Carl
Schurz was born in Cologne, Germany,
on 2nd March, 1829. While studying at the University of Bonn he became
involved in radical politics. Schurz took part in the 1848 German
Revolution and was afterwards forced to flee to Switzerland.
Schurz spent time in France and England before emigrating to the United
States in 1852. Schurz and his wife lived in New
York for a while before buying a farm in Watertown, Wisconsin.
In 1856 Margarethe Schurz founded the first kindergarten in America.
A strong supporter of universal suffrage, Schurz once wrote: "Our
ideals resemble the stars, which illuminate the night. No one will
ever be able to touch them. But the men who, like the sailors on the
ocean, take them for guides, will undoubtedly reach their goal."
A leading member of the Republican Party,
in 1860 Schurz campaigned for Abraham Lincoln
in Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
After the election, President Lincoln appointed Schurz as U.S. envoy
to Spain.
Schurz was an active campaigner against slavery
and on the outbreak of the American Civil
War joined the forces of the Union Army.
He helped recuit Germans living in New
York before being asked to negotiate with European governments
on behalf of Abraham Lincoln.
On his return to the United States, Schurz served under General John
Fremont, the commander of the Department of the West. Soon afterwards
he was given the rank of brigadier general and placed in command of
the 3rd Division of the Army of Virginia (26th June, 1862 to 12th
September, 1862).
Schurz also commanded the 3rd Division of the Army of Potomac (12th
September, 1862 to 2nd April, 1863) and took part in the battles at
Bull Run (July, 1862) and Fredericksburg
(December, 1862). After the battle he was promoted to the rank of
major general, replacing his friend and fellow German, Franz
Sigel. Schurz also took part in the battle at Chancellorsville
(May, 1863) and Gettysburg (July,
1863) before being given command of the 3rd Division of the Army of
the Cumberland (25th September, 1863 to 21st January, 1864).
After the war Schurz worked as the Washington
correspondent of the New York Tribune.
This was followed by a period as editor-in-chief of the Detroit
Post. In 1867 he became editor of the German language newspaper,
the Westliche Post, in St. Louis,
Missouri.
Schurz remained active in the Republican
Party and in 1869 was elected to the Senate. In 1872 he, like
many Radical Republicans, supported
Horace Greeley against Ulysses
S. Grant, the official Republican candidate. Despite the efforts
of Schurz and his close friend in Missouri, Joseph
Pulitzer, Grant won the presidential election by 286 electoral
votes to 66.
In 1877 President Rutherford Hayes appointed
Schurz as his secretary of the interior. Over the next four years
Schurz introduced civil service reforms and made improvements to the
Bureau of Indian Affairs.
After leaving office in 1881 Schurz returned to journalism and became
managing editor of the New York Evening
Post. He also wrote for Harper's
Weekly, The Nation and
had several books published including The
Life of Henry Clay (1887)
and Abraham Lincoln (1891). Carl
Schurz died on 14th May, 1906.
(1)
Carl Schurz arrived in
the United States in 1852. Soon afterwards he visited Washington.
He described the city in his autobiography published in 1906.
My first impressions of the political capital of the great American
Republic were rather dismal. Washington looked at that period like
a big, sprawling village, consisting of scattered groups of houses
which were overtopped by a few public buildings - the Capitol, only
what is now the central part was occupied, as the two great wings
in which the Senate and the House of Representatives now sit were
still in the process of construction; the Treasury, the two wings
of which were still lacking; the White House; and the Patent Office,
which also harbored the Department of the Interior. The departments
of State, of War, and of the Navy were quartered in small, very insignificant
looking houses which might have been the dwelling of some well-to-do
shopkeepers. There was not one solidly built-up street in the whole
city - scarcely a block without gaps of dreary emptiness.
(2)
Carl Schurz, speech to members of the Republican
Party in Massachusetts (18th April, 1859)
I wish the words of the Declaration of Independence, "that
all men are created free and equal, and are endowed with certain inalienable
rights," were inscribed upon every gatepost within the limits
of this republic. From this principle the revolutionary fathers derived
their claim to independence; upon this they founded the institutions
of this country; and the whole structure was to be the living incarnation
of this idea.
Shall I point out to you the consequences of a deviation from this
principle? Look at the slave states. This is a class of men who are
deprived of their natural rights. But this is not the only deplorable
feature of that peculiar organization of society. Equally deplorable
is it that there is another class of men who keep the former in subjection.
That there are slaves is bad; but almost worse is that there are masters.
Are not the masters freemen? No, sir! Where is their liberty of the
press? Where is their liberty of speech? Where is the man among them
who dares to advocate openly principles not in strict accordance with
the ruling system? They speak of a republican form of government,
they speak of democracy; but the despotic spirit of slavery and mastership
combined pervades their whole political life like a liquid poison.
They do not dare to be free lest the spirit of liberty become contagious.
The system of slavery has enslaved them all, master as well as slave.
What is the cause of all this? It is that you cannot deny one class
of society the full measure of their natural rights without imposing
restraints upon your own liberty. If you want to be free, there is
but one way - it is to guarantee an equally full measure of liberty
to all your neighbors.
(3)
On the outbreak of the American Civil
War Carl Schurz asked Abraham
Lincoln for permission to form a regiment in New
York.
I promptly received the desired authority for raising the regiment,
and departed for the City of New York. i found the people of New York
in the full blaze of the patriotic emotions excited by the firing
upon Fort Sumner and the President's call for volunteers. There were
recruiting stations in all parts of the town. The formation of regiments
proceeded rapidly. Wealthy merchants were vying with each other in
lavish contributions of money for the fitting out of troops, and numberless
women of all classes of society were busy stitching garments or bandages
for the soldiers, or embroidering standards.
In New York, I found that many of the German cavalrymen I had counted
upon had already enlisted in the infantry regiments then forming.
But there were enough of them left to enable me to organize several
companies in a very short time, and I should certainly have completed
my regiment in season for the summer campaign, had I not been cut
short in my work by another call from the government. I received a
letter from the Secretary of State informing me that circumstances
had rendered my departure for my place at Madrid eminently desirable,
and that he wished me to report myself to him at Washington as soon
as possible.
(4)
Carl Schurz served as an officer under General John
Fremont during the American Civil War.
I joined General Fremont's army at Harrisonburg, Virginia,
on June 10th, 1862, and reported myself for duty. At the beginning
of the Civil War I heard him spoken of in Washington as one of the
coming heroes of the conflict, in most extravagant terms. I remember
especially Mr. Montgomery Blair, the Postmaster General in Mr. Lincoln's
administration, insisting that Mr. Fremont must at once be given large
and important military command, and predicting that the genius and
energy of this remarkable man would soon astonish the country. Fremont
was, indeed, promptly made a major general in the regular army, and
entrusted with the command of the Department of the West, including
the State of Illinois and all the country from the Mississippi to
the Rocky Mountains, with headquarters at St. Louis. But he sorely
disappointed the sanguine expectations of his friends. He displayed
no genius for organization. Fremont's headquarters seemed to have
a marked attraction for rascally speculators of all sorts, and there
was much scandal caused by the awarding of profitable contracts of
persons of bad repute.
(5)
Carl Schurz
served under General Ambrose Burnside
during the American Civil War. He
wrote about the battle of Fredericksburg in December, 1862.
When McClellan at last had crossed the Potomac
and Richmond, the President removed him from his command and put General
Burnside in his place. The selection of Burnside for so great a responsibility
was not a happy one. He was a very patriotic man whose heart was in
his work, and his sincerity, frankness, and amiability of manner made
everybody like him. But he was not a great general, and he felt, himself,
that the task to which he had been assigned was too heavy for his
shoulders. The complaint against McClellan having been his slowness
to act. Burnside resolved to act at once. The plan of campaign he
conceived was to cross the Rappahannock at Fredericksburg, and thence
to operate upon Richmond.
The battle began on December 13th, 1862, soon after sunrise, under
a gray wintry sky. Standing inactive in reserve, we eagerly listened
to the booming of the guns, hoping that we should hear the main attack
move forward. At eleven o'clock Burnside ordered the assault from
Fredericksburg upon Marye's Heights, Lee's fortified position. Our
men advanced with enthusiasm. A fearful fire of artillery and musketry
greeted them. Now they would stop a moment, then plunger forward again.
Through our glasses we saw them fall by hundreds, and their bodies
dot the ground. As they approached Lee's entrenched position, sheet
after sheet of flame shot forth from the heights, tearing fearful
gaps in our lines. There was no running back of our men. They would
sometimes stop or recoil only a little distance, but then doggedly
resume the advance. A column rushing forward with charged bayonets
almost seemed to reach the enemy's ramparts, but then to melt away.
Here and there large numbers of our men, within easy range of the
enemy's musketry, would suddenly drop like tall grass swept down with
a scythe. They had thrown themselves upon the ground to let the leaden
hail pass over them, and under it to advance, crawling. It was all
in vain. The enemy's line was so well posted and protected by a canal
and a sunken road and stone walls and entrenchments skillfully thrown
up, and so well defended, that it could not be carried by a front
assault.
The early coming of night was most welcome. A longer day would have
been only a prolonged butchery. And we, of the reserve, stood there
while daylight lasted, seeing it all, burning to go to the aid of
our brave comrades, but knowing also that it would be useless. Hot
tears of rage and of pitying sympathy ran down many a weather-beaten
cheek. No more horrible and torturing spectacle could have been imagined.
General Burnside bore himself like an honorable man. During the battle
he had proposed to put himself personally at the head of his old corps,
the Ninth, and to lead it in the assault. Reluctantly he desisted,
yielding to the earnest protests of his generals. After the defeat
he unhesitatingly shouldered the whole responsibility for the disaster.
He not only did not accuse the troops of any shortcomings, but in
the highest terms he praised their courage and extreme gallantry.
He blamed only himself.
(6)
Carl Schurz
served under General George Meade at
the battle of Gettysburg in
July, 1863.
To look after the wounded of my command,
I visited the places where the surgeons were at work. At Bull Run,
I had seen only a very small scale what I was now to behold. At Gettysburg
the wounded - many thousands of them - were carried to the farmsteads
behind our lines. The houses, the barns, the sheds, and the open barnyards
were crowded with moaning and wailing human beings, and still an unceasing
procession of stretchers and ambulances was coming in from all sides
to augment the number of the sufferers.
A heavy rain set in during the day - the usual rain after a battle
- and large numbers had to remain unprotected in the open, there being
no room left under roof. I saw long rows of men lying under the eaves
of the buildings, the water pouring down upon their bodies in streams.
Most of the operating tables were placed in the open where the light
was best, some of them partially protected against the rain by tarpaulins
or blankets stretched upon poles. There stood the surgeons, their
sleeves rolled up to the elbows, their bare arms as well as their
linen aprons smeared with blood, their knives not seldom held between
their teeth, while they were helping a patient on or off the table,
or had their hands otherwise occupied; around them pools of blood
and amputated arms or legs in heaps, sometimes more than man-high.
Antiseptic methods were still unknown at that time. As a wounded man
was lifted on the table, often shrieking with pain as the attendants
handled him, the surgeon quickly examined the wound and resolved upon
cutting off the injured limb. Some ether was administered and the
body put in position in a moment. The surgeon snatched his knife from
between his teeth, where it had been while his hands were busy, wiped
it rapidly once or twice across his blood-stained apron, and the cutting
began. The operation accomplished, the surgeon would look around with
a deep sigh, and then - "Next!"
(7)
After the American Civil War Carl Schurz
wrote about a meeting with John S. Mosby
and his Partisan Rangers.
Perhaps two hundred yards ahead of us, we observed a troop of
ten or twelve of them, who advanced towards us. They looked rather
ragged, and I took them for teamsters or similar folk. But one of
the orderlies cried out: "There are the rebels!" And true
enough, they were a band of Mosby's guerrillas. Now they came up at
a gallop, and in a minute they were among us. While we whipped out
our revolvers, I shouted to my bugler: "Sound the advance, double-quick!"
which he did; and there was an instant "double-quick" signal
in response from the infantry patrol close behind us. We had a lively,
but, as to my party, harmless conversation with revolvers for a few
seconds, whereupon the guerrillas, no doubt frightened by the shouts
of the patrol coming at a run, hastily turned tail and galloped down
the road, leaving in our hands one prisoner and two horses.
(8)
Carl Schurz wrote about the relative merits of William
Sherman, Ulysses
S. Grant and Robert E. Lee in his autobiography
published in 1906.
In the opinion of many competent persons, he was the ablest commander
of them all. I remember a remarkable utterance of his when we were
speaking of Grant's campaign. "There was a difference,"
Sherman said, "between Grant's and my way of looking at things.
Grant never cared a damn about what was going on behind the enemy's
lines, but it often scared me like the devil." He admitted, and
justly so, that some of Grant's successes were owing to this very
fact, but also some of his most conspicuous failures. Grant believed
in hammering - Sherman in maneuvering. It had been the habit of the
generals commanding the Army of the Potomac to cross the Rappahannock,
to get their drubbing from Lee, and then promptly to retreat and recross
the Rappahannock again in retreat. He sturdily went on, hammering
and hammering, and, with his vastly superior resources, finally hammered
Lee's army to pieces, but with a most dreadful sacrifice of life on
his own part. Now, comparing Grant's campaign for the taking of Richmond
with Sherman's campaign for the taking of Atlanta - without losing
sight of any of the differences of their respective situations - we
may well arrive at the conclusion that Sherman was the superior strategist
and the greater general.
(9)
Carl Schurz was with General William Sherman
when he heard about the assassination of President Abraham
Lincoln.
Sherman received a telegraphic message from Secretary Stanton,
containing the announcement of the assassination of President Lincoln.
The terrible news was kept secret from our troops, to be revealed
to them by general order the next day. I well remember the effect
the announcement had upon them. The camps, which for two days had
been fairly resounding with jubilation over the advent of peace, suddenly
fell into gloomy stillness. The soldiers admired their great generals,
but their good "Father Abraham", they loved.
(10)
Carl Schurz wrote about the differences
between Abraham Lincoln and Andrew
Johnson in his autobiography published in 1906.
It was pretended at the time and it has since been asserted by
historians and publicists that Mr. Johnson's Reconstruction policy
was only a continuation of that of Mr. Lincoln. This is true only
in a superficial sense, but not in reality. Mr. Lincoln had indeed
put forth reconstruction plans which contemplated an early restoration
of some of the rebel states. But he had done this while the Civil
War was still going on, and for the evident purpose of encouraging
loyal movements in those States and of weakening the Confederate State
government there. Had he lived, he would have as ardently wished to
stop bloodshed and to reunite as he ever did. But is it to be supposed
for a moment that, seeing the late master class in the South intent
upon subjecting the freedmen again to a system very much akin to slavery,
Lincoln would have consented to abandon those freemen to the mercies
of that master class?
(11)
Carl Schurz, speech at Chicago's World Fair (1893)
I have always been in favor of a healthy Americanization, but
that does not mean a complete disavowal of our German heritage. It
means that our character should take on the best of that which is
American, and combine it with the best of that which is German. By
doing this, we can best serve the American people and their civilization.
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