April 2000 - Nr. 4
Texas Town Remembers German-Americans Caught in the Civil War
TWIG - A recent dispute over the future of a white sandstone monument in the rolling hills of central Texas has reawakened memory of a dramatic chapter of German-American history. The memorial commemorates thirty-five German settlers killed by Confederate soldiers for siding with the Union during the Civil War.
The Germans who settled in Texas during the mid-nineteenth century included artists and intellectuals seeking an escape from the political and religious constraints of the old country, and their convictions made them natural opponents of slavery. As a Confederate state, Texas required citizens to pledge allegiance to the South - and those who refused risked mob violence. So in the summer of 1862, several hundred German settlers from the town of Comfort and the surrounding area joined forces to defend their lands. When the Texas government threatened to put down the rebellion, one group of Unionists left for the Mexican border. They were overtaken by Texas troops at the Nueces River. Twenty were shot on the spot, fifteen others taken prisoner and executed later. It wasn’t until after the war was over that the victims’ bodies were returned to Comfort, where the monument was erected in 1866.
The German Unionists were recently back in the news. An atheist organization in Austin announced it wanted to replace the existing monument in comfort with something larger that would also identify the fallen as opponents of organized religion. These plans did not, however, sit well with Comfort’s current citizens. They protested and prevailed: the plans were shelved and the monument will remain as it is - a modest tribute to thirty-five people whose opposition to slavery cost them their lives.
( history, heritage, culture )
