league with his made ordinary the practice of selling political would-be usurper uncle,t9 After having been prisoners, such as Scottish rebels and English tricked by the captain into believing that the Royalists (during the protectorate of Oliver plantation work he was being sentenced to in Cromwell), into slavery in the British overseas the New World was the fair apprentice-type empire.12 For example, those who had taken labor that the term "indentured servitude" part in the Monmouth Rebellion and schemes to implies, Annesley was handed over to his New end English rule in Scotland and Ireland had World master. Annesley was then to experience become acceptable, in the eyes of English law, thirteen years of brutality and hard labor under for forced "indentured servitude" in the colonial his master.2° Annesley survived this term, New World)3 Oliver Cromweli's victory over something his uncle believed would not occur, the Irishin the 1650s allowed the English and later wrote a book about his ordeal, titled dictator to deport over one hundred thousand of Memoirs of an UnfortunateYoung Nobleman, Ireland's inhabitants to the New World as Returned from Thirteen Years" Slavery in America.21 unfree iabor.14 This deportation included men, As a boy, Peter Williamson was kidnapped women, and children. Those sold in the New from his native Aberdeen and sold to a dealer in World as a result of this expulsion from Ireland unfree white child laborers in 1743. In America, even included eighty-year-old Irish women.15 however, Williamson was sold to a former Furthermore, the depressed and landless "indentured servant," who had been likewise classes of Britain, in the Seventeenth Century, abducted as a child, and finally freed. were often not people who had signed a Wiliiamson's new master quicldy freed the boy, voluntary contract on their freedom, but were who would come to write an account of his "captured by press-gangs.., and shipped into abduction and enslavement, noting that he slavery in colonial America... It was an never again saw the other children who were organized system of kidnapping English, Welsh kidnapped with him from Aberdeen and that he and Scottish workers, young and old, and feared they probably did not fare as well as transporting them to the American colonies to he.22 be sold, with profits being split between the Some economists of the seventeenth and press:gangs and the shipmaster."16 The terms eighteenth centuries called for and supported "kidnapped" and "kidnappeP' emerged inthe the massive deportation and forced servitude in English language as descriptions of press-gangs the British colonies of the impoverished and that abducted children, whose families never landless poor of Britain. Such theoreticians held heard from them again. Likewise, "spirits" came that a policy of this sort was developing the to be used to describe the press-gangs who North American colonies and controlling the "spirited" away the impoverished.17 Caudill despised poor of the British Isles. By 1652, a law mentions how the Cumberland Appalachians of had been enacted allowing the deportation to the 1960s, still retained an archaic song on the the New World and forced servitude as practice of being abducted and "spirited" off to plantation workers and colonial laborers, of the New World: anyone deemed vagrant or caught begging.2s The night I was a-married, Stories like these represent the brutal amount And on my marriage bed, of abduction that was invoDed in seventeenth There come a fierce sea captain century and eighteenth century "indentured And stood by my bed stead. servitude." One source even notes that would- be immigrants, of Scotch-Irish and even German His men, they bound me tightly ancestry, to the English colonies of North With a rope so cruel and strong, America in the eighteenth century, who had no ---,.,,win

16 • The Wittenberg History Journal intention of selling freedom, were sometimes "indentured servants," there were tricked aboard ships for "indentured servants" demographically few African and African that took them to New World bondage.24 Such descended slaves in New England and the people would be cheated of their belongings and northern colonies.32 However, in the southern provided little of the opportunity that they colonies, by the late eighteenth century, the believed immigration would provide. African and African descended slave population Besides political prisoners, expelled ethnic was so large that it made up half of the populace groups, tricked immigrants, and the abducted of Virginia and more then two-thirds of that of from Britain's poor and powerless classes, South Carolina.33 Yet, it has been estimated that people convicted of felonies under Royal law between one half and two-thirds of those who were also subject to being shipped to the New came from Europe to pre-revolutionary America, World as unfree laborers. However, a felon were involuntary and unpaid iaborers,s4 Both could be a hardened criminal, an orphaned these large dispossessed groups of unfree labor pickpocket, or a man with a starving family were to surprisingly encounter similar treatment who stole food, as in the case of one Thomas in the New World. Atwood.2s A pregnant seamstress named Black Africans were the victims of gradually Catherine Davis became a felon and was sold developing Western ideologies. Such ideologies into labor in the New World for allegedly justified the enslavement of Sub-Saharan stealing seven yards of lace. Davis gave birth to Africans through theological claims of their God her child in transit to the New World for auction instilled lowly position and their supposed and her newborn succumbed aboard the ship, biological inferiority,as Furthermore, much was two weeks iater.26 Caudill contended that made of their original non-Christian cultures and colonial American plantation owners of the their "heathen" religious practices, to justify seventeenth century deliberately had ships full their bondage,as of people sentenced to British debtors' prisons Likewise sixteenth-century English theologian brought to the New World, in order to do body and geographerRichard Hakluyt labeled the breaking labor.27 dispossessed and abundant English poor as As the mention of Catherine Davis' journey criminals and supported the concept that they across the Atlantic implies, white "indentured be deported to the New World as condemned servants" appear to have often faced laborers,a7 Numerous Scotsmen of Edinburgh, nightmarish conditions aboard the ships that who were sentenced to forced servitude from transported them to the New World. Sometimes 1662 to 1665, were chastised as "'rouges' and deaths in transit to the New World even ran 'others who made life unpleasant for the British higher than those of African importation slaver upper classes."38 A popular stereotype soon ships.28 Ships designed to carry three hundred developed in the Britain of seventeen and were sometimes filled to the point were they eighteenth centuries that impoverished men were overcrowded with twice as many people who were made to serve in the New World as they were supposed to carry.29 In 1743, were morally inferior dangerous criminals,a9 nearly a third of the convicts headed for Stereotypes of female "indentured servants" as America, to be sold as "indentured servants," whores and women of the lowest moral aboard the shipJustitia died, and others were so character also became common among British undernourished that some began drinking their New World planter elites.4° Thus, in some urine.3° One impressment ship carrying Scotch- sense, an "ideology" of the lowness of the Irish passengers, who had been tricked into British poor was being embraced, by the transit, had its transportees resort to wealthy and powerful in Britain and the cannibalism,sl colonies, to justify acts of expulsion and forced It is further interesting to compare the servitude. demographic portions of both African and Upon surviving their journey and arriving in African-descended slaves and white "indentured colonial North America, imported Africans were servants" in pre-revolutionary Colonial America. brought to marketplaces. There prospective Perhaps because of the existence of white buyers examined them in usually humiliating A PlightForgotten: An Argumentfor viewing indenturedservitude as white slavery • 1 7

and degrading ways. One of the most tragic and particularly in the southern British colonies of disturbing activities of the system of African Continental North America, was pitiless field enslavement would often occur with the labor.49 Brutal and torturous maltreatment purchase of various Africans by different buyers, certainly occurred, as with any system that namely the separation and breaking up of functioned on the moral level of African families 41 enslavement; where one man (or woman) is As stated earlier, would-be German given ownership over the life of another. immigrants to North America were often tricked Enslaved Africans and their enslaved aboard ships reserved for indentured servants, descendants were also subject to unbelievably deprived of their possessions, made to owe the harsh punishments for running away from their ship's captain for some sort of necessity, and master(s) or attempting to organize or take part then forced to sell themseDes and their families. in a slave rebellion. Some colonies went as far as This situation, and the abuses inherent in it, to punish African and African descended slaves were so common that in 1765, the Pennsylvania with being burned alive for invoDement in German Society placed pressure upon the state rebellion,s° legislature to help prevent such activities.42 Prior White "indentured servants" likewise were to this date, tricked and indebted German used for brutal manual labor on plantations and immigrants, if they survived the journey to the without pay. William Eddis, writing from British New World, were taken to market areas, North America in 1774, went as far as to declare displayed, and manhandled like cattle by that white indentured servants were worked potential buyers, in a manner similar to that harder on plantations than enslaved Africans/ experienced by imported Africans and African African descendants, because the latter were slaves put up for sale.43 Women being sold in property for life and were too valuable to a such a situation were allegedly harder to sell master to be iost.51 A personalized example of because the main interest of buyers was hard the hardships experienced by the unfree white manual laborY Furthermore, Germans, as well laborers of the Colonial America, can be found as Irish and Scotch, trapped in this situation in the case of David Evans, who spent his often had entire families broken up and sold servitude doing the task of removing trees and separately, never to meet each other again.45 clearing virgin land .52 Convicts who were deported to the New Convict "indentured servants" were often the World as involuntary laborers were often sold victims of brutal whippings and were commonly inside the ships that had carried them across the chained and placed in iron collars, as were Atlantic.46 A convict named William Green enslaved Africans.53 Like the enslavement of stated in his 1758 memoir, that when potential Africans and their descendants, there were cases buyers boarded the ported ship, "They search us of masters and their handymen flogging, raping, there as the dealers in horses do those animals and murdering their indentured servants.54 in this country, by looking at our teeth, viewing Advertisements for runaway convict indentured our limbs, to see if they are sound and fit for servants often mentioned scars, bent backs, and their iabour."47 Under such circumstances, a ugly burns which could testify to a hardened life woman named Eleanor Bradbury was sold with of impoverishment in Britain and the physical her three sons to a buyer in Maryland, while a stresses of labor for their master(s), perhaps man who lived in Pennsylvania purchased her some type of abuse while serving as involuntary husband.48 Thus, it can be concluded that many laborers.5s forced "indentured servants" faced the prospect The fact that there were indentured servants of being degraded to the level of auctioned who ran away from their masters and became property and a likelihood of being separated fugitives is a further contrast to consider. Stiff from their families, perhaps permanently. laws existed in several colonies for runaway Imported African slaves and their enslaved indentured servants who were captured to be descendants were to face varying degrees of flogged and have their servitude extended. In at treatment, depending on the personality of their least two cases in Maryland, one in 1743 and the master(s) and on their jobs. Much of this labor, other in 1754, white "indentured servants" and 18 ° The Wittenberg History Journal black slaves actually ran away from their temporary bondage would become the highest masters together,ss determination for what constituted slavery. White "indentured servants" in the late To confront this argument, it should first be seventeenth century were so impoverished and restated that there are colonial records which abundant in the colony of Virginia that they tell of white "indentured servants" being "kept the province on the brink of civil war."57 murdered by their masters and thus never Two armed rebellions of "indentured servants" surviving their term of service. Secondly, again actually broke out in Virginia, in 1661 and one must take account of the countless number 1663.58 This was one reason why Virginia of people who were forced into "indentured plantation owners began to turn more toward servitude" yet never signed any indenture. African and African descended slavery in the Added to this, one must study the reality of the next century.59 indenture system as opposed to its theoretical One argument that could be proposed against working. the assertion that the existence of indentured Many indentures promised "freedom dues" of servitude in the seventeenth and eighteenth land, usually fifty acres, to those who signed centuries was white slavery, similar to that of them. However, the overwhelming majority of African enslavement, is that some, perhaps "indentured servants" who entered Maryland many, white indentured servants had sold from 1670 and 1680 either died in service or themseDes freely and did not necessarily receive were simply denied the land they had worked poor treatment at the hands of their buyers. for.61 Some servants were maltreated near the This is partially true, in that some indentured end of their terms in order to make them servants almost certainly did willingly sell runaway and thus have their terms themselves into servitude and some, such as lengthened,s2 Such actions clearly show that Peter Wllliamson, were fortunate enough to be the indentured system may have been in no bought by masters who treated them well, way what it theoretically appeared to be. abided by the indentured contract, and perhaps Methods of the owners of the indentures of allowed them to receive a sincere apprentice female indentured servants for keeping their education.6° However, as has already been laborers past their contractual terms could be shown, there were numerous cases where very nefarious. The colony of Virginia people were abused, tricked into involuntary recognized that there were men who were labor contracts, and shanghaied without ever impregnating their female indentured servants, signing a contract. Furthermore, to discount the with the intention of having these servants massive amount of forced indentured servitude sentences expanded for having illegitimate and abuses because some indentured servants children. Even more shocking is the fact that received decent treatment would he like arguing "The 'bastard' or 'obscene' children, as they that enslaved Africans and their enslaved were called.., were bound over.., for a period descendents were not really slaves at all, of thirty-one years! This heinous child-slavery because some black slaves received decent from birth was not modified until 1765 when treatment and may have even been given their the Assembly of Virginia declared it to be 'an freedom from a master. unreasonable severity to such children' and A far more compelling argument for the limited the term of bondage for such White profound differences in the two systems is children to a 'mere' 21 years for boys and 18 made when the issue of indentures, and the years for girls." 3 specified terms of service inherent in them, is In what manner can human suffering be contrasted with the life-long bondage that was measured, even at the individual level, to say the normal experience of most African and nothing of the collective? Earlier in this study, African-descended slaves. Such an argument William Eddis was mentioned for his statement would note that indentured servants were only that he felt that the "indentured servants" he bondspersons for a particular period and were saw laboring were made to suffer worse than subsequently freed from labor at the end of their the African and African descended slaves that terms. Thus a matter of lifelong bondage or worked the same plantations. This account is A Phght Forgotten..An Argument for viewing indentured servitude as white slavery ° 49

noted because it is testimony to the hard labor Americans are also aware that Africans had assigned "indentured servants," not to suggest enslaved other Africans long before European that one type of collective heartache can be and Euro-ColoniaI slave ships appeared. judged better or worse then another. However many Americans do not know of the Some who would be perhaps critical of the striking similarities between European study presented might claim that it is insensitive enslavement of Africans and European forced to the experience of enslaved Africans and their labor of other Europeans. enslaved descendents by simply comparing and Given the evidence presented, it is suggested contrasting their plight with that of white here that the term "indentured servitude" was a "indentured servants." This is in no way the euphemism used by a "civilized" Western elite desired outcome of this work. Rather, this work that in fact enslaved impoverished whites has been written to argue that those who (mostly British). In the twentieth century, some suffered in the system of indentured servitude have talked of how they believe black slavery to were often no better then slaves themseDes. A have left a long enduring and negative legacy. piece that discusses the Armenian genocide by Given the way in which the wounds of man's Ottoman Turks in 1915 is not an attack on the misdeeds often produce more suffering, they are collective suffering of the Jewish community in probably right. However, when one reads of the twentieth century, as this paper is no way a Caudill's impoverished and backward refutation of the black slavery experience. Appalachians of the 1960s, one can not help but Most modem Americans are aware of the wonder if "indentured servitude" also left its enslavement of Africans and their descendents scars. that occurred in Western Civilization right up to the second half of the nineteenth century. Some

Endnotes

10Ibid, 248. 1 Harry M. Caudill, NightComes To The Cumberlands, (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1962), ix-x. 11Sharon V. Salinger,"To ServeWel! andFaithfully": Labor and Indentured Servants in Pennsylvania, 1682-€800, (Cambridge: 2 Ibid, 4-5. CambridgeUniversity Press, 1987), 92.

a Ibid, 5-6. 12Michael A. Hof£manII, TheyWere White and TheyWere Slaves,(Coeur d'Alene, Idaho: The IndependentHistory & 4 The American Heritage Dictionary, 8 ed., (New York: Research Company, 1991), 68. Laurel: 1990), 768. 13Oliver P. Chitwood, A Historyof ColonialAmerica,(New s Oscar and Mary F. Handtin, "Origins of the Southern York: Harper & BrothersPublishers, 1931), 414. Labor System," WilliamandMary Quarterly,7:2 (April, 1950): 205. la George Novack, Slavery in Colonial America," in America's RevolutionaryHeritage: Marxist essays, (New York: 6 Alden T. Vaughan, "The Origins Debate: Slavely and PathfinderPress, 1976), 142. Racism in Seventeenth-Century Virginia," in Colin A. Palmer, ed., The Worldsof UnfreeLabour, (Aldershot, United Kingdom: zs D. M. R. Esson, The Curseof Cromwel!:A Historyof the Ashgate PublishingLimited, 1998), 54-55. IronsideConquest of Ireland,f649-53, (Totowa, NJ:Rowman and Littlefield,1971), 176. • Thomas Burton, Parliamentary Diary: 4656-59, vol. 1, (London: Henry Colbum, 1828), 253-274. 16Hoffman 69.

8Journalsof theCommons House of Assemblyof South t7 Ihid, 125. Carolina: t692-t775, vol. 5, 294-295. 18 CaudiU 5-6. Walter Rodney, African Slaveryand Other Forms of Social Oppression on the Upper Guinea Coast in the Context of 19John van der Zee, Bound Over: Indentured Servitude & the Atlantic Slave-Trade," in Colin A. Palmer ed., The Worlds of American Conscience, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985), 195- UnfreeLabour, (Aldershot, United Kingdom: Ashgate Publishing i96. Limited, 1998), 243-245. 20 Ibid, 197-198. 20 ° The Wittenberg History Journal

21 Ibid, 196. 41Leslie Howard Owens, TheSpecies of Property:Slave Life and Culturein theOld South,(New York: Oxford UniversityPress, 2aPeter Williamson, Sufferingsof PeterWilliamson, 1976), 189. (Stockbridge,MA: n.p., 1796) microfiche BB48027at the Ohio State University Main Library, 1. 42 Salinger 95.

2 Hoffman 70. 4a Ibid, 97.

24 James Truslow Adams, A History of American Life, Volume 44 Ibid. IIh ProvincialSociety, 1690-t763, (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1927), 175-176. as Adams 177-178.

25 A. Roger Ekirch, Bound for America: The Transportation of a6Ekirch 122. BritishConvicts into the Colonies,t7t8-4775, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987), 66-67. 47 Ibid, 123.

26 Ibid, 111. a8 Van der Zee 165.

21 Caudill 5-6. 49Chitwood 425.

28 SaEnger 91. so Ibid, 422 423.

29 Marcus W. Jernegan, Laboring and Dependent Classes in sl Van der Zee 134. America, 1607-1783: studies of the economic, educational, and social significance of slaves,.servams` apprentices, and poor folk, (Chicago: 52 Ibid, 137-138. University of Chicago Press, 1931), 50 51. 5aEkirch 150. a0Ekirch 102. s4 Hoffman 107. 81 Adams 176. s5Ekirch 157-158. 32Chitwood 422. 56 Ibid, 196-198. 3 Ibid. s7 Ekirch133. 84Elaine Kendall, Review of BoundOver by John van der Zee," LosAngeles Times, 1 September 1985, sec. BKS, p. 1, 7. 5aHoffman 102.

3s Vaughan 64-65. s9 Bkirch133.

36 George M. Predrickson, White Supremacy: A Comparative 60 Hoffman 54. Studyin Americandg SouthAfrican History, (Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress, 1981), 72. 61 Ibid, 85-86.

s7Hoffman 63 64. 62 Ibid.

a8 lbid, 70. 6s Ibid, 89.

a9 lbid, 65.

40Hilary Beckles,Natural Rebels: A SociaIHistory of Enslaved Black Women in Barbados, (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers UniversityPress, 1989), 56-57.

Works Cited

Caudill, Harry" M. Night Comes To The Cumberlands, Boston: Adams, JamesTuslow. A Historyof AmericanLife, VolumeIlI: ProvincialSociely, 1690-1763. New York: The Macmillan Little, Brown and Company, 1962. Chitwood, Oliver P. A Historyof ColonialAmerica. New York: Company, 1927. Harper & BrothersPublishers, 1931. The American Heritage Dictionary. 3d Edition. New York: Laurel, Ekirch, A. Roger. Bound for America: The Transportationof 1990. BritishConvicts into the Colonies, t718-1775. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987. Beckles, Hilary. NaturalRebels: A SocialHistory of Enslaved Black Women in Barbados. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1989. Esson, D. M. R. The Curse of Cromwelh A History of tile A Plight Forgotten: An Argument for viewing indentured servitude as white slavery • 21

Itonside Conquest of Ireland, t649-53. Totowa, NJ: Owens, Leslie Howard. This Species of Property: Slave Life and Rowman and Littlefield, 1971. Cuhurein theOld South.New York: Oxford University Press, 1976. Fredrickson, George M. WhRe Supremacy: A Comparative StudI, in Americand2 SouthAfrican History. Oxford: Oxford Rodney, Walter. "African Slavery and Other Forms of Social University Press, 1981. Oppression on the Upper Guinea Coast in the Context of the Atlantic Slave-Trade,"In The Worldsof Unfree Handlin, Oscar and Mary F. "Origins of the Southern Labor Labour, ed. Colin A. Failer, pp. 241-254. Aldershot, System," WilliamandMary Quarterly.7:2 (April, 1950): United Kingdom: Ashgate PublishingLimited, 1998. 199-222. Rut*, John Towill, ed. Diary of Thomas Bunon, Esq. vol. 4, Hoffman, Michael A., Ii. TheyWere White and TheyWere London: Henry Colburn, 1828. Slaves. Coeur d'Aiene, ID: The Independent History & Research Company, 1991. Salinger SharonV. "To ServeWell and Faithfully":Labor and Indentured Servants in Pennsylvania, t682-18oo. Jemegan, Marcus W. Laboring and Dependent Classes in Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1987. America, "1607-t783: suldies of the economic, educational, and social significance of slaves, servants, apprentices, Van der Zee, John. Bound Over: Indentured Servitude & and poor folk. Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press, American Conscience. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1931. 1985.

Jout*lalso[the CommonsHouse of Assemblyof SouthCarolina: Vaughan, "The Origins Debate: Slavery and Racism in 1692-4775, voI. 5. Seventeenth-CenturyVirginia," In The Worldsof Unfree Labour, ed. Colin A. Palmer, pp. 25 68. Aldershot, Kendall, Elaine. Review of Bound Over by John van der Zee, Los United Kingdom: Ashgate Publishing 1 September 1985. Limited, 1998.

Novack, George. "Slavery in Colonial America," America's WiUiamson, Peter. Sufferings of Peter Williamson. Stockbridge, RevolutionaryHeritage; Marxist essays. New York: MA: n.p., 1796. PathfinderPress, i976. 22 •

Munster as the New Jerusalem: Charisma, Fear, Location, and Circumstance

By Amanda Kutz WittenbergUniversity Class of 2002

For close to five centuries, rusty iron cages Catholic Church, thought to be the only have been hanging on top of St. Lambert's Christian belief, frightened many who feared Cathedral in Munster, Germany. They have not the wrath of God. been touched or moved since their arrival on top As more bloodshed occurred with new of the church tower in 1535. Instead, the cages religious ideas abounding, the judgement of the serve as a daily reminder to all that blatant Almighty seemed closer than ever. The city of disrespect for the state will not be tolerated by Munster, located in the northwestern corner of the government or the just God who watches the Holy Roman Empire next to the over them.1 The cages were the final home of Netherlands, exemplified the political strife leaders of the radical apocalyptic Anabaptist sweeping Western Europe. The bishop prince movement who established absolute control of who was supposed to serve as the authority Munster, Germany from 1533 to 1535. After over the town resided outside its limits, leaving confessing to crimes against the state and God, the town to struggle with issues of power and they were put inside the cages and burned to justification internally. The townspeople death. The cages were then hoisted high into created divisions among themselves based on the air, and placed atop the church overlooking religious views, deeming those with the correct the land of religious upheaval that changed the divine assessment of the present moment were western world. the guardians and authors of law within the city. The whole of Western Europe became the As religious and political strife intermixed with political and religious hotbed of the sixteenth radical apocalyptic views from the Netherlands century, sparked by Martin Luther's posting of and surrounding areas of Wittenberg and his ninety-five theses in 1517. The Reformation Strassborg, a disunited town council opened the spread throughout Europe and beyond as each door for radical change. By the 1530s, Munster new follower added his or her own unique was ripe for the upheaval of all its traditional element of faith to Luther's attempt to reform values concerning faith and government on a the Roman Catholic Church. As religion was huge scale. As the council's newly appointed closely intertwined with politics, religious radical preacher divided the town, an outside upheaval went hand in hand with political millennialistic Anabaptist sect began sending turmoil as well. The struggle no longer just disciples into Munster, preparing it for takeover involved the dominant Protestant versus as the New Jerusalem. Eventually besieged by Catholic fight, but as new Protestant sects the apocalyptic Melchoirite Anabaptists in 1533, developed, feuds for power and authority pitted the radical upheaval in Munster was the result of Protestant sect against Protestant sect. As a culmination of social, political and political lines became drawn on many different geographical circumstance, and the charismatic religious grounds, the fighting and new radical leadership that brought about a society fueled doctrines that were produced escalated fear in by apocalyptic fervor and fear. many of the people that the Biblical prediction Munster was the head-city of a princely of the end of the world was at hand. The bishopric. The bishop prince, Franz von upheaval of the sacred doctrine of the infallible Waldeck, exerted little control in the city, living Munster as the New Jerusalem: Charisma, Fear, Location, and Circumstance • 23 well outside city bounds.2 He did not receive Receiving the support of the Uberwasser much support from the town, as his nuns, who controlled St. Lambert's Cathedral, perpetuation of restrictive trade policies and the town council which was powerless alienated the influential town merchants.3 against the burgher class's adamant approval of Without the bishop prince's interferiflg, Munster Rothmann, Rothmann successfully drove out all basically was free to run itself. It did so by the Catholic pastors and supporters, replacing means of a twenty-four-man council. "...Each church officials v,4th new pastors who held year ten electors, directly elected by the full similar evangelical views.8 Rothmarm began citizens, chose the twenty-four man council...in preaching radical theological sermons, claiming times of public discontent they could replace infant baptism and the belief of them."4 While the town's guildsmen were not transubstantiation in communion were council members, the United Guild exerted abominations to God.9 Appealing to the peopIe, much influence on the council and in the town. Rothmarm "began to emphasize Christian Generally of the burgher class, the guildsmen stewardship and the duty of the Christian to use used their power to rally the more aristocratic his possessions for the common good. This town council against the bishop prince.5 message had fallen on responsive ears in the In the late 1520s, Bernard Rothmann, a adjoining territories, for crops had been poor Munster native, was financially supported by and food was dear.°1° the town's guildsmen to attend theology school The aristocratic town council preferred a in Wittenberg, west of the town of Munster and more Conservative Lutheran view on baptism. 1 the birthplace of the Reformation, and to travel Given their social position, the idea of to other Reformation cities. Rothmann was communal living threatened their power in the initially influenced by Luther's ideas which town. Trying to rein in authority, and adhere to "greatly diminished the role of the priest as the wishes of the bishop prince, the council held mediator between layman and God, thereby a public colloquy in August of 1533 with increasing the importance of the Bible and Herman Busche, a well-known student of personal conscience in directing the layman's Luther, plus local Catholic and Lutheran clergy. spiritual journey."6 Returning with other The council formally charged Rothmann v,4th Reformation radical ideas, Rothmann preached breaking the established order of the Holy his first Protestant sermon outside of St. Roman Empire, concerning infant baptism and Lambert's Cathedral in 1532. the teachings on the body and blood of Christ.12 The bishop prince, pressured by the Holy Rothmarm, however, was undaunted by the Roman Emperor Charles V, had Rothmarm colloquy, which forced the clergy of the removed, but the town guildsmen protected Catholic and Lutheran churches to form a quasi- Rothmarm. 7 Theguildsmen, of the upper-middle alliance based on the tradition of infant baptism class, were attracted to the Protestant message. and transubstantiation in order to be a Unlike the Roman Catholic Church, the significant opposition to Rothmarm and his Protestant belief in salvation through faith growing supporters. 3 The townspeople divided instead of through works or a monetary themselves, some clinging to the traditional donation was appealing to those trying to make beliefs of the Catholic and Lutheran faith and a living. Protestant faith did not judge the some embracing the new radical protestant guildsmen by class, which determined their doctrine preached by Rothmarm. These ability to donate money or goods. Instead, they divisions usually fell on class-lines as the burgher were able to keep their money and be assured of class saw Rothmarm as their hero and the upper salvation through grace. Rothmarm represented class saw him as the Anti-Christ. As divisions the guildsmen's defiance toward the Holy and debates mounted around him, Rothmarm Roman Empire and its puppet, the Roman continued preaching in St. Lambert's Cathedral. Catholic Church, while also proving to the Following the colloquy, the entire twenty- bishop prince that his authority was no longer four man council was replaced by fewer real in the town. noblemen, and more heads of the United 24 • The Wittenberg History Journal

Guild.14 With their support, Rothmann began governments feared the nature of his "radical preaching more fervently, stressing communa! tendencies and chiliastic speculations."16 views along with his adamant adult baptism Heading south of Munster, in the town of belief. Soon his reputation spread to the south, Strasbourg, the Hofmann's radical adult baptism attracting the attention of the Melchiorite beliefs and millennialistic prophecies began Anabaptists. Disciples of Melchior Hofmann attracting new attention. He acquired a group of and Jan Matthys visited Munster and began followers, most notably women who claimed conversing with Rothmann. Upon seeing the abilities as prophetesses. As one man's political and religious strife around them in the confession recorded of Hofmann's followers: town, the disciples were sure they were in "One of the prophetesses also prophesied - and God's chosen New Jerusalem, which had been that through a vision -that Melchior was Elijah," promised to them almost a decade before by the God's chosen apocalyptic prophet,lz Along with father of their faith, Melchior Hofmann. his re-baptism, or Anabaptist beliefs, Hofmann Melchior Hofmann became attracted to asserted his Divine power as the prophet Elijah Lutheranism shortly after Luther posted his and predicted the end of the world was at hand. ninety-five theses. Believing it was his duty to As Hofmann quoted scripture showing the spread Christ's message, Hoffnarm evangelized government persecution of Christians in the end in the northern lands of the Holy Roman Empire times, his personal persecution by the town and among the western borders of the authorities for social disruption only confirmed Netherlands as a missionary. His sermons, the belief in his followers minds that they were however, began to question the church's view living in the end times and that Hohnann was on infant baptism and the apocalypse. He indeed God's chosen prophet.18 Fulfilling his started prophesizing about Christ's return and prophecy, Strasbourg officials jailed Hofmann in the elect, characteristically touchy subjects for 1533, where he remained until his death in 1543. Protestant and Catholic churches alike. In one Hofrnann's followers were assured more of his recorded sermons, Hoflnann states that than ever that their beloved prophet was indeed God's elect shall "enter into the Holy [of Holies] God's chosen and the end times were upon and come to the Sabbath and the true rest them. As Hofmann languished in jail, however, completely naked and resigned to enter the bed the group began to wonder who would take of the Bridegroom where the righteous [re-] new leadership. A baker influenced by Hofmann birth takes place and where one is instructed by in the Netherlands, Jan Matthys claimed God God and the Word."15 Claiming to be a divine revealed to him that he was the biblical prophet authority, his sermons gave the poor hope, as Enoch, the prophet the Bible claims to follow they took comfort in knowing they would have Elijah. A tall man with a great black beard, eternal rest in the afterlife. Obedience to Christ, Matthys's appearance was very intimidating. 19 therefore, was equated with obedience to As rumors that challenged Matthys's claim Hofmann. The peasant class that clung to became known, one former follower recorded: Hofrnan became more visible as Hoflnann "When John Matthys learned of this, he carried impressed upon his followers the importance of on with much emotion and terrifying alarm, and evangelizing. Their belief in being God's chosen with great and desperate curses cast all into hell elect gave them confidence to be loud in their and to the devils to eternity who would not hear beliefs. Obeying Hofmann and essentially his voice and would not recognize him and Christ, the followers proclaimed their salvation accept him as the true Enoch."2° Fearful of God's message, regardless of their audience's social wrath and Matthys's violent temper, his status or the place where they were followers rose in number in an effort to honor evangelizing. God. With Hohnann in jail, Matthys was left to The radical ideas Hofmann proclaimed carry out the work of establishing the New alarmed the Lutheran Church as well as local Jerusalem. Figuring Strasbourg was not the officials. Hofmann left the Lutheran faith and chosen site, Matthys looked north to Munster headed south, as the northem cities' where a radical pastor's reputation and the Munster as the New Jentsalem: Charisma, Fear, Location, and Circumstance * 25 town's lack of central authority had been show of himseif, Matthys would daily ride to rumored. the city walls, complete with armor and musket Matthys sent scouts throughout Germany to in hand, "like a v dd man out of his senses.'2 report on places ripe for evangelical Matthys's luck eventually wore off, as the conversion.21 Munster, v,dtb its lack of princely combined Lutheran and Catholic fighters led by authority, newly appointed town council, and Munster's bishop prince eventually captured approval of the radical teachings of Bernard him and brutallykilled him, Rothmann, became the obvious chosen for a ...And he was so violent that even his communal society based on Old Testament law enemies for their part were terrified of to be set up. Matthys entered into a relationship him...they were so incensed that they did with Rothmarm, indoctrinating him with even not just kiil him like other people but hacked and chopped him into little pieces, so that more radical beliefs and encouraging him to be a his brethren had to carry him in a basket part of God's divine plan by setting up Munster when the tumult was over.27 as the site of the New Jerusalem. The His head was put on top of a long pike, which Melchiorite Anabaptists started moving into was thrust into the ground.outside the city as a Munster, eventually taking the town over in warning of what was to come if the gates were early 1534. So-called prophets or preachers left not let open. Munster in an effort to find more followers who After Matthys's somewhat heroic death, one would hear prophesy and see signs in Munster, of Hofmarm's original followers, Jan Van preparing the way for Christ to establish his Leyden, emerged as God's new chosen figure. new kingdom on earth.22 Leyden established a new dictatorship style The preachers that were sent out gained government, proclaiming himself the King of much attention in the surrounding areas, causing Munster. He wore a gold crown and purple concern to officials who feared revolt. As robe and set up a throne in the town's center officials caught one preacher, he confessed: where he was attended by fashionably dressed "Also Knipperdollinck who is of the right spirit, courtiers and his fifteen wives. From there he had heard wonderful things from heaven and he passed out judgment, establishing martial law as called out: better yourseDes, better yourselves the divine voice of God As one follower later then the King of Zion will come and rebuild confessed, God instructed Leyden that everyone Jerusalem; and many more who also had the should be baptized to cleanse the town and spirit have called out the same and called for those who would not convert would be penitence."23 The Anabaptists also sent out a punished.28 During Leyden's rule, many letter to friends whom they thought would be executions took place, most of which were done willing to join them. Using fear, they claimed purely for example's sake. "He showed little they were the chosen city of the New Jerusalem confidence toward his subjects and through his and that no one should "neglect to come unless secret and public informers he kept them from he wishes to tempt God."24 Few came to entering into secret arrangements."29 Leyden's Munster to join the Anabaptists, but many left, elaborate lifestyle overwhelmed the people who fearful of what was to come. were tired, hungry and living in fear. Christ's Matthys establishedauthority by using Old return seemed far away, as keeping themselves Testament Law. Communal-style living was alive became the more prominent goal. installed, as everyone surrendered their goods to Life inside Munster under Leyden's rule was be evenly distributed amongst the followers. a lot less glorious than what had been imagined Daily Matthys prophesized, giving credence to by the chosen inhabitants of God's New his claim as Enoch as he "sat quietly, clapped his Jerusalem. Under supposed communal living, hands, nodded with his head, and groaned much inequality existed when Leyden and his greatly as if he were about to die."25 In military elite dressed as royal monarchs and maintained fashion, Matthys sent out men to patrol the city elaborate lifestyles. Baptisms still took place gates, to ward off Lutheran and Catholic fighters daily, as the Anabaptists became intolerant of all attempting to re-capture the town. Making a 26 ° The Wittenberg History Journal others within their city walls. Polygamy placed in large cages immediately following the became widespread, with Leyden himself taking removal of their tongues by means of hot metal some fifteen wives, including Matthys's former prongs. The cages were then set on fire as wife. Fear still drove the people despite their Leyden and the others were burned to death, military losses and shortage of food.s° The perhaps as a foretaste of what was awaiting scarcity of food became a real problem for the them after death. The cages, with the dead thirteen hundred men and six thousand women, remains, were hoisted high on top the tower of plus the numerous childrenY As one captured St. Lambert's Cathedral, a reminder to all of the prisoner noted in a letter, the white was being obedience and respect expected by the state and scraped off the wall and mixed with water so God. What once served as Munster's children thought they would be drinking milk.32 introduction to the radical chiliastic Anabaptist One Munster inhabitant also stated that the lack theology would be forever remembered as the of meat caused almost all the cats and dogs to be final resting-place for a man whose devoted eaten plus several horses.33 Some people left the followers gave everything they had for the city, gladly sent out by those remaining, so as to build-up of what they thought was the New save food for themselves. Those remaining Jerusalem. grew sickly pale with bloated stomachs. Their While it is easy for an observer to call the strength to keep out the besieging forces followers of the apocalyptic claims in Munster dwindled daily as not even fear could motivate crazy, the reappearing of the New Jerusalem them to fight for their New Jerusalem. scenario throughout history proves the actions Jan van Leyden did not inspire his new are not so deviant after all. It is more logical to "subjects" to fight for the New Jerusalem as he conclude that the abnormal circumstances appeared less concerned with establishing God's heralding an end-time fear is a not such an kingdom and more enamored with enhancing abnormal part of human nature. Humans his own personal authority as Munster's king. striving to fill a spiritual void in their lives, in Leyden left the protection of the town up to his this case Christians, wish to enjoy the benefits of paradise in the afterlife. The leaders of these carefully monitored forces. By Leyden's command, the men were not allowed to cults claim authority from God and are "often communicate with each other. The men's able to assure the potential converts that they weakness and lack of back-up forces made it can all be saved - which means a promise of difficult to keep the attacking forces out. The everlasting salvation and tranquility to the men guarding the gates eventually gave out to potential devotee."ss As Hofmarm, Matthys and the combined Lutheran and Catholic forces, led Leyden proclaimed, re-baptism and obedience by the bishop prince, pressing to relieve the were necessary to ensure salvation. Believers' town of the Anabaptist dominion. After a year adherence to only these demands ensured their of control, the besieging forces overcame the place in the afterlife by demonstrating chiliastic group in late 1535. A short fight took commitment and perseverance in the faith. place within city limits after the besieging forces Max Weber, a well-noted sociologist and finally got through the city gate. Most men were scholar on the Reformation, explains the heated killed in the fighting or taken as prisoners. follower-to-leader relationship as extreme Women and children were generally released, devotion.36 Because charismatic leaders emerge eventually receiving pardons from the church for out of emotionally charged situations, followers their involvement. Leyden and the other leaders do not hold the leaders to the same standards were hunted down and captured, where they they would normally hold for each other. were then subject to much questioning and Followers assume special authority is granted to torture. On 22 January 1536, Leyden faced their charismatic leader due to the execution.34 Before his death, Leyden confessed circumstances. Charismatic leaders are his crimes and asked God to have mercy on his confirming a belief already in the minds of their soul for the atrocities he had committed. followers. For example, Matthys's emergence as a leader fit into a divine plan in the minds of his Leyden, along with other town leaders, were Munster as the New Jerusalem: Charisma, Fear, Location, and Circumstance ° 27

followers. Already convinced they were living again, the fear of eternal damnation in hell in the end times thanks to Hohnann, Matthys outweighed the idea that the New Jerusalem seemed like the natural and prophesied new claims were a mere hoax. Matthys's violent leader to follow. manner, which scared his enemies into chopping Van Leyden, like Matthys before him, once him into little pieces to make sure of his death, again fit into the natural and divine plan evoked fear in his followers. Also his tall, dark established by Matthys and Hofmann in their appearance added legitimacy to his claim as followers' minds. His authority was more God's prophet. Leyden used the same violent extreme, but accepted as followers wished to mariner, shouting judgment down from a gilded show obedience to God, represented by Leyden throne. His royal appearance also added weight on earth. Hofmann's stricter communal and to his claim as the King of Munster. polygamous society was viewed as necessary to Although many of the tactics are planned by prepare the town for Christ's return. It was also the leader, most of the circumstances seen, originally, as a better way of life. surrounding them, which help give validity to Following the horrors of the Black Plague in their claims, just happen to occur at the right 1529 along with the deficiency of crops and place and time. The political and religious widespread famine thereafter, the middle class upheaval in Munster in the early 1530s had no and poor were willing to leave the hierarchical relation to the sermons of Melchior Hofmann. rule of the state and church who were not The enthusiasm inspiring the upheavals had its helping them get back on their feet. Unable to roots in something that happened over a century find association and morality in the mainstream, before. Through a twisted chain of events, the people of Munster turned to the radical however, they became related as charismatic leaders who accepted them.37 leaders inspired disgruntled peasants to The people of Munster believed they were mobilize. living in the New Jerusalem because everything Much of the psychological reasoning, which predicted to them came true. When Hofmann allowed for the siege of Munster to take place, predicted the government persecution of occurred long before the Melchiorite Christians, as when Strasbourg authorities jailed Anabaptists started gaining the public's him for public disruption, it only validated in his attention. The Black Death that swept Europe followers' minds that the end times had begun. in the mid-fourteenth century was still vivid in Even outrageous claims helped confirm the the memories of most of the population, who authority of the leaders involved, as the idea never truly settled their fears :with death. Crop that a merciful God had saved them as promised failures in the early part of the sixteenth century overshadowed doubt that the original prediction heightened the sense of insecurity among the was false. Rothmann predicted the world's end lower classes. Also, religious tensions were on Easter of 1533. "When nothing happened, spawned by the questioning of the Catholic Rothmann took solace in the example of Jonah, Church, perhaps the one stable element in the whose prophecy of Nineveh's destruction was population's life, by Martin Luther in 1517. The prevented by a merciful God."38 As is peasants revolted in 1524 against their monastic Rothmann's case, even when charismatic landowners without the support of the leaders' claims turn out to be false, they are able Lutherans. Believing social freedom was a part to use the untruth to further their authority. of their newfound freedom from the Catholic Fear was also a tool used by the leaders to Church, many were ready to engage in a new exert authority and control. Of most concern to way of life. The charismatic leadership allowed the people was the idea of what could happen to for the dissatisfied people to unite, them if the New Jerusalem claims were genuine unfortunately v¢ith the high price of mass death. and they turned their back on it. Hofmann in Peasants seeking social justice and eternal his sermons wrote that Christ will divorce his salvation ultimately were forced to live under bridegroom if she is disobedient to him, ending the arbitrary rule of Jan van Leyden with a low all fellowship and communion with her.39 Once chance of survival. Many wishing to do the will

L. 28 • The Wittenberg History Journal of God within the city walls were killed by like those in Munster because of their Leyden's troops for example's sake. Eventually unconventional ways. It is quite obvious, everyone was forced to alter their communal measures were taken too far during Munster's ways of living as Lutheran and Catholic forces siege by the leaders and followers of the group. hung the Munsterites' celebrated king and other Tolerance by the state of the apocalyptic leaders' charred remains in cages from a church. Anabaptists could have proved less destructive.4° When tourists visit Munster, they are sure to A better method for dealing vdth groups such as see the cages high above St. Lambert's Cathedral the Anabaptists in Munster is needed to ensure and hear the story of how they reached their the burned cages or the more recently burned final destination. Stories of Munster, the Branch compounds, do not reoccur. Until then, the Davidians, Solar Temple members, or any other cages high on St. Lambert's Cathedral shouId millermialistic group in our society are hastily remind the everyday gazer of the respect judged and dismissed as some sort of psychotic demanded by the State and God, but also that a phenomena. The frequent re-occurrences of more tolerant way of dealing with the these groups, however, present a problem for unconventional groups in our society might the hurried write-off most of these groups prevent the kind of destruction the cages receive. Judgement is quickly passed on groups represent.

Endnotes

t Johnathon D. Gtieser, "A Tale of Two Convents: Nuns and la Ibid, 115. Anabaptistsin Munster, 1533-1535," The SixteenthContutyJoumal, 26 (spring1995): 45. 14 Stayer, The German Peasants" War, 125.

2 George Williams, TheRadica! Reformation (Philadelphia: The Is Melchior Hoffman, "The Ordinance of God," In Spiritual Westminster Press, 1962), 364. and Anabaptist Writers, eds. George H. Williams and Angel M. Mergal (Philadelphia:The WestminsterPress, 1957), 191. a Irvin BuckwalterHorst, TheRadical Brethren: Anabaptism and theEnglish Reformation 1o 1558 (Nieuwkoop, Netherlands:N.V. 16 Chiliastic is another word for miEennialistic; derived from DrukketijTrio, 1972), 67. the Greek word for kilo, which means one-thousand. The Bible often speaks of Christ's thousand -year reign on Earth where He 4 James M. Strayer, The German Peasants" War and Anabaptist will establish the New Jerusalem. Abraham Friesen, "Present at Community of Goods (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, the Inception: Merino gimons and the Beginningsof Dutch 1991), 125. Anabaptismf MennoniteEliswtical Bulletin, (April 1996): 8.

s Grieser, "A Tale of Two Convents," 46. lr Obbe Philips,"A Confession," Spiritualand Anabaptist Writers, Williams and Mergal, 212. Tal Howard, "Charisma and History: The Case of Munster, Westphalia 1534-1535," Essaysin History,vol. 35, 1993 [journal 181bid,209 10. online] (University of Virginia: Corcoran Departmentof History); availablefrom http://etext.virginia.edu/journals/EH/EHgS/ 19 "Meister Heinrich Gresbeck's Berichtf The Reformation hi howardl.html; accessed 9 February2000, 49. Its Own Words, ed. Hans J. Hillerhiand (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1964), 255. 7 George Williams, The Radica!Reformation (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1962), 364. 20 Phihps, "A Confession," 214.

BIbid, g65. 2 Howard, "Charisma and History," [joumaI online], 51.

9 Donald J. Ziegler, ed., "Introduction to the."Munster 2a"A Letter to the Duke nf Cleves, March 1534," In The Colloquy, 1533," In GreatDebates of theReformation, (New York: German Reformation, Katherine Leach, ed. John Wroughton Random House, 1969), 110. (London: Macmillan EducationLtd., 1991), 69. 10Williams, The Radical Reformation, 367-368. 2a Jacob yon Osnabruck, "From the Confession of Jacob yon Osnabruckf In Leach, 70. 111bid,367.

2a O. Harting, "De Munsterische Furie," In Hillerbrand, 253. 12 "Abschrift eines gruntlichengesprechs, so tho Munster twyschen etlinchen gelerten und den predicanten dasulvest =s "Meister Heinrich Gresbeck's Berichtf In Hillerbrand, 255. gehalten etlicher twyspenniger ler halven, anno domini M.C. XXXlII in Augusto, In Ziegler, 112. 26 philips, "A Confession," 221. Munster as the New Jerusalem: Charisma, Fear, Location, and Circumstance ° 29

27Ibid, 222. forces. The Munster story, was popular news in the sixteenth century, appearing in many broadsides. "Neue Zeimng," In 28 Dyonisius of Diest, "From the Confession of Dyonisius of Hi erbrand, 262. Diest," In The German Reformation, Katherine Leach, ed John Wroughton (London: Macmillan Education Ltd., !991), 71. s4 Horst, The RadicaI Brethren,72.

29"Neue Zeitungf In Hillerbrand,261. 35 Andrew J. Pavlos, The Cult Experience (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982), 120-121. so Horst, The Radica! Brethren,70. 3 Howard, Charisma and History,[journa! online], 52. 81 The population count is not certain. This number was sent out of Munster in a letter from one of the Anabaptists 37 Gerald Pankhnrsg "The End is Near," Lecture Notes, inhabitants. H. Graes, "Statement," In Hillerbrand, 263. Wittenberg University,2 December 1999.

s2 Justinian yon Holtzhausen, "Letter," In Hillerbrand, 262. 38 Grieser, "A Tale of Two Convents," 41.

s3 This information was printed in a newspaper article s9 Hoffman, "The Ordinance of God," 196. following the capture of Munster by the besieging forces. The story telts the first hand account of a solider that entered the city 40 Pankhurst, "The End is Near." as a disciple, but was in reality an informer for the besieging

Works Cited

"Meister Heinrich Gresbeck's Bericht." In The Reformation in Rs "Munster Colloquy, 1533," In Great Debates of the Refornlation, ed. Own Words, ed. Hans J. Hillerbrand, 255-257. London: SGM Donald J. Ziegler, 112-141. New York: Random House, 1969. Press Ltd., 1964.

"A Letter to the Duke of Cleves, March 1534." In The German "Neue Zeitung." In The Reformationin its Own Words, ed. Hans J. Reformation, ed. Katherine Leach. [Publications of Hfllerbrand,259 262. London: SCM PressLtd., 1964. Documents and Debates, ed. John Wroughton.] London: Panhhurst, Gerald. "The End is Near. Lecture Notes. Wittenberg Macmillan Education Ltd., 1991. University, 2 December 1999. Dyonisius of Diest. "Front the confession of Dyonisius of Diest." In The German Reformation ed. Katherine Leach. [Publications Pavlos, AndrewJ. The Cult Experiences. Westport, CT: of Documents and Debates, ed. John Wroughton.] London: Greenwood Press, 1982. Macmilllan EducationLtd., 1991. Philips, Obbe. "A Confession." In Spiritua!and AnabaptistWriters, Ffiesen, Abraham. "Present at the Inception: Merino Simmons eds. George H. Williams and Angel M. Mergal, 206-225. and the Beginnings of Dutch Anabaptistm." Philadelphia:The WestminsterPress, 1962. MennoniteHistotical Bulletin (April 1996): 8-12. Stayer, James M. The Germans Peasants" War and Anabaptist

Graes H. "Statement." In The Reformation in its O 'n Words, ed. Community of Goods. Montreal and Kingston: McGill- Hans J. Hillerbrand, 262-263. London: SCM Press Ltd., 1964. QueeNs University Press, 1991.

Von Holtzhausen, Justinian. *Letter." In The Reformation in Its Grieser, Johnathan D. "A Tale of Two Converts: Nuns and Anabaptists in Munster, 1533 1535." The Sixteenth Century Ot n Words. Ed. Hans J. Hillerbrand,262. London: SCM Journal,26 (Spring 1995): 21-47. Press LTD., 1964.

Hatting. "De Munsterische Purie." ln Reformation in Its Own Words, Von Osnabruck, Jacob. "From the confessions of Jacob yon Osnabruck. In The German Reformation by Katherine ed. Hans J. Hillerbrand, 253-254. London: SCM Press Ltd., 1964. Leach. Publications of Documents and Debates, ed. John Wroughton. London: Macmilliam Education Ltd., 1991. Hofmann, Melchior, "The Ordinance of God." In Spiritualand Anabaptist Writers, eds. George H. Williams and Angel M. Williams, George. TheRadicalReformation. Philadelphia: The Mergal, 184-203. Philadelphia,The WestminsterPress, 1962. Westminster Press, 1962.

Horst, Irvin Bukwalter. The RadicalBrethren: Anabaptism and the Ziegler, Donald J. ed. The Great Debates of the Reformation. New EnglisfiReformationto 4558. Nieuwkoop, Netherlands:D. de York: Random House, 1969. GraM, 1972.

Howard, Tal. "Charisma and History: The Case of Munster, Westphalia I534-1535." Essaysin History,vol. 35, 1993 [journal online]. Available from http://etext.virginia.edu/ joumals/EH/EH35/howardl.htmi;Internet; accessed 9 February2000. 30 •

Anastasia and Anna Anderson: The Truth Revealed

By Mandy Oleson WittenbergUniversity Class of 2002

America's eighty-year fascination with would soon be engaged in World War I, which Anastasia Nicholaievna Romanov, one of the marked the beginning of the end for Nicholas last Grand Duchesses of Russia, has produced a and tsarism. myriad of myths and legends. What has made After many devastating setbacks in the war, this woman survive in our memories for so the Provisional Government assumed long? One answer lies in her heritage. responsibility for government operations in Anastasia was the daughter of Nicholas II, Tsar February 1917. Nicholas had no choice but to of all Russia. Having been born into the imperial abdicate both his and his son's right to the family, she was royalty. Yet, it is more than throne. Concerned over the safety of the royalty which draws us in; it is mystery. The imperial family, the Provisional Government details of her family's execution in 1918 were confined the Romanovs to Tsarskoe Selo, the murky, hidden with many other secrets by the retreat of the tsars located outside St. Petersburg. Communist regime in Soviet Russia. Did this Due to the social unrest in western Russia, the woman escape? Was she alive and living in the Provisional Government moved the family to United States? Was a former princess leading the Siberian town of Tobolsk in August 1917 for the life of a normal citizen? Americans tend to their own safety.2 The Provisional Government, embrace these fantasies. Our democratic however, could not escape the social forces heritage does not provide us with a sovereign, gaining momentum in Russia, and in October leading us into an enchantment with royalty. 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power. Bolshevik Witness Princess Diana's death in 1997. Her control spelled trouble for the tsar and his funeral became one of the largest television family. Within half a year, the Romanovs were events worldwide. In America, we could watch moved again. This time, they were sent deep the coverage on any one of the major network into the Ural Mountains to the city of stations. Diana connected with the common Ekaterinburg. The family was held captive in people; therefore, we embraced her. We have the Ipatiev House, under the command of Yakov even sought to create our own form of royalty Yurovsky.3 This house came to be known as the through the Kennedy family. The legend of House of Special Purpose among the troops Anastasia is rooted in this type of royal intrigue. assigned to guard the family. Unbeknownst to Unfortunately, she did not survive the Romanov the Romanovs, Yurovsky was planning their executions and Anna Anderson, the most execution "on the orders of Lenin,"4 leader of the pr9minent Anastasia claimant, was simply a Bolshevik Revolution. The firing squad for the pretender. seven Romanovs and four of their servants Anastasia Nicholaievna Romanov, Grand would consist of ten guards plus Yurovsky. The Duchess of Russia, was born on 5 June 1901.1 men were ordered to shoot for the heart, making She was the fourth daughter of Tsar Nicholas II the deaths as quick and bloodless as possible.5 and Empress Alexandra. In addition to her At 1:15 AM on 17 July 1918, Yurovsky sisters, Olga, Tatiana, and Maria, Anastasia had instructed the tsar's personal physician to a younger brother, Alexei, who was the heir to awaken the family and servants. They were the Russian throne. In 1913, the Romanovs told that the military situation around celebrated the three-hundredth anniversary of Ekaterinburg was becoming dangerous and that their dynasty in Russia, but their prosperous rule they would need to be moved to a new location. was to last for only a few more years. Russia Dressed in their traveling clothes, they were Anastasia and Anna Anderson: The Truth Revealed • 31 guided into a basement room. At this point, the Anastasia, daughter of Tsar Nichoias II.s family did not suspect the fate which awaited Anna Anderson came to believe that she was them, but it must have seemed odd that Anastasia, and as a result, she filed two petitions Yurovsky was instructing them on the places in and two lawsuits in Germany, seeking legal which they should stand. He aligned the recognition as the Tsar's heir. Her two petitions Romanovs in the front row, v lth their servants sought the revocation of a document issued in behind them. Suddenly the ten guards entered 1933, which named the family of Hesse as the the room, and Yurovsky began reading from a tsar's heirs2 Her first petition, filed in 1938, was piece of paper, "Nikolai Aleksandrovich,... rejected in 1941. Anderson then appealed this your relatives wanted to save you, but they did ruling in 1942, but the case was suspended due not succeed, and so we have to shoot you." The to World War II)° The case resumed in 1956, family had no time to react before the shooting and a year later, the judges again handed down a began. While some members of the imperial verdict which declared Anderson was not party fell over dead, others lay writhing on the Anastasia)1 In ruling on this second petition, floor, still alive. The Grand Duchesses, having the judges considered the key testimony of Hans sewn the family jewels into their Joachim Mayer. Mayer was an Austrian undergarments, survived the first attack by the prisoner of war in Russia following World War I gunmen. Yurovsky then ordered the men to use and had joined the Bolsheviks in 1918. He their bayonets and rifle butts to finish the girls. testified that "he had witnessed the Ekaterinburg When Yurovsky was satisfied that everyone was executions, and saw Anastasiafs dead body after dead, the bodies were loaded onto a waiting the massacre."12 truck. Anderson, however, was not finished; she From the House of Special Purpose, the again returned to court in 1958, asking for mangled remains of Russia's last imperial family recognition as Anastasia. She filed her suit 'on were driven into the Koptiaki Woods to be the ground that new evidence had been buried. Their bodies were stripped naked and discovered."13 While Anderson's lawyers thrown into an oid mine shaft. Their clothes demonstrated "that she was able to name were then burned in a bonfire to eliminated any correctly faces in photographs, describe specific possibility of recognizing them as the events, [and] identify uniforms, buildings and Romanovs. With their mission accomplished, locations" these things could not overshadow the Ural Soviets sent a telegram to Moscow one crucial point: Anderson "spoke no saying, "On the night of 16 JulyNicholas Russian. 'I4 This fact was extremely important Romanov was shot. His family has been in attempting to establish her identity. Her evacuated to a safe place." This telegram was detractors demanded to know how a woman then used as a press release by the Soviets in claiming to be a Russian princess was not able to Moscow. To the world, only Tsar Nicholas II speak her native language. Anderson's lawyers was dead; his family remained alive. This provided no real explanation. The defense also misleading information would contribute to questioned Anderson's actions when confronted several rumors surrounding the whereabouts of by witnesses who challenged her alleged the empress and her children, and certain stories memories because she "has tended to be began to focus on the escape of one daughter in painfully shy, truculent or agitated to near- particular: Grand Duchess Anastasia. Was hysteria."1 Anderson's responses seem to have Yurovsky mistaken; did Anastasia escape the been a ploy to evade the rejection of her brutal murders of her family?6 legitimacy. On 17 February 1920, a woman was dragged The most damaging testimony against from the Landwehr Canal in Berlin after Anderson came from this third trial when Doris attempting to commit suicide by jumping into Wingender took the witness stand. On 12 the frigid waters.7 At the time, this woman did August 1922, Anderson, who had been staying not have a known name or identity. Eventually, with the Kleist family, disappeared from their she would use the formal name Anna Anderson, residence. She reappeared three days later, but but to many people, she came to be known as no one was able to account for her whereabouts 32 ° The Wittenberg History Journal

during this time 6 until Wingender took the [Anderson's] ear bore a certain curve and indentation that he had been unable to locate on stand• Wingender was the daughter of a landlady, any photograph of the Tsar's daughter."25 who had a tenant by the name of Franz.iska Anderson had placed a strong emphasis on the Schanzkowski. Schanzkowski, a Polish factory physical similarities which she believed existed worker, had disappeared on 15 February 1920)7 between herself and Anastasia. Clauberg's Her family and friends had not seen her since testimony struck at the center of one of that day, but in the summer of 1922, Wingender Anderson's best arguments, further weakening saw Schanzkowski once again.18 As Wingender her case. testified in court on 21 May 1958, she identified The second witness, Erich Wollenberg, was Anderson as none other than the missing a German Communist who, while in Siberia in Franziski SchanzkowskiJ9 As further evidence, 1929, was "assured... that all of the Russian when Anderson disappeared from the Kleist's imperial family was dead and that the 'Frau house, she was "attired in a camel's-hair-colored Tschaikovsky'26... was really the Polish factory coat, lilac dress and green felt hat, [yet worker, Franziska Schanzkowska."27 reappearing] three days later [she was] in a dark Wollenberg's testimony reaffirms Mayer's report blue dress and light blue hat." Wingender that the whole family had perished and testified to giving Anderson the blue dress and Wingender's account that Anderson was actually hat and to turning over the coat, hat, and dress, Schanzkowski. The third witness, Rudolf which Anderson had previously worn, to a Lacher, would corroborate both Mayer's and detective.2° To illustrate her point, Wingender Wollenberg's stories that no members of the produced two photographs, one of herself in Imperial family survived the massacre. Lacher, 1920, wearing a blue dress and one of Anderson an Austrian orderly who had been in the Ipatiev • taken in 1922, sporting the same blue dress.21 House on the night of the murders, desribed These revelations dealt a serious blow to being able to see "from the window of his room, Anderson's claims• The dates corresponded •.. 'eleven bloody bundles'" loaded onto a correctly to Schanzkowski's and Anderson's truck.2s The evidence, while circumstantial, mounted appearances and disappearances. Two days after Schanzkowski disappeared, Anderson was against Anderson and her claim• The judges pulled from the canal; the three days, for which returned for the fourth time and presented the Anderson was missing and her lawyers could same result. "Judge Edgar Peterson, in reading not account, were the same three days on which the court's verdict said, 'In German law the Wingender saw Schanzkowski. The judges plaintiff Anna Anderson should herself have weighed the evidence and returned with a ruling been able to proved that she is identical in on 15 May 1961: Anna Anderson was not person with the Grand Duchess Anastasia. This Anastasia, not was she Franziska Schanzkowski. proof was not provided in these proceedings•'" In their verdict, the judges ruled that Anderson's The court, however, again refused to support claim to be Anastasia was "unfounded," and the counterclaim that Anderson was they deemed that the defense's counterclaim Schanzkowski.29 asserting that Anderson was Schanzkowski was The court had ruled on four different "irrelevant•" In their opinion, however, itwas occasions that Anderson was not Anastasia, yet "eminently likely"23 that Anderson.was questions remained surrounding her claim. Did Schanzkowski. Anastasia really survive the executions and Anderson was still not finished in her escape from Russia? Since circumstantial attempt to be recognized as Anastasia. Three evidence alone linked Anderson as defeats were not enough, and she brought her Schanzkowski, who was Anna Anderson? Even case before the courts for the fourth time in though the court.cases were concluded, these 1962.24 Three important witnesses testified questions continued to be asked• against Anderson. The first witness was In 1979, Russia was still under Soviet Professor Karl Clauberg, who presented his control, which restricted its citizens in both testimony, "submitting that Anastasia's speech and action. Two men, Alexander Anastasia and Anna Anderson: The Truth Revealed • 33

Avdonin, a geologist, and Geli Ryabov, a that Maria was the missing daughter.33 The Moscow filmmaker, came into possession of a Russian government, however, was not report written by Yurovsky after the murders. completely satisfied with the work of their This report had been kept secret for over sixty scientists and requested the aid of American years, but its contents were fascinatiflg. scientists in studying the remains. Yurovsky's own record indicated that he moved Dr. William Maples, a forensic the bodies of the Romanovs and their servants anthropologist from the University of Florida, from the mine shaft two days after the put together a research team to travel to Russia executions out of fear that they would be to examine the Romanov remains. The discovered. Yurovsky then attempted to destroy researchers included Dr. Michael Baden, a the bodies with fire, but he only burned two of forensic pathologist, Dr. Lowell Levine, a the corpses before he realized that this method forensic dentist, and Dr. Cathryn Oakes, a hair- would still leave evidence. His report stated that and-fiber specialist.34 The American team the bodies of the tsar's son and an unknown conducted its own research, developing its own woman were burned. Yurovsky first believed conclusions, which were very different from that he had burned the body of Empress those of the Russian scientists. Maples believed Alexandra. Then he changed his mind and that the bodies of Alexei, then 13, and decided that the corpse must have been the Anastasia, then 17, were missing from the empress' maid9° Yurovsky's records, therefore, remains.35 His deduction was based on age; account for two of the bodies. "none of these three skeletons were young Avdonin and Ryabov, using Yurovsky's enough to have belonged to Anastasia."36 Dr. description of the burial site, dug up the remains Maples gave two other reasons for his decision of the Romanov family in 1979. With Russia that Anastasia's skeleton was not present: the under Soviet domination, the men could not first was height and the second was publicize their findings and were forced to development of the third molars. Using rebury the bones.31 On 10 July 1991, Russia photographs, Maples was able to show that entered a new age; Communism had fallen and Anastasia was the shortest of the four sisters. in its place democracy was rising. Boris Yeltsin The length of the bones exhumed from the was inaugurated on this day as the first grave indicated that Anastasia's remains were President in the history of Russia. The very next not present. The second piece of evidence came day, "an exhumation party set out for a small from Dr. Levine's studies. Each of the skulls of clearing in the forest on the former Koptyaki the three girls had well developed third molars, Road."32 The scientists, following Avdonin and which Anastasia could not have possessed at her Ryabov's directions, uncovered nine bodies in age.37 the grave. This find would correspond to According to Maples, the discrepancies Yurovsky's assertion that two of the bodies had between his and Abramov's conclusions can be been burned, since there were eleven members explained by Abramov's questionable research in the imperial entourage. The scientists' task practices. If certain bones were missing from was to determine whose remains were in the the skull, Abramov guessed in order to match grave. the skull with a face - an unacceptable practice Russian scientists used a technique of video from Maples' perspective. Maples returned recording to capture the images of the skulls instead to Yurovsky's secret document in his from the grave, and they graphically matched attempt to solve the mystery. His conclusion these skulls with photographs to identify the rested on the fact that Yurovsky must have members of the royal family. "By the summer burned the body of Anastasia, but "how could of 1992, Abramov and his colleagues were Yurovsky have mistaken the body of a convinced that they had found Nicholas, seventeen-year-old girl for that of a mature Alexandra, Olga, Tatiana, Anastasia, [and the woman?" Maples looked at the situation in four servants] .... Everyone agreed that the which the family was killed. It was mid-July, Tsarevitch was missing." From these temperatures were around seventy degrees conclusions, Abramov and his team believed Fahrenheit, their faces had been smashed in 34 • The Wittenberg History Journal

with bayonets and rifle butts, and the blood Woods were now identified and Gill was "'98.5 "would have dried into a black, caked, percent certain that this was Romanov DNA'"43; impenetrable mass." The bodies had been the mystery of Russia's last royal family was stripped of their clothes; the o ly obviotls solved.., or was it? feature would have been the sex of the corpse, While earlier evidence had established that because "the naked bodies would have bloated Anastasia's body had been burned, what about to unrecognizability." Also aiding the Anna Anderson? Could this new testing finally decomposition would have been the flies which determine the identity of the woman who laid their eggs in the mutilated faces and bodies. sought for most of her life to obtain legal In the two days in which Yurovsky was gone, recognition as Anastasia? Anna Anderson had "the eggs would have hatched into maggots." died, however, on 12 February 1984 in Beyond knowing that he burned a female body, Charlottesville, Virginia, and her wish to be Yurovsky would have been unable to identify cremated was carried out the very same day.4 the victim,s8 Based on Yurovsky's records and Fortunately for the DNA researchers, a Virginia Maples' research, experts have determined that hospital had preserved a piece of Anderson's the other burned body belonged to Anastasia. intestine from a surgery in 1979. "Peter Gill and According to this premise, all eleven bodies are his colleagues extracted DNA from a section of. accounted for; Anastasia could not possibly have . . [this] intestine." They found that Anderson's escaped to the West. DNA was missing the "pivotal sequences" The final piece of the puzzle came when which had appeared in the DNA of the tsar and Peter Gill and Kevin Sullivan, researchers at the tsarina. This discovery confirmed that the court Forensic Science Service in England, received the had ruled correctly in the four trials: Anna Romanov bones in 1992 to perform DNA Andersor was not Anastasia. One test remained research. They were able to use "DNA from the to be performed on a matemaI relative of cell s nuclei.., to determine the sex of the Franziska Schanzkowski. "Anderson's individuals, to compare the nine skeletons' mitochondriaI DNA... [was] compared... DNA, and eventually to establish that five of the with those [sequences] of a maternally bodies were from the same family."39 Gill descended great-nephew of Schanzkowski. focused his research on a form of DNA called They were identical."46 mitochondrial DNA.4° With his knowledge of Finally, the mystery of Anastasia and Anna the hereditary match on the maternal side, Gill Anderson is solved. Based on the body count of could begin comparing the Romanov's both the remains in the woods and the burned mitochondrial DNA with living relatives from victims, Anastasia Nicholaievna Romanov did both sides of the family. The mitochondrial not escape from Ekaterinburg, but instead DNA from the skeletons of the three daughters perished with her family. And Anna Anderson, matched perfectly with Alexandra's DNA. The who sought in life a title that was not hers, empress' mitochondrial DNA was then received in death her true identity: Franziska compared with Prince Philip, consort of Queen Schanzkowski. This theory, however, will not Elizabeth II of England, and relative of be accepted by everyone. Because two bodies Alexandra's through Queen Victoria. The two are still missing, people will continue to believe Were a match. Alexandra's remains had been that Anastasia was a survivor and that she did positively identified.41 Nicholas' DNAnow live the remainder of her life in the West. remained to be tested against living relatives. Popular culture loves a conspiracy theory, and When his mitochondriai DNA was tested, it just as Elvis continues to appear around the "matched those of two descendants of Louis of world many years after his death, the Anastasia Hesse-Lassel, wife of Denmark's King Christian legends will live until tangible evidence can be IX and his maternal grandmother."42 The produced to end all speculation. II tangible remains from the grave in the Koptiaki Anastasia and Anna Anderson: The Truth Revealed • 35

Endnotes

1 This date is given according to the Russian Orthodox 22 "Court Says Woman is Not Anastasia," New York Times, 16 (JuIian)calendar, which is thirteendays behind the Gregorian May !961, 8. calendar. 23 Kurth, 316-7. Mark D. Steinberg and Vladimir M. Khrustalev,Tke Fall of theRomanovs: Political Dreams and PersonalStruggles in a Timeof 24 Ibid., 319. Revolution, trans, of Russian documents by Elizabeth Tucker (New Haven, CT: Yale University, 1995), 117 169-70. =5Ibid., 326.

a John Klier and Helen Mingay, TheQuest forAnastasia: 26Anna Anderson went by the name Anna Tschaivosky in the mid-1920s. Solving the Mystery of the Lost Romanovs, (Secaucus, NJ: CaroI PublishingGroup, 1997), 44. 27 Kurth, 336. 4 John Darton, "Scientists Confirm Identification of Bones as 2a Ibid., 349 50. Czar's," Hew York Times, 10 July 1993, 3.

5 Klier, 48. 29"Appeal in AnastasiaMystery Is Rejected by Hamburg Court," New York Times, 1 March 1967, 16. Ibid., 49-51, 57 59. s0 Robert K. Massie, "The Last Romanov Mystery," The New z Ibid., 93. Yorker,1 & 28 August 1995, 83.

a After Anderson was pulled from the canal, she was 1 Ibid., 77. admitted to the DaiIdorf Asylum, where her identity was unknown for two years. In 1922, a nurse at the hospital saw a s2 Maddie, 77. picture of Tsar Nicholas' children. This woman believed that aa Ibid., 78. Anderson was Tatiana, the second daughter, and she asked Russian emigres living in Germany to look at the woman. When these people came, they said that Anderson was not the Tsar's 4 Ibid., 79-30. daughter. The nurse decided that she must have been mistaken; as Anastasia Toufexis, "It's the Czar All Right, But Where's this woman was Anastasia not Tatiana. Anderson was released from the asylum shortly thereafter, and she went to live with the Anastasia?," Time, 14 September 1992, 65. Kleist family. It was in their care that she supposedly developed a6 Massie, 82. the story of her survival and escape from Russia.

"Court in Berlin Rejects Suit of *Czarfs Daughter'," New u7 Ibid., 83. York Times,30 January1957, el. aaIbid. 10 Peter Kurth, Anastasia: The Riddle ol Anna Anderson, (Boston, Little Brown, 1986), 290-3. a9Josie Glausiusz, "Royal D-Loops, Discover, January 1994, 90. 11New York Times,30 January1957, 31. 40"Mitochondrial DNA is passed only from mother to child, 12 "The Lady's No Duchess," Newsweek, 11 February 1957, remaining unchanged for generations.... This means that our mitochondrial DNA is identical to that of our mother, our 45. motherfs mother and siblings, as well as to more distant maternal la A thur J. Olsen, "German Court Starts New Effort to Settle relativesf (Glausiusz, "D-Loops," 90. Anastasia Controversy," New York Times Magazine, 2 April 1958, 41Jennifer Worsen, "Tooth Sleuthing, American Health, June 3. 1993, 17. 14 Arthur I. Olsen, "'Anastasia' Grand Duchess or Grand 42 Glausiusz, "D-Loopsf 90. Hoax?," New York Times 24 August 1958, sec. 4, pg. 19, 22.

15Ibid., 22. a Ibid.

44 "Anna Manahan Dies; 'Anastasia' Claimantf New York 6 Kurth, 48. Times,14 February1984, 26. 17 Olsen, "Anastasia," 24.

la Ibid., 26. 45 Kurth, 455.

1 Kurth, 304. 4 Josie Glausiusz, "Anastasia, Nyetf Discover, January 1995,

20 Olsen, "Anastasia," 22, 26. 99.

21 Kurth, 305. 36 • The Wittenberg History Journal

Works Cited

Secondary Sources "The Lady's No Duchess. Newsweek, 11 February 1957, 45. "Court in Berlin Reiects Suit of 'Czar's Daughter'." New York Times, 30 January 1957, 31. Toufexis, Anastasia. "It's the Czar All Right, But Where's Anastasia?." Time, 14 September t992, 65. Darton, John, "Scientists Confirm Identification of Bones as Czar's." New York Times, 10 July 1993, 3. Warsen, Jennifer. "Tooth Sleuthing." American Health, June 1993, 17. Glausiusz, Josie. "Anastasia, Nyet. Discover, January 1995, 99. Frimary Sources Glausiusz, Josie. "Royal D-Loops." Discover, January 1994, 90. "Anna Manahan Dies; 'Anastasia' Claimant." New York Times 14 February1984, 26. Klier,John and Helen Mingay. The Quest[or Anastasia: Solving the Mystery o[the Lost Romanovs. Secaucus, NJ: Carol Publishing "Appeal in AnastasiaMystery Is Rejected by HamburgCourt. Group, 1997. New York Times, 1 March 1967, 16.

Kurth, ]peter. Anastasia: The Riddle of Anna Anderson. Boston: "Court Says Woman is Not Anastasia." New York Timesj 16 May Little, Brown, 1986. 1961, 8.

Massie, Robert K. "The Last Romanov Mystery." The New Olsen, Arthur J. "'Anastasia Grand Duchess or Grand Hoax?." Yorker,21 & 28 August 1995, 72 95. New York Times, 24 August i958, sec. 4, pg. 19.

Steinberg, Mark D. and Vladimir M. Khrustalev. The Fall of the Olsen, Arthur J. "German Court Starts New Effort to Settle Romanovs: Political Dreams and Personal Struggles in a Time of Anastasia Controversy." New York Times Magazine, g April Revolution. Russian documents translated by Elizabeth 1958, 3. Tucker. New Have: Yale University]Press, 1995. • 37

"Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War

By Adam Ruschau WittenbergUniversity Class of 2001

On the early morning of July 1, 1863, not facing weak militia or cavalry, but crack General John Bufford's two brigades of Union Union infantry. The battle of Gettysburg was cavalry held a thin line along a low ridge just on. After the battle, a public joumai would state west of the town of Gettysburg. Buford's men that "It was to the Iron Brigade more than any were facing a Confederate force that vastly other that the nation owes "its salvation at outnumbered them and who had reinforcements Gettysburg... ,,3 near by. When one of Buford's aides, up in the T. Henry Williams called the Iron Brigade cupola atop the Lutheran seminary, spotted blue "probably the best fightingbrigade in all the troops coming from the southeast, the cavalry army."4 It served throughout the Civil War, men received a welcome sight; the infantry had being formed shortly after the battle of First Bull finally arrived to support them. Among the first Run. In all the battles it fought in, it was never two infantry brigades to arrive on the field was routed,s something few brigades in the Union the brigade commanded by General Solomon Army of the Potomac can claim. It was the only Meredith, known throughout the Union army all western brigade in the eastern Union armies.6 by their nickname: the Iron Brigade. This Other brigades in the Civil War had nicknames. brigade was famous for their tenacity in battle. Many, such as the Excelsior Brigade, the Irish Their distinctive black Hardee hats gave them a Brigade, and the Louisiana Tigers, received their different appearance than most of the rest of the nicknames before they saw action. Relatively army. (During the Chancellorsvilie campaign, few brigades earned their nicknames for their less than two months earlier, one of Berdan's performance in battle, like the Stonewall Brigade Sharpshooters, recalling a march, mentioning and, of course, the Iron Brigade. the Iron Brigade: What made the Iron Brigade such an [A]s the great Western of Iron Brigade effective fighting force? What enabled them to passed, looking like giants with their tail make some of the bravest stands and charges in black hats, they were greeted with hearty the Civil War? Historians have repeatedly cheers .... And giants they were, in stressed some of the same issues and some action... I look back and see that famed body different ones. Jean P. Ebling believes that the of troops marchingup that long muddy hill brigade's fighting spirit, (or unit pride or espritde unmindful of the pouring rain, but full of life and spirit, with steady step, filling the entire corps), stemmed from their pride in being roadway, their big black hats and feathers volunteers, the high quality of leadership in the conspicuous.1) brigade, the skilled training they received, and The men of the Iron Brigade quickly formed into their successful performance in battle.7 line of battle and relieved Buford's tired cavalry. Meanwhile, Alan T. Nolan, probably the As they started to engage the Confederates, one acknowledged expert on the Iron Brigade, claims Confederate soldier was said to remark "There that "... unusual leadership, the coincidental are those damned black-hatted fellows again! fact of the opportunity to be trained as soldiers, Tain't no militia. It's the Army of the and esprit de corps made the Iron Brigade what Potomac."2 it was- the best fighting brigade in the Federal The Confederates soon realized they were armies."s Both of these descriptions of what 38 • The Wittenberg History Journal

made the Iron Brigade good fighters have merit. McClellan's Peninsula campaign. Changes were The brigade's leadership and training had a huge made to the brigade as well. King was promoted to command the division to which the impact on crafting the brigade into a fighting western brigade belonged and a regular army unit, but what really sustained it throughout numerous battles was its reputation. They built artillery captain named John Gibbon was promoted to brigadier general and assumed for themselves a reputation as the best fighters command of the brigade. The men from W the army. It was something the men were Wisconsin and Indiana did not yet know it, but v y proud of, and no matter how terrible the odds, the men felt they have to live up to that their new commander was to have a such an impact that "after the war, if called upon to reputation. This is what truly made the Iron name the commander of the Iron Brigade, most Brigade great. Their story is one of great of the veterans would have unhesitatingly courage, sacrifice, stubbornness, and named the man they served under for only six determination. When the war broke out in April 18619, the months in 1862--John A. Gibbon."11 state of Wisconsin, in the initial call for troops, As a regular army man, Gibbon set about making his volunteer soldiers more like regulars. was called to furnish only one regiment. Instead Gibbon already had a positive view of the men of only one regiment, Wisconsin furnished two. has would command noting that "from the The Second Wisconsin Volunteers were character of these I was already impressed with mustered into federal service on 11 June 1861 and were assigned to General Irvin McDoweli's the conviction that all they needed was some command near Washington. Initially enlisting discipline and drill to make them first class soldiers and my anticipations were more than for only three months, before they would see realized.'q2 Within a week of taking command action they re-enlisted for three years. During " the campaign of First Bull Run, the Second he issued his men new uniforms, the dress served in General William T. Sherman's brigade. uniforms of the regular army, complete with the There they saw their first action and learned of black regulation hat, known as the Hardee hatJa With this action, "Gibbon achieved the horror's of war. Sherman wrote of the organizational unity by the simple expedient of Second that "This regiment ascended to the brow of the hill steadily, received the severe fire providing his troops with a distinctive uniform."14 His men were already distinct in of the enemy, returned it with spirit, and advanced delivering its fire."1° First Bull Run makeup form the rest of the army, and now they were distinctive in looks as well. With his had been a disaster for the Union, but the men looking like regulars, Gibbon next set out Second Wisconsin had fought fairly well in spite of the federal route. Around Washington, as the to train them to act like regulars. Overhearing a remark that he was just an artillery officer and army was being reorganized by General George knew nothing of infantrydrill, Gibbon B. McClellan, three new regiments arrived: the Sixth Wisconsin, the Seventh Wisconsin, and the immefliately set out to drill his brigade relentlessly, to make it the best drilled brigade in Nineteenth Indiana. These new regiments were the army.15The result of this drill was that assigned into a brigade along with the Second "before the brigade had been in action, it won a Wisconsin and the brigade was placed under reputation as a superior unit."16 One soldier in command of General Rufus King. This was start the brigade wrote later that "it was Gibbon who of the brigade that would later be known among did much to teach us how to be soldiers."17 the annals of war as the Iron Brigade. While McClellan's Army of the Potomac was King's brigade of Westerners, as the brigade fiercely fighting in the Peninsula, McDowell's was soon called, was still assigned to General forces waited, training, defending Washington McDowell's command, what would later from the Confederate threat of Stonewall become the First Corps of the Army of the Potomac. In the spring of 1862, much to the Jackson. In Gibbon's brigade, some changes were disappointment of the green regiments, made in the field officers of some of the McDowell's corps did not participate in "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War • 39 regiments. After weeding out some officers that was moving up to join forces with Jackson. were unfit for command or transferred, the Quickly, the scattered commands were gathered brigade finallyhad generallygood quality together and placed under command of General officers to led them at the regimental level as John Pope. As elements of the Army of the well as the brigade level. In Second Wisconsin, Potomac arrived back in Washington, they were Colonel Edgar O'Connor, a West Pointer, filtered down into Pope's Army of Virginia. In a commanded the regiment with Lieutenant daring move, General Jackson moved his army Colonel Lucius Fairchild as second in command. in between Pope and Washington, in the area Gibbon had a very high opinion of both of these near where the battle of First Bull Run had been men and it was his opinion that they were what fought a little over year ago. As Pope's army made the Second such an outstanding concentrated to meet this threat, King's division, regiment.18 The Sixth Wisconsin had some to which Gibbon's Brigade belonged, marched outstanding leadership as well. Colonel along the Warrenton Turnpike towards Lysander Cutler, Lt. Colonel Edward Bragg, and Centerville on August 28. Hatch's brigade was Major Rufus Dawes constituted the Sixth's field the first brigade in iine2°, Gibbon's second, and officers. (Both Cutler and Bragg would Doubleday's and Patrick's brigades behind eventually command the brigade.) Although Gibbon. Hatch's brigade was a fair ways ahead none of them had been to West Point they of Gibbon's. As dusk was setting in, Gibbon's would prove their caliber as leaders in the four regiments along with the brigade's artillery, upcoming battles. The leadership in the Seventh Battery B, Fourth U. S. Artillery, (Gibbon's old Wisconsin and Nineteenth Indiana, while not as command), marched past the farm of John highly regarded as that of the Second and Brawner. Unbeknownst to the Westerners, Sixth19, was also quite capable. The Seventh Jackson's forces were very close and he was was commanded by Colonel William Robinson, planing to attack this lone brigade marching while the Nineteenth was commanded by across his front. As the brigade passed a Colonel Solomon Meredith, who received his rectangular wood, Gibbon looked to the north commission due to his political connections, and saw a Confederate artillery battery who did not get along well with General Gibbon unlimbering and preparing to fire on his men. and tried to use his political influence to both The Confederate battery fired several rounds at remove his regiment from Gibbon's brigade and Gibbon's surprised brigade before Gibbon, to get appointed a brigadier general. (He would suspecting that the battery was alone and later succeed in the later.) Although there was unsupported,21 ordered Battery B up to friction between Gibbon and Meredith, neutralize that battery's fire. He also sent the Meredith proved himself a capable leader, even Second Wisconsin, his only veteran regiment, if he was a political appointee. With capable forward, believing he might be able to capture officers and good, strict training, "Gibbon's the enemy battery. As the Second moved Black Hats", the new nickname of the brigade, forward and came to the crest of the low ridge were shaping up into a fine body of men. The on which the was situated, they were fired upon question was, how would these well trained and by the regiments Jackson had sent forward to well led men act in combat? The brigade would attack. It was then, Gibbon realized his men soon find out. were in for a serious engagement. In late Spring of 1862, McClellan's Peninsula The Battle of Brawner's Farm, also known as campaign started to fall apart after a new Gainsville or Groveton in some history texts, southern general, Robert E. Lee, took command pitted Gibbon's one brigade against elements of of the Confederates. With McClellan's forces two Confederate divisions.22 As the Second still disembarking from the Peninsula, the Wisconsin became engaged, Gibbon ordered the scattered Union forces in northern Virginia, Nineteenth Indiana to move into line on the left which Gibbon's brigade was part of, faced a of the Second, and the Seventh Wisconsin on severe threat. Not only were they threatened by the right of the Second. The Sixth WisconsIn Stonewall Jackson's forces, but now Lee's army was ordered to right of the Seventh with a 40 ° The Wittenberg History Journal sizable gap in between the two regiments. Virginia." 27 Bragg wouid write after the war Realizing his brigade was seriously out- that "... there it was that Jackson's stubborn numbered, Gibbon sent urgent requests for fighters learned that iron was just as enduring reinforcements. The only reinforcements he and immovable as stone."28 (A reference to the received were two regiments from Doubleday's Confederate's "Stonewall Brigade", which faced brigade which moved into line between the the IronBrigade at Brawner's Farm.) The men Seventh and Sixth Wisconsin. The fighting was of the brigade who hadn't seen combat before fierce. Rufus Dawes, of the Sixth Wisconsin, were eager for their first fight, but after said of the battle; "the two crowds, they could Brawner's Farm, Dawes would write that "in our hardly be called lines, were within, it seemed to future history we will always be found ready me, fifty yards of each other and they were but never again anxious." 9 The brigade had pouring musketry into each other as rapidly as proved itself, but had suffered heavy casualties. men could load and shoot."2s The Confederate Almost one third of the brigade was lost at brigades of Taliaferro, Baylor, Lawton, and Brawner Farm, losing a total of 751 men.3° Even Trimble, as well as some other brigades in though the brigade had behaved with great support, pressed Gibbon's men for over an hour. gallantry, they received little recognition for ital The Westerners held their ground, even though and the small battle they fought was they were taking appalling casualties. The more overshadowed by the battle of Second Bull Run, severe fighting was on the Union left flank, near which was to be fought in the days immediately the farm buildings. Seeing the other regiments following Brawner's Farm. The question still of the brigade under harsher fire than his own, stands; how was this brigade of mostly green, Dawes remarked "How long our men withstood untried regiments able to hold their ground with this last attack, I cannot estimate, but in the steady determination in the face of vastly history of war, it is doubtful whether there was superior numbers? It seems unlikely that only ever more stubborn courage than was displayed excellent leadership and discipline held them to by the Second and Seventh Wisconsin and the line. Before the brigade had seen action, the Nineteenth Indiana regiments, on this field of Second Wisconsin men tended to view battle."24 Colonel O'Connor, of the Second themselves in higher regard then their brigade Wisconsin, was killed, and Colonel Meredith's members since they were veterans already. This horse was shot out from under him injuring him constant boasting by the Second may have as it fell. On the right, Dawes was receiving his forced them to live up to this boast and keep orders from Colonel Cutler when Cutler was form being disgraced at Brawner's Farm. This wounded. Remaining calm, he said to Major boasting may have also compelled the other Dawes, "Tell Colonel Bragg to take command, I regiments to try and perform as well or better am shot."25 No matter how many casualties than the Second Wisconsin.s2 This was the start they took, the brigade still held its ground. Even of their growing reputation. Not only were they Jackson remarked after the battle that, the one of the best drilled brigades, they were now federals "maintained their ground with obstinate one of the best fighting brigades. determination." 6 Finally with nightfall and During the battle of Second Bull Run, exhausted men, the Confederates halted their Gibbon's brigade saw relatively little action until attack an assumed their prior position. Gibbon the end. When Longstreet's Confederate corps then moved his brigade off the field, and in a attacked the Union left flank, the flank collapsed conference at King's headquarters it was decided and the Union army began to route. Gibbon's that they would continue with their original brigade was chosen to be the rear guard of the orders to march towards Centerville, but they entire army. While Gibbon's men were holding would do it via Manassas Junction, to the south. their line as the rest of the army retreated, Gibbon's brigade had fought their first General Philip Kearny rode up to Gibbon, engagement and showed what they were made disgusted that the army was being routed again of. "Outnumbered, they had fought to a stand- on the same battlefield as First Bull Run, and still the best men in the Army of Northern told him to hold his position until General's "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade h the Civil War • 41

Reno's men, which were still fighting, were able afternoon35, when it was ordered to attack the to retreat past them. Kearny would be killed in gap up the National Road. The brigade marched action a week or two later and in one his last up the road, the Nineteenth Indiana on the left letters he wrote of Second Bull Run saying, "the of the turnpike, with the Second Wisconsin army ran like sheep, all but a General Reno and behind them, in support, and the Seventh a General Gibbon."ss Gibbon's brigade held on Wisconsin on the right of the turnpike, with the until the rest of the army past and then Sixth Wisconsin supporting them.3s As they conducted a fighting retreat with his brigade. marched forward, a section of Battery B was During the entire battle of Second Bull Run placed on the road, to support the advance. Gibbon's brigade lost another 120 men.34 They They were attacking up a mountain side against were able to hold off the Confederates long Colquitt's brigade of D. H. Hill's division. They enough for the army to regroup and fall back in advanced steadily, driving back Colquitt's an orderly fashion. pickets. Soon the Seventh Wisconsin came up Not long after Second Bull Run, Lee decided against a stone wail, behind which the to invade Maryland. The Union army was Confederates took shelter and poured deadly reorganized during the same period of time. fire onto the Seventh. The Confederates behind Pope was removed from command, and the wall started moving around the Seventh's McClellan was put in command again. Pope's right flank and poured flanking fire into them. Army of Virginia was merged into the Army of Captain John B. Callis, commanding the the Potomac and the corps to which Gibbon's Seventh, since the three field officers of the brigade belonged was designated the First Corps Seventh had been wounded at Brawner's Farm, and placed under the command of General quickly sent word the Colonel Bragg, of the Joseph Hooker. McClellan moved his army to Sixth, asking for support. Bragg quickly try and get at Lee's divided forces. In his way, wheeled his regiment to the right. Dawes, was South Mountain. There were several passes commanding the right wing of the Sixth, was in South Mountain that were defended by ordered by Bragg to have his men to fire a volley Confederates. One of these was Turner's Gap into the woods where the flanking fire had been which Gibbon's brigade was heading for. While coming from. As soon as they had fired this on the march, Gibbon went to see General volley, Dawes heard Bragg order, Have your McClellan to request a new regiment for his men lie down on the ground, I am going over brigade. He explained to McClellan that his you."37 Dawes gave the order and right wing brigade was made of western men and lay down as the left wing, commanded by requested that the new regiment also be a Bragg, which had moved into position behind western regiment. McClellan agreed and the right wing while the volley had been fired, promised Gibbon that the first western regiment charged over their prone comrades and fired he received would go to Gibbon's brigade. another volley into the woods. The right wing Returning to his brigade, he told them what then repeated this maneuver and did this several General McClellan had said and also that times, attacking the woods and driving off the McClellan had told him that if the army was to Confederates that were there. Meanwhile, on do a few more days hard marching, they would the left of the road, the Nineteenth Indiana destroy Lee's army. Urging his men to ridicule swept forward running into slight opposition. stragglers along the line of march, brought more As they moved up parallel to the Seventh pride to the men and eventually developed into Wisconsin which was still bogged down by the the brigade's tradition of having no stragglers. Confederates behind the stone wall. The On September 14, the battle for South Second Wisconsin then came up and formed a Mountain was on. Gibbon's brigade was line parallel to the turnpike and charged into the detached from the division and moved into flank the Confederates behind the stone wail. position at the base of Tumer's Gap where the This forced them to fall back. The Sixth National Road passed through the gap. There Wisconsin, moving up, found a position to the brigade waited until about five o'clock in the inflict severe fire on the main body of 4,2 • The Wittenberg History Journal

Confederates. As dark came the fighting ceased, The Iron Brigade had performed exceedingly and the Confederates withdrew. Late in the well at South Mountain. Gibbon would write night, the brigade was relieved by fresh troops, that "the conduct of the officers and men was except the Sixth Wisconsin which stayed on the during the engagement everything that could be field all night, in their advanced position. desired, and they maintained their well-earned Bragg's report rings with sarcasm saying, "Soon reputation for gallantry and discipline .... ,41 after daylight my regiment was relieved by the The brigade was building a reputation that they Second New York from Gorman's brigade, who would have to live up to, but it was also a costly had been lying in the field, under cover of a one. The brigade lost 318 men at South stone wall, at a safe distance in the rear, Mountain, heavy casualties.42 The.brigade had refreshing themselves with a good night's sleep, shown itself admirably so far in this trial by fire, after a long and fatiguing mardh of some 10 but Antietam was only three days away. miles."38 After the Union gained possession of the Watching the battle from his headquarters, passes through South Mountain, they marched was General McClellan and General Hooker. towards Sharpsburg, where Lee was trying to They were both very impressed with the concentrate his forces. McClellan decided to brigades performance in the battle. After the attack on the morning of September 17. war, McClellan related his verbal exchange with Hooker's First Corps would open the assault, General Hooker that reportedly gave the Iron attacking from north, through the Miller farm Brigade its nickname. which had a cornfield just to the south of it. McClellan: "What troops are those The Iron Brigade was to be in the first wave of fighting on the Pike?" the assault. They would be going up against Hooker: "General Gibbon's Brigade some of the same men they fought at Brawner's of Western men." Farm. Early in the morning, the brigade McClellan: "They must be made of marched down the Hagerstown turnpike, the iron." Seventh Wisconsin and the Nineteenth Indiana Hooker: "By the Eternal, they are on the right of the turnpike, and the Second iron! If you had seen them at Bull Run as Wisconsin on the left, with the Sixth Wisconsin I did, you would know them to be iron." in two groups on both sides of the turnpike.4a McClellan: "Why, General Hooker, Battery B moved in behind them in support. they fight equal to the best troops in the The bloodiest day in American history had world."39 begun. Gibbons Black Hats had new nickname that As the regiments advanced, the Second would come into popular use just after the battle Wisconsin and part of the Sixth, commanded by of Antietam, only three days away. After South Major Dawes, moved through the comfield. As Mountain, McClellan wrote to the governor of they were moving through the corn, the other Wisconsin saying: regiments of the brigade and the rest of the Sixth I beg to add my great admiration of Wisconsin, under Colonel Bragg, moved forward the conduct of the three Wisconsin and encountered the enemy in the woods. After 'Confederates • regiment in General Gibbon's brigade. I some hard fighting the fell back, have seen them under fire acting in a and Colonel Bragg fell wounded. While the mariner that reflects the greatest possible Seventh Wisconsin and Nineteenth Indiana were credit and honor upon themselves and clearing out the West Woods, the Sixth and their state. They are equal to the best Second Wisconsin appeared at the edge of the troops in any army in the world.4° cornfield, where they received heavy fire from At Brawner's Farm, the brigade had proved itself the Confederates. Nevertheless, the Sixth and in battle, but was mmoticed; at South Mountain, Second Wisconsin pushed forward towards the the brigade had shown its worth under the eye Dunker church at the end of the clearing. The of the commanding general and had received the Confederates soon counter attacked however, nickname that would follow them ever after. and after a brief attempt to hold their position, "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War • 43 the Sixth and Second were forced to withdraw South Mountain had given them a reputation, through the corn. Bragg wrote of this that "the Antietam reinforced it."49 enemy broke and ran before their advance, After Lee retreated from the battlefield at leaving his dead and wounded in large numbers Antietam, the Union army stayed around on the field, and the regiment pursued, and only Sharpsburg, regrouping and reorganizing itself. retired again in the presence of a host that McClellan was removed from command and would have been madness to have opposed with Ambrose Burnside was put in charge. Hooker a handful of men, brave though they were and was promoted to command one of Burnside's fearless."44 As they withdrew, the Confederates grand divisions and General Reynolds was pressed their advantage and tried to take Battery placed in command of the First Corps. While B. The men of the Second and Sixth attempted this was going on, the Twenty-fourth Michigan to defend the battery. Gibbon himself was regiment arrived at the army and was assigned sighting some of the cannons of the battery, to the Iron Brigade. While Colonel Henry pouring double canister into the attacking Morrow of the Twenty-fourth brought his Confederates. Just when it looked as if the regiment before the veterans of the Iron Brigade, battery might be lost, Lt. Colonel Bachman, and extolled their qualities, the Wisconsin and commanding the Nineteenth Indiana in the Indiana men were silent and did not absence of Colonel Meredith, led the Nineteenth enthusiastically welcome the new members. As Indiana in charge onto the flank of the attacking one member of the Twenty-fourth later put it, Confederates. This brave charge forced the they "had a right to know before accepting our enemy back, but the Nineteenth lost heavily; full fellowship if we, too, had the mettle to Bachman and many others were killed in the sustain the honor of the brigade."5° The men of charge. The battery was saved and shortly after the Twenty-fourth, although not pleased with this, the Iron Brigade was relieved by another, the cool reception they received from the other and sent to the rear to reform. Later in the regiments, were excited to be part of "a fighting battle, many of the Union regiments were brigade, a fighting division and a fighting corps, routed and the Iron Brigade attempted to stop all commanded by fighting generals."51 the route. Captain John Kellogg, of the Sixth Although they didn't show it openly, many of Wisconsin, rallied some of the stragglers behind the officers and men of the Wisconsin and a stone wail. Then General Doubleday, Indianaregiments thought fairly highly of their commanding the division, rode up and asked new Michigan companions. Gibbon wrote of it Kellogg "What regiment is this?" "A regiment of that "from its bearing I have .no doubt it will not stragglers" Kellogg replied. "What regiment do be long before it will be a worthy member of you belong to?" "The Sixth Wisconsin, sir." the 'Black Hats.''52 Gibbon would not be with "Are these Wisconsin men?" Then Kellogg the brigade long enough to see this, though. replied, "No sir, Wisconsin men never run."45 Soon after the Twenty-fourth joined the brigade, The men of the Iron Brigade had again Gibbon was offered a divisional command and performed exceedingly weli in battle. took it, but not without regrets. Gibbon had In just three weeks, the Iron Brigade had created the Iron Brigade, and the men who fought in four engagements, earned a reputation served in it would always think of it as Gibbon's as one of the best brigades in the Union army, brigade. and suffered near catastrophic casualties. The Even more distressing to Gibbon than brigade lost another 348 men at Antietam.46 leaving his precious brigade, was the new Gibbon would say of this that "the loss of the commander. Solomon Meredith finally received brigade is again evidence of its well-earned his promotion to brigadier general and received honors."47 BetweenBrawner's Farm and command of the Iron Brigade. Although the Antietam, the brigade had lost 1,592 casualties,48 way in which got the promotion and Gibbon's far more than fifty percent casualties. They had dislikeof him paint Meredith in a bad light, it is fought valiantly and both earned and upheld worth noting that "whatever Meredith's faults, their reputation. It has been written that "... if Gibbon alone left a record unfavorable to 4.4 ° The Wittenberg History Journal

him."53 In fact, "the soldiers' letters and diaries now swear by the Twenty-fourth."Ss The are warmly admiring of Meredith."54 Along distinctive hats of the Iron Brigade had become a with a new commander of the brigade, some old badge of honor to be earned, and the Twenty- faces came back as well. Colonels Robinson and fourth Michigan earned theirs at Fredricksburg, Cutler had recovered from their wounds enough although they would not receive the hats until to retake the field. The army then proceeded to shortly before Gettysburg. march south towards Fredricksburg and another After the Union defeat at Fredticksburg, the looming battle with Lee's army. Union army re-crossed the Rappahannock and On December 12, the First Corps crossed on the two armies spent the v mter across the river pontoon bridges over the Rappahannock, south from each other. Burnside was relieved of his of Fredricksburg, and took up position across command and General Hooker was placed in from Stonewall Jackson's Confederate corps. command of the army. In the spring of 1863, The battle opened the next morning. While Hooker devised a plan to swing around the several Union corps assaulted the Confederates Confederate army and attack Lee from the rear. atop the heights just outside of Fredricksburg, To do this, he would need several diversions in down where the First and Sixth Corps were, order to keep Lee's army in its present position. Meade's and Gibbon's divisions assaulted The Iron Brigade would launch one of these Jackson's lines. The Iron Brigade, in diversionary assaults at Fitzhugb's Crossing. On Doubleday's division, saw relatively little action, April 29, the Twenty-fourth Michigan and the compared to their previous battles. At one point Sixth Wisconsin charged down the bank of the in the battle, however the brigade was ordered Rappahannock, boarded pontoon boats, and to advance on some woods where some enemy crossed the river under heavy Confederate fire. fire had been coming from. The Twenty-fourth Meanwhile, the other regiments of the brigade Michigan and the Seventh Wisconsin led the supported the crossing from the river bank and advance on the woods. Taking some fairly then crossed themselves. The Twenty-fourth heavy fire from the woods, the Twenty-fourth Michigan and the Sixth Wisconsin quickly kept advancing. As the regiment faltered cleared out the Confederate defenses and slightly, Colonel Morrow told his men, "Steady, occupied them. It was a daring operation that men, those Wisconsin men are watching you."55 probably should have caused many casualties, and the men kept steadily advancing. They but the Iron Brigade received relatively few cleared the rebels out of the woods and won casualties for such an attempt. recognition from the rest of their brigade. Not too long after this engagement, the Meredith praised the efforts of the Twenty- battle of Chancellorsville began, but the First fourth in his report saying, "the Twenty-fourth Corps arrived too late to participate and prevent Michigan, commanded by Col. Henry A. the Union defeat. At Fitzhugh's Crossing, the Morrow, is a new regiment, having never been Iron Brigade "had done what was asked of them under fire before. They showed themselves to and more, and the defeat the army suffered be worthy of the praise they have received, and seemed in no way to be attached to them."59 of association with the old Iron Brigade."s6 Although the Union army had suffered severe Meredith was not alone in his assertion that the defeats at both Fredricksburg and hancellorsville, Twenty-fourth had lived up to the Iron Brigade's the Iron Brigade in its part in both these battles reputation. Dawes wrote that "No soldiers ever was not defeated. As the Union army regrouped faced fire more bravely, and they showed after this defeat, Lee and his army marched themselves of a fibre worthy to be woven into north to invade Pennsylvania. Hooker's army the woof of the 'Iron Brigade.''57 The chaplain turned to pursuit with the First Corps in the of the Twenty-fourth wrote that "the Twenty- lead. Hooker would replaced before the next fourth won its spurs in the late battle and has a engagement by General George Meade, but this right to wear the Black Hats of the 'Iron mattered little to the Iron Brigade as they Brigade.' the only entire brigade that wears marched towards the small town of Gettysburg them, and the old regiments say that they can on June 30 and a meeting with destiny. "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War " 45

On July 1, Wadsworth's division, to which Union brigades backwards, the Iron Brigade the Iron Brigade belonged, was the first infantry fought a fighting retreat, constan@ making division to arrive on the field. His division stands even in the face of overwhelming consisted of two brigades: the Iron Brigade and numbers. At one point in the battle, the Seventh Cutler's brigade. (Lysander Cutler had be Wisconsin was surrounded by Confederates on promoted earlier and received a brigade three sides before they were compelled to command.) As Wadsworth's division relieved retreat. Over by the railroad cut, the Sixth the tired cavalrymen, Cutler's brigade moved to Wisconsin was forced steadily back as well. either side of the Chambersburg pike and the They ordered to defend Battery B, which was Iron Brigade moved forward into McPherson's stationed astride the railroad cut on Seminary Woods, to the left of Cutler's brigade.6° The Ridge. As the men of the Sixth defended the Sixth Wisconsin, under command of Lt. Colonel battery, Dawes noticed that Eleventh Corps in Rufus Dawes (Bragg was not at the battle), was the fields to the north of Gettysburg had been initially held in reserve. The rest of the Iron completely routed and that his command was Brigade charged forward into Archer's brigade of endanger of being taken from the rear by the Confederates, smashing the Confederate assault Confederates. The Sixth fell back through the and capturing many of Archer's men, including town fighting as they retreated, trying to make General Archer himself. As General Reynolds their way to the Union rallying point on was ordering them into position, he was shot Cemetery Hill. They finally made it and joined dead from his horse. After they had broken the up with the rest of the shattered Iron Brigade, Confederate assault, the brigade reformed in the which had fought bravely as they retreated, woods and prepared to repel future assaults. even though many other Union regiments had Meanwhile, Cutler's regiments on the right of been completely routed. the pike were being routed. Dawes took the The brigade saw little action in the next two Sixth Wisconsin over towards a railroad cut days of the battle. The brigade was less than a which was cut through McPherson's ridge, shadow of its former strength. Out of the 1,883 where Confederates from Davis' brigade were men that were in the brigade on the morning of advancing. Dawes, seeing the situation, ran July 1, only 671 men were left at the end of the over to the major commanding the Ninety-fifth battle.6a The Twenty-fourth Michigan had more New York and told him, "We must charge."61 men killed than any other Union regiment at Together, the two regiments charged the Gettysburg.64 They also lost nine color bearers railroad cut, losing many men but forcing the on the first day. 65The Iron Brigade had been surrender of an entire Confederate regiment, the decimated, but they had held their ground long Second Mississippi. The battle continued to enough to enable the Union to defend Cemetery rage on and both armies received Hill. After the battle, General Wadsworth told reinforcements, but the Confederates received Colonel Morrow "Colonel Morrow, the only more. Soon the Iron Brigade regiments began to fault I find with you is that you fought too long, pressed. Meredith's horse was shot out from but God only knows what would have become under him and landed on him, severely of the Army of the Potomac if you had not held wounding him. The Nineteenth Indiana, which the ground as long as you did."66 Gettysburg held the extreme left of the Iron Brigade's line was the crowning achievement of the Iron soon began to buckle under heavy pressure from Brigade, but it was also the beginning of the end the front and flank. Colonel Morrow said that of the brigade. the Nineteenth Indiana "fought most gallantly, Gettysburg was the last stand of the "Iron but was overpowered by superior numbers... ,,62 Brigade of the West."s7 After Gettysburg, new As the Nineteenth Indiana was forced to fall regiments were added to the brigade, and some back, the Twenty-fourth Michigan was exposed of them weren't western regiments. First the to some severe flanking fire and compelled to 167th Pennsylvania was attached to the brigade fall back to a second line of defense. As the for a short while. These men were draftees and Confederates superior numbers pressed the at one point refused to march, and the rest of .46 " The Wittenberg History Journal

the brigade was almost forced to shoot them end of the war. before they kept marching. The Seventy-Sixth During the war, the Iron Brigade suffered the New York served with the Iron Brigade for a heaviest losses, in proportion to their numbers, few weeks in 1864 and were then moved of any Union brigade in the war.69 Lance elsewhere. Finally a battalion of the First New Herdegen points out that the brigade had to York Sharpshooters and the Seventh Indiana uphold its name on the battlefield and as a result joined the brigade permanently. None of these of this, ended up fighting themselves to death7° regiments which joined the Iron Brigade after Through the comments of many of the men and Gettysburg wore the black hats. Before the historians, it can be clearly seen that their pride Union army started on the Wilderness campaign in their reputation as the best troops in the in 1864, the First Corps was merged into the Union army often influenced the brigade to Fifth Corps. This was a source of irritation for stand up and fight against fierce odds. it is many of the men of the Iron Brigade because doubtful that the Twenty-fourth Michigan being in the First Corps was a great source of would have performed so well in battle as pride to them, especially being the First Brigade, quickly as they did had they not felt the pressure First Division, First Corps, (which they had been to live up to the reputation the brigade had since Chancellorsvilie). These effects started already carved for itself. Jean F. Ebling demoralizing the old Iron Brigade. emphasizes this spirit when she remarks: At the Wilderness, the Iron Brigade was led into battle by General Cutler, and later by The staunch spirit of the Iron Brigade Colonel Bragg after Cutler assumed command of was an outgrowth of the success they the division when Wadsworth was killed. They experienced on their own part of the line still managed to fight bravely at the Wilderness in every one of the seven battles in and in the rest of Grant's campaign. The biggest which they had fought, the army as a blow to the morale of the Iron Brigade was the whole might retreat or fail to capitalize removal of the Second Wisconsin after the on victory, but the Brigade had always Wilderness. Later on, the Nineteenth Indiana given as good or better than it had would be merged with the Twentieth Indiana, takenJ1 losing their name and being moved out of the brigade. In spite of these demoralizing Reputation and pride can be powerful maneuvers, many men of the Second Wisconsin, motivators. The Iron Brigade had these as well Sixth Wisconsin, Seventh Wisconsin, and as uniqueness, excellent leadership, and Nineteenth Indiana re-enlisted in the army when excellent training. their terms of service ran out. Dawes wrote of Due to their feats on the battlefield, the Iron Brigade will always be revered for their bravery. the Sixth Wisconsin, The pride the men felt at being members of the Our detached men who have been Iron Brigade was incredibly tangible. John cooks for officers, hostlers, clerks, and Gibbon was always extremely fond of his little teamsters,.., nearly all decline to re- brigade, even after he ceased to command it. enlist, but the men who have stood by When invited to a reunion of soldiers from the old flag through fair and foul Wisconsin, Gibbon replied "I was never a weather, and through many bloody Wisconsin soldier.., but at the judgment day I battles, almost to a man dedicate their want to be with Wisconsin soldiers."72 This lives and service anew to their country.68 remark of his would probably hold true for any of the regiments of the Iron Brigade. The Iron The Iron Brigade although altered in its Brigade earned for itself a reputation of valor. composition continued to fight bravely until the "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War • 47

Endnotes

19Ebling believes that the leadershipin the Seventh 1 C. A. Stevens, Berdan's United States Sharpshooters, as Wisconsin and Nineteenth Indiana was not as good as that in the quoted in Alan T. Nolan, TheIron Brigade: A Military.History(Ann Second and Sixth Wisconsin, because the Second and Sixth out- Arbor: Historical Society of Michigan, 1983), 219: performed them onthe parade ground. Bbling, 31.

2 Champ Clark and the editors of Time-Life Books, 0 General Pope's report on the battle indicates that Gettysburg:The ConfederateHigh Tide, The Civil War(Alexandria, Gibborffs brigade was first in line, but this was not so. See Reports Virginia:Time-Life Books, 1985), 48. of Ma]. GeneralJohn Pope, 27 January1863, in The War of the Rebellion, vnl. 12, 37. and Reports of Brig. Gen. John Gibbon, 4 O. B. Curtis, Historyof theTwenty fourth Michigan of the December 1863, in The War of the Rebellion, voI. 12, 880-382. IronBrigade (Detroit: Winn and Hammond, 1891), 166. 21 Reports of Brig. Gen. John Gibbon, 8 September 1862, 4 T. Henry Williams, as quoted in Alan T. Nolan, "Iron in The War of the Rebellion, vol. 12, 878. BrigadeGeneral: John Gibbon , in "Rally Once Again": Selected Civil War Writingsof Alan T. Nolan,Alan T. Nolan (Madison, 22See Appendix B for a map of the battle. Wisconsin: Madison House Publishing,2000), 57. 2 Rufus R. Dawes, Service with the Sixth Wisconsin s Some historians have claimed that the Iron Brigade was Volunteers (Madison: The State Historical Society of Wisconsin, routed in the battle of the Wilderness, in May 1864, but there is 1962), 62. some evidence against this. For more information about this and the Iron Brigade in the Wilderness, see Sharon Eggeleston 24 Ibid., 63. Vipond "'A New Kind of Murder': The Iron Brigadein the Wilderness", in Giants in Their Tail Black Hats: Essays on the Iron 25 Ibid., 62. Brigade, eds. Alan T. Nolan and Sharon Bggeleston Vipond (Bloomington: Indiana UniversityPress, 1998). 26 Report of Lieut. Gen. Thomas J. Jackson, 27 April 1863, in The War of theRebellion, vol. 12,645. 6 While most historians do inherently claim that the Iron Brigade fought well because westerners fought better than 27Ebling, 89-60. easterners, they do recognize that the Brigade's westerness was a great source of pride to the men who served in the brigade. 2aSteven J. Wright, "John Gibbon and the BlackHat Brigade", in Giantsin TheirTal! Black Hats, 66. 7 JeanP. Ebling, "The FightingSpirit ol[ the Iron Brigade:

A Study of Morale in a Civil War Volunteer Unit (M. A. thesis, 29 Dawes, 70. Northern Illinois University, 1963), 83. 30Reports of Brig. Gen. John Gibbon, 8 September 1862, a Alan T. Nolan, "Virginia's Unwelcome Visitors", in in War of the Rebellion, vnl. 12, 378. "Rally Once Again", Nolan, 190. at Many histories of the Second Bull Run Campaign 9 William DeLoss Love, Wisconsinin the Waro[the mention the batde of Brawner's Farm as occurring between King's Rebellion;A History.ofA!l Regimentsand Batteriesthe State has Sentto division and Jackson's corps, ignoring the fact that the battle was theField (Chicago: Church and Goodman, 1866), 228. fought only by GibboNs brigade and two of Doubleday's regiments. Even Pope's report elsewhere referred to, seems to to Report of Col. William T. Sherman,25 July 1861, in indicate that all of King's division was engaged when that was The Warof theRebellion: A Compilationof the OfficialRecords of the not the case. Gibbon said, in his response to Pope's report that ". Union and Confederate Armies, vnl. 2 (Washington, Government .. my single brigade was left almost alone to sustain itself against PrintingOffice, 1971), 369. a division of the enemy, and that the division as such was not engaged at all; that in place of being 'supported handsomely by n Ebling, 51. Doubleday's brigade.' but two regiments of that brigade came to our assistance." (Reports o[Brig. Gen. John Gibbon, 4 December t2John Gibbon, PersonalRecollections of theCivil War 1863, in The War of theRebellion, vol. 12, 380.) Some histories that (Dayton: Morningside Bookshop, 1978), 27. perpetuate the fallacy that King's division was engaged are Francis F. Wilshin, ManasasNational Battlefield Park, Virginia, Nationa! ta See Appendix A. ParkService Historical Handbook Series,no. 15 (Washington 1953). and Edward J. Stackpole,From Cedar Mountain to Antietam: t4EbBng, 54. August-September,4862 (Harrisburg:The Stackpole Co., 1959), 160. is Gibbon, 39. "6Bbhng, 82 Nnlan, "Virginia's Unwelcome Visitors', 186. Nolan 15. puts forth this explanation of why the brigade may have fought as web as they did for their first engagement. He makes a fairly 17Lance J. Herdegen, TheMen StoodLike Iron: How the compelling argument for this. IronBrigade Won itsName (Bloomington: IndianaUniversity Press, 1997), 72. 3s philip Kearny,as quoted in Gibbon, 66.

18EbBng, 21. a4Reports of Brig.Gen. John Gibbon, 3 September 1862, in The War of theRebellion, vol. 12, 379. 48 • The Wittenberg History Journal

as Report#CoL SolomonMeredith, 20 September1862, in 54 Nolan, "Virginia's Unwelcome Visitors", 189. The War of the Rebellion, vol. 19, 249. Meredith gives an estimate on the exact time the brigade was ordered forward. ss Ibid., 187.

36 See Appendix C for a map of the battle. s0Report of Brig.Gen. SolomonMeredith, 22 December 1862, in The War of theRebellion, vol. 21,476. 7 Dawes, 82. 57 Dawes, 112. 3aReports of Lieut.CoL Edward S. Bragg,28 September1862, in The War of the Rebellion, vol. I9, 254. 58 William C. Way, as quoted in Curtis, 102.

39 This conversation is related in: Herdegen, The Men s9 Marc Storch and Beth Storch, U'Like So Many Devils': StoodLike Iron, 146. The Iron Brigade at Fitzhugh'sCrossing", in Giantsin TheirTall Black Hats, 100. 40 George B. McClellan, as quoted'in Dawes, 85. 60 See Appendix II for a map of the battle. 41Reports of Brig. Gen.John Gibbon,20 September1862, in TheWar of theRebellion, vol. 19, 248. 61 Dawes, 167.

42Ibid. 6 Reportof Col. HenryA. Morrow,22 February1864, in The War of the Rebellion, vol. 27, 268. 4aSee Appendix D for a map of the battle. 63William Wade Dudley, TheIron Brigade at Gettysburg 44Reports of Lieut.CoL EdwardS. Bragg,21 September1862, (Cincinnati,1879), 15. in The WaroftheRebellion,vol. 19, 255. 64William F. Fox, ReginlentalLosses in theAmerican Civil 4sThis story is reported in: Herdegen, TheMen Stoodlike War, 48t541865 (Albany: Albany PublishingCo., 1898), 17. Iron, 183. 6s Curtis, 166. 46Return of Casuahiesin the UnDnforces athe battle of Antietam,in The War of theRebellion, vol. 19, 189. 66 Ibid., 168.

47Reports of Brig. Gen.John Gibbon,20 September 1862, in 67Many historiansof the Iron Brigade,including Alan T. TheWar of theRebellion, vol. 19, 249. Nolan and John Selby, consider Gettysburg the last battle of the Iron Brigade. Although the regiments continued on, the brigades 48 Dawes, 53. composition changed and it was never the same.

4 Dennis g. Lavery and Mark H. Jordan,Iron Bffgade 68 Dawes, 285. • Generah John Gibbon: A Rebel in Blue ('vVesport, Connecticut and London: Greenwood Press, 1993), 66. 69 Fox, 117.

50 Curtis, 65. 70 Herdegen, The Men Stood like Iron, 198. 51ibid., 66. 71Ebllng, 70. s2 Gibbon, 92.

5aAlan T. Nolan, TheIron Brigade: A MilitaryHistory (Ann 72 John Gibbon, as quoted in Nolan, The Iron Brigade, 167. Arbor: Historical 8ociety of Michigan, 1983), 173. "Those Damned Black Hats": The Iron Brigade in the Civil War ° 49

Works Cited

Clark, Champ and the Editors of Time-Life Books. Gettysburg: The Cradle&rateHigh Tide. The Civil War. Alexandria, McPherson, James M. For Cause attd Comrades: Why Men Fought Virginia: Time-Life Books, 1985. in theCDil War.New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. Curtis, O.B. Historyof the Twentyfourth Michigan of theIron Brigade. Detroit: Winnand Hammond, 1891. Nolan, Alan T. and Sharon Eggleston Vipond, eds. Giants in Their Tall Black Hats: Essays on the Iron Brigade. Bloomington: Dawes, Rufus R. Service with the Sixth Wisconsin Volunteers. Indiana University Press, 1998. Madison: The State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1962. Nolan, Alan T. "RallyOnce Again": SelectedCivil War Writingsof Alan 12Noinn. Madison: Madison House Publishing, Dudley, William Wade. TheIron Brigade at Gettysburg. 2000. Cincinnati, 1879. __ . The lron Briga&: A Military History. AnnArbor: Dunn, Craig L. Iron Men, Iron Will: The Nineteenth Indiana Historical Society of Michigan, 1983. Regimentof theIran Brlgade. Indianapolis: Guild Pressof Indiana, Inc., 1995. Priest,JohnMichael. BefoteAntietam: The Battle for South Mountain. 8hippenburg, pennsylvania: White Mane Ebling,Jean P. The FightingSpirit of the Iron Brigade: A Study Publishing Co., Inc., 1992. of Morate in a Civil War Volunteer Unit." M.A. Thesis, Northern Illinois University,1963. Quiner, E. B. TheMilitary History of Wisconsin:A Recordof theCivil andMilitary Patriotism of theState in the Warfor the Union. Fox, William F. Regimental Losses in the American Civil War, 186t- Chicago: Clark and Co., 1866. 1865. Albany: Albany PublishingCo., 1898. Robertson, JNO. Michigan in the War. Lansing: W. S. George and Gibbon, John. Personal Recollections of the Civil War. Dayton: Co., 1882. Morningside Bookshop, 1978. Roster ofWisconsin Volunteers, War ofthe Rebellion, t861-1865. Herdegen, Lance J. and William J. K. Beaudot. In the Bloody VoI. 1. Madison: Democrat Printing Co., 1886. RailroadCut at Geuysburg.Dayton: Morningside, 1990. Sears, StephenW. Landscape Tumed Red: The Banle of Antietam. Herdegen, Lance J. The Men Stood Like Iron: How the Iron Brigade New Haven and New York: Ticknor and Fields, 1983. Won its Name. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. Selby, John. The Iron Brigade. New York: Hippocrene books, Inc., 1971. Kozlowski, L.J. To Stand For All They Won: Rufus Dawes of the Iron Brigade." Timeline 12, no. 2 (1995): 2-15. Stackpole, Edward J. From Cedar Mountain to An&tam: August- September, 4862. Harrisburg: The Stackpole Co., 1959. Laver,/, Dennis S. and Mark H. Jordan. Iron Brigade Generah John Gibbon, A Rebel in Blue. Westport, Connecticut and The War of theRebellion: A Compilationof the Offici!l Recordof the London: Greenwood Press, 1993. Union and Confederate Armies. Vols. 2, 12, 19, 21, 28, 27, 36. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1971. Longacre, Edward G. The FightingLife of John Gibbon: CooI as a Steel Knife." Civil War Times Illustrated 26, no. 2 Wert, Jefhy D. A Brotherhoodof Valor: TheCommon Soldiers of the (1987): 16-25, 44. StonewallBrigade, CSA, and thelron Brigade, USA. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1999. Love, William DeLoss. Wisconsinin theWar of theRebellion; A History of all Regiments and Batteries the State has Sent to the Wilshin, Francis F. Manassas National Battlefield Park, Virginia. Field. Chicago: Churchand Goodman, 1866. NationalPark Service Historical Handboofl Series, no. 45. Washington, 1953. 50 •

July 1967 Detroit Riots: A Culmination of Economic Frustration ByJamie Chope WittenbergUniversity Class of 200f HartjeAward Winner

journalists who covered civil rights activity in In the aftermath of the Detroit riots of 1967, the north and south, note that during the first thirty-nine were reported dead and more than one thousand injured. In the week following the day of looting certain shops were spared--those marked with signs saying "Soul Brother" or riot, which started on 23 July, over 1,317 fires "BlackAll The Way!" But by the end of day raged through the city, most out of control. The "looters ceased to practice discrimination and damage estimate totaled more than $250 stole without regard to the owner's color or million, including the looting of 1,700 stores. creed."4 Black homeowners banded together. Two thousand police officers on duty, with With hunting rifles and shotguns they defended 6,800 National Guardsmen and 3,300 US Army their homes from gangs of youngsters breaking troops assisting, made 3,400 arrests.1 What in and protected firefighters. "The looters were motivated the rioters? Would a "race riot" be enraged by the armed Negroes. 'We're going to the correct label for the violence? Urban and get you rich niggers next,' a looter screamed at a sociological studies tend to place great emphasis Negro psychiatrist."5 Arsonists did not seem to on race as a motivating factor for the rioters.2 care if their mol0tov-cocktails burned stores and On the other hand, a plethora of historical spread to well maintained black homes. evidence shows a greater emphasis on the Twenty-two black firefighters were called to economic factors that played a role in the riots. Twelfth Street, the origin the riots, but reported The Detroit riots were fueled by economic being pelted with bottles and bricks,s differences between not only black and white Who were the rioters? The National Detroiters, but by the economic gains some Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders black Detroiters had made supposedly at the reported in 1968 that the typical rioter in the expense of poor blacks. summer of 1967 was a black male aged 15-24, In the week following the riot, a Detroit Free had not graduated from high school, and was Press article presented a survey of the responses frustrated because of lack of training for of black Detroiters when asked: How much did anything but menial, low-status job. In an each of these grievances have to do with the attempt to explain further reasoning behind riot? Although police brutality received the their violence, the commission reported the highest ranking, lack of jobs, poverty, and anger rioter held hostility toward whites, but equal with local business people were listed as a few hostility toward middle-class blacks7 of the top six grievances having a great deal to Living only a few blocks from the epicenter do with the riot. White public offic!als and of the riots at the time, lifelong Detroiter Peter hatred of whites did have a great deal to do with Buchanan recalls that the riot was not a race riot the riots according to approximately one third of in his mind, but "was a riot of haves and have- the 437 blacks sampled, but too much drinking nots."8 Rioters made known their hatred of the ranked higher than those factors respectively.3 grocery store by ransacking its shelves, then Racism may have been an intrinsic part of the burning it. According to the Detroit Free Press, economic factors, but further analysis shows forty-seven grocery stores were burned. that much of the looting and arson itself was colorblind. Furniture was strapped on top of cars and taken home because according to one rioter, they had Van Gordon 8auter and Burligh Hines, July 4967 DetroitRiots: A Culminationof EconomicFrustration ° 54 been charged outrageous prices for the and whites. Sauter and Hines called much of overpriced junk.9 the looting and freedom to take things Breaking in and entering, looting, and arson unattainable, "a source of sheer spiritual ecstasy, collectively expressed the outrage rioters felt for sometimes coupled with revenge."1° Whether a their economic condition. Most economic riot over economics or race, one distraught factors such as hiring for jobs or renting Vietnam soldier felt it did not make sense, apartments in slums were related to racism and considering blacks and whites were fighting discrimination the young black men faced. But side by side half a world away.11 A riot full of during the actual rioting, economics played a animosities toward the haves by the have-nots: greater role than racism, resulting in the economic frustration only begins to explain tire destruction of property, belonging to both blacks unexplainable.

Endnotes

1 Detroit Riotsj Facts on File, Burton Historical Collection, a Ibid., 21. The word choice used to describe the black Detroit Public Library, Detroit. Detroiters obviously dates itself with the use of "Negroes."

2 Richard A. Chikota and Michael C. Moran, eds., Riot in 6 Ibid., 13. the Cities(Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson UniversityPress, 1970). 7 Report of the NationalAdvisory Commission on Civil The eds. present "An Analytical Symposium on the Causes and Disorders, at 2-50 to 2-52. Noted inRiot in the Cities. Effects" of the riots. Relevant analysis includes Detroit 4967z Racial Violence or Class Warfare, p. 151. 8 Peter Buchanan, interviewed by author, 9 January 2001, Detroit. a Detroit Free Press, 6 August 1967. 9 gauter 33. 4Van Gordon Sauterand BurleighHines, Nightmarein Detroit;a Reb¢llionand its Victims(Chicago: Regency, 1968), 13. t° Ibid., 28. Nightmare describes the lives of the forty-three victims whose lives were taken during the riot. They also chronicle the events nlbid., 64. and motivation of the rioters starting 27 July.

Works Cited

Btmhanan, Peter. Interviewed by author, 9 January 2001, Detroit. Detroit Riots Facts on File, Burton Historical Collection, Detroit Public Library,Detroit. Chikota, Richard A., and Michael G. Moran, eds. Riot in the Cities. Rutherford:Fairleigh Dickinson UniversityPress, 1970. Sauter, Van Gordon, and Burleigh Hines. Nightmare in Detroit; a Rebellionand its Victims.Chicago: Regemy 1968. DetroitFree Press, 27 July, 6 August 1967. 52 °

Fashoda: The Pitfall of Imperial Policy and a Possible War Avoided

By Stephen ScottDoucher WittenbergUniversity Class of 200f HartjeAward Finalist

Starting with the opening of the Suez Canal There are two aspects of the Fashoda Crisis in 1885 and concluding by 1887, Egypt became that make it an incredibly fascinating event. The a semi-autonomous satellite of the rising British first was the how it illustrated the dangers for Empire in Africa.1 An immediate result of this Europe inherent in the imperial race. imperial British triumph was the violent Newspapers in France and Britain rallied for a separation of the Sudan from its former masters war between two countries that where in Cairo, by the success of the largely anti- increasingly forgetting the pre-1815 history of Western reactionary forces of Mahdism.2 Anglo-French animosity/Though sober heads Another relatively immediate result was a prevailed in the wake of Kitchener's victory at feeling of jubilation among those British Omdurman and the French government ordered subjects, home and abroad, that had invested so Marchand and his force home in November, much effort, money, and personal vision to 1898, for fi moment the possibility of a new making a reality of a British Empire in Africa Anglo-French conflict was a reality,a that stretched from the pyramids of Egypt to The other aspect of Fashoda that is amazing the farms and mines of the Cape Colony. This to contemplate is how different modern history joy was contrasted by the disgust of other may have been had France and Britain unleashed imperialists who had dreamt of a colonial the nightmare of technological mass butchery empire in Africa from west to east and not from upon each other. Would Germany have entered north to south. These disgruntled imperialist the conflict against the Third French Republic thinkers were, of course, French.s and thus revived the pre-1815 Anglo-Prussian In 1896, ministers and men of military and alliance? How would Italy, Russia, Spain, and political standing in Paris moved to assert the United States have reacted to a Fashoda French power in Africa and issue forth the based conflict? destabilization of British control over Egypt by Historians obviousiy will never know, yet launching a seizure of the former Egyptian Fashoda teaches that even those accepted outpost on the Sudanese Nile, Fashoda. This notions of historical study, such as the ever action the French government intended to increasing friendship of France and Britain since cement through a new alliance with the Germany's unification, where not concrete virulently antbEuropean Mahdists4 and the guarantees of an era, but were events that where recently triumphant Ethiopian emperor, fragile and hostage to an unseen future. The Menilek II. The expedition from the French assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in 1914 Congo to Fashoda that followed, led by Major was the simple stroke that turned the Balkans Jean-Baptiste Marchand, succeeded in taking into a powdered keg for world war. Incidents the Sudanese Nile territory, yet not only gained like the Morocco Affairs and the Fashoda Crisis no serious local support, but almost opened the likewise could have function as incendiary door to war with Britain. actions. Fashoda: The pitfall of imperialpolicy and a possible war avoided • 53

Endnotes

1 M. . Chamberlain, The Scramble forAfrica, 2nd ed., 5 D. W. Brogan, The French Nation: From Napoleon To London: Longman, 1999, 80. Petain, New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1957, 200.

2 Ibid. 6 Chamberlain 81.

David LeveringLewis, TheRace to Fashoda:Colonialism z DarrellBates, TheFashoda Incident of 4898: Encounteron andAfrican Resistance, New York: Henry Holt & Company, Inc., theNile, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress, 1984, 154-155. 1987, 8. 8 Sir HarryH. Johnston,A Historyof The Colonizationof a Thomas Pakenham, The Scramble forAfrica, 4876-19t2, Africa By Alien Races, New York: Cooper Square Publishers, Inc., London: Weidenfeid and Nicolson, 1991, 467. 1966, 227. 54 °

The Most Famous Gunfight

By NickLong WittenbergUniversity Class of 2004 Hartje Award Finalist

no longer had complete control and wouid have The most famous gunfight occurred in Tombstone, Arizona where the Earps and the to fight to get it back. Virgil and Morgan wold begin their crusade cowboys were fighting for control of the town. to rid the town of the lawless cowboys, so the The Earps were three brothers who came to citizens of Tombstone could walk down the Arizona looking for a way to become rich and street without fear of getting shot. This would powerful, they were Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan. They were once lawmen, but wanted to try also give the Earps the opportunity to make their own wealth. Virgil enacted a law that their hand at some other profession since that profession did not bring them the wealth they Wyatt invented earlier in his career of no all craved. The cowboys were a wild bunch of carrying firearms into city limits. Virgil hoped lawless men who did anything they wanted, and that if no one had weapons, no one would get hurt. This seemed like the best way to let no one stand up to them. The Earps did not want to cause trouble gradually force the cowboys out, but the with anyone; they only wanted to peacefully cowboys were not going to give up the town • start their own businesses. Wyatt and Virgil without a fight. The cowboys wold see how far they could push the Earps by disobeying the were power hungry men who would not let laws and causing trouble. Virgil could always some cowboys stand in their way of accomplishing what they wanted. The cowboys handle the situation with peaceful measures if controlled the town and everything that went on possible, but on occasion he would have to "buffalo" the cowboy.1 This tactic that Wyatt, in it, so they were not about to let some new guys disrupt their control. The cowboys wanted Virgil, and Morgan used infuriated the cowboys. On October 26, 1881 Ike Clanton, a to send the message from the start who was in member of the cowboys, was drunk and yelling charge of the town; so they showed the Earps just how powerful they were by ransacking the that he was going to kill the Earps, so Wyatt "buffaloed" him and took him to jail, where town and no one did anything to stop them. Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan noticed that the law Virgil locked him up for disorderly conduct. did nothing to control the cowboys, and that the Wyatt was not a lawman, but when the cowboys started to attack his brothers he joined cowboys owned the lawmen. Wyatt was the leader of the Earp brothers, but did not want to in to defend them. Five other members of the cowboy gang get back into law, so the Earps tried rode into town, not knowing that Ike had been unsuccessfully to start their business without arrested. Virgil had to let Ike go after he paid interfering with the cowboys. But the cowboys his fine, and Ike told the Earps that they picked were not going to let the Earps do what they wanted without paying the cowboys off. The a fight that they could not win. Ike went down to where the other cowboys were and tried to Earps refused to give in to the cowboys and the stir them up to go and kill the Earps, but the bitter clash would begin. Virgil took things into his own hands and McLaury brothers and Ike's brother did not became the deputy Marshal of Tombstone, and want to start the first today without the consent Morgan served under Virgil as a deputy. Wyatt of the cowboy's leader Johnny Ringo and Curly refused to get back into law and opened his own Bill Brosius. The cowboys had carried their gambling house. The cowboys knew that they guns with them into city limits. This was in The Most Famous Gunfight • 55 direct violation of the law; so Virgil deputized O.K. Corral. The McLaury brothers and Billy Wyatt and John "Doe" Holliday to help Morgan Clanton were shot and killed. Ike had ran off and him peacefully disarm the cowboys. and begged Wyatt not to shoot him. Morgan, The Earps only wanted to disarm the Virgil, and Holliday were all shot and injured, cowboys, not have a shoot out, but when Virgil but Wyatt came away without a mark on him. told them to throw up their hands and turn over This was the most famous gunfight of the west, their guns, Frank and Tom McLaury thumbed and with this fight a legend would be born. their six shooter.2 With this, the most famous Wyatt would become a legend for his gunfight started. The fight lasted only about involvement in the battle. The only one to thirty seconds, but three men lay dead at the escape without injury.

Endnotes

1 "Buffalo" was the term used by the Earps. It was 2 In the west this was a sign that you are getting ready when they would use their butts of their colts to hit the other for a gunfight. They are about to draw their weapons to shoot. person in the head to arrest him. 56 •

Walt Disney World: From Florida Swampland to Magic Kingdom By MelindaScott WittenbergUniversity Class of 2001 Hartje Award Finalist

On Sunday afternoons, after going to church, the population than Disneyland. A site with a a father would take his two daughters to the pleasant climate was also necessary, to allow the local amusement parks for some family time. park to remain open throughout the year. While the two girls rode the carousel, their Florida was ultimately determined as the ideal father noticed how bored the other parents location, given its tropical climate• Once this seemed, the littered grounds of the park, the decision was made, many areas of the state poor upkeep of the rides, and the unfriendly were considered. Palm Beach was looked at, but nature of the employees. The man longed for a quickly eliminated because of its proximity to place where he could take his children and they the ocean, which would cause high humidity could have fun together. This man was Walt and hurricane risk. The northern portion of the Disney, and it was here, at these dingy, run- state was also eliminated from consideration down amusement parks, that the idea for because of its cold winters. During a fly-over of Disney's theme parks was born. the state in 1963, Disney and his staff decided Disneyland celebrated its grand opening in on central Florida as the locale that would best Anaheim, California on July 17, 1955. The park serve their needs, where they would be had been promoted by Disney as "a new insulated from the ocean storms while having experience in entertainment."1 He mandated the tropical climate of the south. the daily upkeep of the rides, continual cleaning In the early 1960s, central Florida was a land of the grounds, and development of attractions of limitless swamps and forests and the city of that would entertain the whole family. He also Orlando was a sleepy community. These two began calling his employees "Cast Members," factors enabled Disney to do what he was wanting his guests to feel like they were unable to do in Anaheim, buy enough land not experiencing a show from the moment they only to build a second theme park, but also stepped on the property. While the area inside "clusters of hotels and resorts and recreational Disneyland's gates had been meticulously facilities." Disney began purchasing land in planned by Disney and his Imagineers, as his small parcels under various names in early 1964. imaginative engineers were known, the area just By the fail of i965, 27,000 acres, twice the size outside the gates was quickly turned into a of the island of Manhattan, had been purchased "second-rate Las Vegas,"2 brimming with cheap on the OrangeoOsceola County line near motels, restaurants, and strip malls• Within just Orlando for the price of only $183 per acre.4 a few years of Disneyland's opening day, Disney With this immense amount of land changing began to consider a second park, one where he hands, the local newspapers began to become could have better control over his guests' suspicious. The Orlando Sentinelreported the I complete experience. transactions in May, 1965 and had deduced it In the early 1960s, Walt Disney and his team was Disney by October of that year.5 The of Imagineers began scouting sites secret was out; it was time for Disney to inform for a new park. It had already been decided that the world of his plans. I the new park should be located east of the After the story ran, a hastily arranged press Mississippi River, to tap a different segment of conference was called by Governor Haydon W, lt Disney World: FromFlorida Swampland to Magic Kingdom • 57

Bums to announce Disney's plans. Burns always know that this was Walt's dream."8 introduced Disney as "the man of the decade, When Roy Disney dedicated Walt Disney who will bring a new world of entertainment, World on October 23, 1971, he did so in the pleasure and economic development to the State memory of his brother. He said, "Walt Disney of Florida."6 Burns also announced during the World is a tribute to the philosophy and life of press conference that the state would give Walter Elias Disney... May Walt Disney World Disney any cooperation necessary to make this bring Joy and Inspiration and New Knowledge venture successful. Over the next two years, to all who come to this happy place.., a Magic the Florida legislature passed bills in Disney's Kingdom where the young at heart of all ages favor, including tax incentives, establishment of can laugh, and play, and learn.., together."9 a municipality, and control over zoning and Walt Disney's dream for a self-contained environmental affairs. Disney and his team theme park had come true. Through his began work on the site later that month. imagination and ingenuity, a place was Unfortunately, Disney would not live to see the established where parents and children could completion of his dream. have fun together. Walt Disney World quickly On December 15, 1966, Wait Disney died of became the standard to v hich developers lung cancer.7 The completion of the new park looked when designing a theme park. Walt was left to Disney's brother Roy, the financial Disney World continues to be the most visited genius behind all of Disney's ventures. Roy vacation spot in the world, proving that like its oversaw the completion of the park and titled creator, Walt Disney World is truly an American the park Walt Disney World. He stated, "It's original. going to be Walt Disney World, so people will

Endnotes

1 Bob Thomas, WaltDisney: An AmericanOriginal, (New 5 Jeff Kurtti,Since the World Began: Walt Disney World The First25 Years,(New York: Hyperion, 1996), 13-15. York: Hyperion, 1994), 247. 6 Thomas, Disney: American Original, 837. 2 Ibid., 333.

7 Kurtti, Since the WorldBegan, 20. StevenWatts, TheMagic Kingdom:Walt Disney and the AmericanWay of Life, (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1997), 423. BThomas, Disney: American Origina!, 357.

4 Ibid., 423. 9 Kurtti, Since the WorldBegan, 39.

Works Cited

Kurrti,Jeff. Sinceth WorldBegan: Walt Disney World The First Thomas, Bob. Wah Disney:An AmericanOriginal New York: 25 Years. New York: Hyperion, 1996. Hyperion, 1994.

Shenk, JoshuaWolf. Hidden Kingdom Disney's Political Watts, Steven. Th Magic Kingdom:Walt Disney and theAmeriean Blueprint."American Prospect (Spring 1995: 21, 80-4). WayofLife. NewYork: Hougliton Mifflin 1997.

Smith, Dave. DisneyA to Z: The OfficialEncydopedia. New York: Hyperion, 1996. 58 °

Contributors

Jamie Chope Jamie Chope is a senior history major at Wittenberg University. He has completed his degree requirements, but will return to campus on May 12, 2001 to graduate with his classmates. He is currently travelling the country, seeing all the historical sites that the United States has to offer.

Luke Clarkson Luke Clarkson is a junior history major at Wittenberg University. Luke is involved in many campus activities, including the History Journal. He is also a member of the men's track program.

Stephen Scott Doucher Stephen Scott Doucher was born in Dayton and graduated from Olentangy High School, in Lewis Center, Ohio. He is a senior class student of history at Wittenberg and while interested in numerous historical and historiographical periods, topics, and issues, focuses mostly on European history. His parents, younger brother, cat, and dog all currently reside in the town of Powell, a few minutes north of Columbus.

Amanda Kutz Amanda L. Kutz is a junior Political Science and History double major. Currently, Amanda is interning in Washington D.C. with the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute. After graduation, she plans to study law and public policy. Eventually she hopes to work in politics, as a political strategist or run for office.

Nick Long Nick Long is a senior history major at Wittenberg University. He is also a member of the four-time North Coast Athletic Conference champion football program at Wittenberg University. He will . complete his degree this spring, but will student teach in the fall to obtain a teaching certificate. Nick plans to teach middle or high school history after graduation.

Mandy Oleson After transferring from Indiana University two years ago, Mandy Oleson is currently in her junior year at Wittenberg. She spent last season as a member of the Tiger women's basketball team. This semester, she is enhancing her History major and improving her German by studying in Salzburg, Austria.

Adam Ruschau Adam Ruschau is a senior history major. He is especially interested in nineteenth century military history, but does not plan on making history his career. After graduation, he is planning on attending a Lutheran seminary and becoming a Lutheran pastor in a small town or rural congregation.

Melinda Scott Melinda Scott is a senior at Wittenberg University, double majoring in elementary education and history. She is active in the Gamma Zeta chapter of the Phi Alpha Theta History Honorary, the Wittenberg Education Department Honorary, the History Journal, and the Student Democrats. Melinda is the winner of this year's Margret Ermarth History Departement Award. She is currently the Interim Sports Information Director and is a member of the statistical crew for football and men's and women's basketball Melinda is originally from London, Ohio and is searching for a teaching job, as graduation is fast approaching.