A Cosmopolitan Community Hanseatic Merchants in the German-American Atlantic of the Nineteenth Century by Lars Maischak A dissertation submitted to Johns Hopkins University in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Baltimore, Maryland October 2005 © Lars Maischak 2005 All rights reserved Abstract This thesis examines the experience of a group of long-distance, wholesale merchants from the Hanseatic city-republic of Bremen who dominated American-German trade during the nineteenth century. It places their history in the context of the emergence of bourgeois conservatism, and of the dialectical tension between modernization and tradition that characterized this transnational political current. As members of a trans- Atlantic community, Hanseats mediated in their ideas and practices the influences of German home-town traditions, of an Anglo-American critique of liberalism and democracy, and of the Hamiltonian idea of improvement that inspired United States conservatives. American Whigs, in their cooperation with Hanseats, are cast in a new light as promoters of international improvement, and as driven by ideas and concerns that represented a transnational bourgeois response to the French Revolution that rejected democracy but embraced technology in an attempt to make capitalism safe for Protestant Christian traditions. While unique at the time, democratic suffrage in the United States did not create an exceptional ideological landscape. From Hanseats’ vantage point, the Second Party System appeared as a specifically American variant of a familiar political division between elite politics and mob rule, allowing them to adopt ideas and emulate practices that they found in America. This dissertation is based on extensive family and business correspondence, newspapers, and parliamentary, diplomatic, and court records from multiple archives in Baltimore, Bremen, and New York. It combines family and gender history, the history of political ideas and institutions, and political economy in a transnational approach to ii social history that reconstructs the life-world of historical actors in all its facets and relates it to their political and economic activities. This work comes to the conclusion that the history of modern conservatism presents an irony. Conservatives pursued policies intended to safeguard traditional values and practices from the challenges of capitalism and democracy. These policies, in turn, contributed to the consolidation of an industrial-capitalist world economy and of the power of nation-states, both of which undermined the very values and practices conservatives hoped to preserve. Advisor/First Reader: Ronald G. Walters Second Reader: Michael Johnson Other Readers: Vernon Lidtke Erika Schoenberger Siba Grovogui iii Acknowledgements It would have been impossible to write this thesis without the help of many friends and colleagues who generously gave their time and thoughts to make this a better work. To all of them I feel the deepest gratitude. Some particular individuals, whose efforts have left more of a trace on the following pages than those of others, should not remain unmentioned. My advisor, Ronald G. Walters, supported me with invaluable advice and infinite patience. His rare gift of knowing at every point when to leave the candidate alone, and when to nudge him into producing work, laid the foundation of an efficient and productive cooperation. His stringent editorial help and his conscientious engagement with the often idiosyncratic arguments advanced by this author are largely responsible for what little clarity might emerge from this product. Ron Walters went beyond what one can reasonably expect from an academic advisor not just in his care for this candidate’s intellectual development, but also in that for his physical well-being: frequent trips to Binkert’s butcher-shop ensured that his advisee’s fridge remained well-stocked with essential German meat products. Other members of the History Department of Johns Hopkins University have in similar ways left an impression on the work of this author. Vernon Lidtke introduced me to the world of German nineteenth-century thinkers whom I had thus far ignored in my pursuit of American History. Michael Johnson opened to me the strange country that is the antebellum South. Peter Jelavich, Paul Kramer, Lou Galambos, and Toby Ditz gave their time for discussing with me several key segments of this thesis. Even where my iv Northern German stubbornness rejected their constructive criticism, I hope that they will nonetheless discover on these pages the traces of my engagement with their objections and suggestions. Among the scholars who influenced this work, David Harvey had an early and formative impact on my thinking. His assistance in guiding me towards an understanding of the role of merchant capital in the nineteenth century gave a decisive impulse for the direction my further research and writing took. Giovanni Arrighi, as a teacher, and Erica Schoenberger and Siba Grovogui as members of my committee, likewise inspired me to think through the material rendered here in clearer and more thorough ways. Christine Weideman, Assistant Head Archivist of the Manuscripts and Archives Division of Yale University Library, generously allowed me to have photocopies made of substantial portions of the letters contained in MSS 434, the John Christopher Schwab Family Papers. As a result, I was able to complete much of my research in the comfort of my own study. Without the active help of many other archivists and their staff in Bremen, Baltimore, and New York, much of the source material that was indispensable for the completion of this project would have remained out of my reach. I am particularly indebted to Dorothea Breitenfeldt, curator for family and business papers at the Staatsarchiv Bremen, who not only pointed me to the papers of obscure merchants that turned out to be mother-loads of evidence, but who also was a confidence-inspiring guide through the maze of the ancient and archaic structure of this venerable institution. Catherine Molineux and Dirk Bönker sacrificed valuable time in reading and criticizing the entire draft of this thesis. Even more importantly, their true and loyal friendship of many years sustained me through the trials and tribulations of graduate v student life. Without them, it is safe to say that I would have thrown in the towel at some point. Other colleagues have read several chapters in various stages of completion. Caroline Domenghino and David Marshal, in particular, provided me with invaluable criticism during a crucial phase of this project. Patryk Babiracki and Caleb McDaniel likewise contributed their insights on key passages of my argument. The discussions with these and many other colleagues represented to me the best of what a scholarly community can be. Among scholars of the Hanseatic world, Heide Gerstenberger’s work has been an inspiring example to my own. Her criticism of my own attempts at writing maritime history has disabused me of many a received idea that had kept me from seeing the forest for the trees. Lydia Niehoff, Jan Oberg, and Jan Martin Lemnitzer have selflessly shared with me their insights on Bremen’s merchants, and have allowed me to cite the evidence that their own labors had excavated from the archives. Without their help, this Americanist would often have been lost in the bewildering landscape of a nineteenth- century German home-town. No dissertation is exclusively an academic achievement. Domestic conditions at all times have shaped the pace and quality of my work. As a sometime Lebensabschnittsgefährtin, Aimée Pohl left an imprint on the totality of this thesis. Miami, the cat, has reminded me of the importance of getting enough food and sleep as she tolerated my presence in her apartment. Finally, my parents, Ursula and Uwe Maischak, have each in their own way enabled me to accomplish what little in this work is not attributable to some other mind. To them I dedicate this thesis. Naturally, any remaining errors of fact and of reasoning are my responsibility, alone. vi Contents page Index of Tables, Graphs, and Maps viii Glossary x Introduction 1 PART I: MOORINGS OF THE HANSEATIC NETWORK Chapter 1: Prudent Pioneers – 35 Hanseats in Trans-Atlantic Trade, 1798 – 1860 Chapter 2: The Hanseatic Household – 91 Families, Firms, and Faith, 1815 – 1864 Chapter 3: Cosmopolitan Conservatives – 149 Home-Town Traditions and Western Ideas in Bremish Politics, 1806 – 1860 PART II: EXCHANGES IN A TRANSNATIONAL WORLD Chapter 4: Community and Commerce – 195 From Patronage to Wage Labor and Social Control, 1815 – 1861 Chapter 5: International Improvement – 228 Hanseats, Hamiltonians, and Jacksonians, 1845 – 1860 Chapter 6: Nations, Races, and Empires – 275 Hanseats Encounter the Other, 1837 – 1859 PART III: DECLINE OF A COSMOPOLITAN COMMUNITY Chapter 7: The End of Merchant-Capital – 335 Crisis and Adaptation in a World of Industrial Capitalism, 1857 – 1890 Chapter 8: Decisions and Divisions – 375 Hanseatic Responses to Nation-Making Wars, 1859 – 1867 Chapter 9: Three Endings – 420 Conclusions, Hollywood Endings, and Fire-Bombs Appendix – Maps 436 Sources 439 Bibliography 443 Curriculum Vitae 458 vii Index of Tables, Graphs, and Maps Tables page Table 1 43 U.S. Tobacco Exports, 1855-1860 Table 2 43 U.S. Cotton Exports, 1855-1860 Table 3 44 Major Foreign Ports mentioned in the New York Times, 1851-1869, by Decade Table 4 60 German long-distance Merchant Firms in the United States, 1846