Germany Through Humanitarian Relief 1919-1924
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ABSTRACT AMERICAN BENEVOLENCE AND GERMAN RECONSTRUCTION: “AMERICANIZING” GERMANY THROUGH HUMANITARIAN RELIEF 1919-1924 by Louis Anne François Grün From 1919 to 1924, the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), supplied over 5 million German children with food aid that came to be known as the Quäkerspeisung. Following four years of fighting and the British Blockade, Germany lacked proper food reserves and production to supply its ailing population. Amidst a concern of revolution and food riots, the German government appealed to the Allied Nations to support the nation with food. However, the American public was not ready to support Germany with humanitarian relief due to the recent fighting and as such the American Relief Administration (ARA) was not able to help the German people. Herbert Hoover, the director of the ARA, reached out to the Quakers and tasked the American Friends Service Committee with helping Germans. The Quäkerspeisung which officially started in February 1920, would, in the words of AFSC co-founder Rufus Jones, “Americanize” the German nation and return the former war enemy into the international community. This thesis will show the motivations of US humanitarian relief to Germany and the impact of the Quaker feeding. Furthermore, the project will highlight the Weimar government’s response to the aid and their plans to support national reconstruction by focusing on children. AMERICAN BENEVOLENCE AND GERMAN RECONSTRUCTION: “AMERICANIZING” GERMANY THROUGH HUMANITARIAN RELIEF 1919-1924 Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Miami University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts by Louis Anne François Grün Miami University Oxford, Ohio 2020 Advisor: Dr Erik Jensen Reader: Dr Amanda McVety Reader: Dr Steven Conn ©2020 Louis Anne François Grün This thesis titled AMERICAN BENEVOLENCE AND GERMAN RECONSTRUCTION: “AMERICANIZING” GERMANY THROUGH HUMANITARIAN RELIEF 1919-1924 by Louis Anne François Grün has been approved for publication by College of Arts and Science and Department of History ____________________________________________________ Erik Jensen ______________________________________________________ Amanda McVety _______________________________________________________ Steven Conn Table of Contents List of Figures ............................................................................................ iv Dedication ....................................................................................................v Acknowledgments...................................................................................... vi Introduction 1 Chapter I The United States get involved 10 o The Hardship of Occupation ..........................................................15 o The AFSC steps in .........................................................................20 Chapter II The Remaking of Germany 31 o The Remaking of a Nation .............................................................36 Chapter III A New Age of Humanitarianism 46 o The Armenian Case........................................................................52 Conclusion 59 iii List of Figures 1.1 Occupied Rhineland ...........................................................................15 1.2 Detailed map of the Rhineland ..........................................................18 2.1 Home-front propaganda .....................................................................34 2.2 German Relief Organization Poster ...................................................38 2.3 Feeding of Children ...........................................................................44 3.1 Hunger Map of Europe ......................................................................50 iv Dedication Un meng Grousselteren, Léopold a Liliane Boever-Wampach & Fernand a Marie- Charlotte Grün-Pütz. To my grandparents, Léopold and Liliane Boever-Wampach & Fernand and Marie Charlotte Grün-Pütz. For instilling the love of history in me and pushing me to pursue my dreams. v Acknowledgements A lot of people supported and helped me in realizing this project and I would like to thank each one of them for their help. First of all, I would like to thank my amazing advisor Dr. Erik Jensen for his unwavering and continuous support. Even when I had to delay my graduation by two months, you never doubted my ability to finish this project and helped me turn it into my most passionate work yet. Your mentorship both as an academic and teaching advisor has led me to gain a new appreciation in history and I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for being such an important beacon throughout my time at Miami University and especially during the global pandemic. Another very special thank you goes out to the other members of my committee, Dr. Steven Conn, and Dr. Amanda McVety. As both advisors and teachers you gave me the extra push when it came to helping me find a thesis topic that I am passionate about. I would also like to thank Dr. Sheldon Anderson, Dr. William Brown, and Dr. Stephen Norris for their support as teaching advisors. Your kind and supportive words have made me value teaching history even more. Thank you for all of your lessons and allowing to share my passion of history with you. A huge thank you to my family back home in Luxembourg: Thank you for supporting me over the last couple of years on my overseas adventure. To my parents – Marc and Christiane: From day one you supported both mine and Michel’s dreams to pursue a higher education and I cannot imagine how hard it must have been as parents to have both of your sons studying abroad. Your love extended all around the globe and I can consider myself extremely lucky to have such loving and supportive parents. To my brother Michel: Thank you for continuously sharing funny videos and stories with me and keeping me up to date with what is happening in Europe. You brought a smile to my face every time I got a notification from you and made me feel like we were never far apart. To my grandma Boma Marietti: Thank you for sharing your love of history with me. Our discussions brought me much joy and I always loved to hear about the new things that you discovered in your books. And an additional thank you to my aunt Simone, who through her sense of humor made me take life never too seriously. Merci un iech all: Mamma, Pappa, Michel, Boma a Simone. Ouni iech hätt ech et net gepackt. This journey could have not been completed with my remarkable partner and best friend – Alicia Walsh-Clarett. Your steadfast support over the last two and a half years kept me going and pushed me ever closer to the completion of this project. Thank you for not only helping me achieve my dream but also for being the amazing, intelligent, and adventurous woman, I have come to know, love and respect. Not to mention my fellow cohort who became invaluable friends to me. Ben Susman’s and Zachary Logsdon’s wit and humor kept me going even when everything seemed hopeless. Both of you became true friends, and I am lucky that I could share an apartment with you. Zinaida Osipova and Kristin Osborne allowed me to share my passion of soccer with them and remained great friends throughout even the most stressful times. vi Introduction The winter of 1916-1917 came to be known as one of the harshest periods in Germany during World War I. The Germans referred to the period as Steckrübenwinter, or “Turnip Winter” due to the lack of common food items induced by bad harvests, paired with the need to supply troops on the front with proper supplies and the continuation of the British Blockade that cut Germany from importing vital resources. The German civilian population had to resort to feed themselves almost completely from turnips since rye and wheat supplies needed for bread ran extremely low. The “Turnip Winter” was, in many ways, a taste of things to come, as ongoing food shortages caused widespread hunger and malnutrition throughout the country into the early 1920s, a circumstance that stemmed from the continuation of the Allied Blockade as well as massive disruptions in Germany’s domestic agricultural production and continental imports. When the Armistice, the official cease-fire between the Allies and the German Empire, was signed in November 1918, the German government was hoping to quell the civilian unrest within the country, that was growing amidst the food shortages induced by the blockade. Little could they have anticipated that the blockade would be upheld well into the year of 1919, until after the Treaty of Versailles was signed in June of that year. Quaker historian Gregory Barnes states that the reason why the Blockade had continued is because “British and French, but prominent Americans as well – seemed to hold a Manichean belief in good people to be rewarded and bad peoples […] to be punished.”1 The Germans would have to suffer for the cruelties they had committed during the war and the blockade was deemed to be a just punishment. The consequences of the continued blockade would, however, have destructive consequences on the German population as historian C. Vincent Paul highlights: “in the weeks and months following the armistice, Germany’s deplorable state further deteriorated.”2 Civilians that were not to blame for the German army and government’s faults would suffer the most from the blockade and the German government, in 1918, estimated that over 750,000 people died of the effects of the blockade from 1915-1918.3 1 Barnes, Gregory A. A Centennial History of the American Friends Service