Nassau Plantation: The Evolution of a Texas German Slave Plantation

Chapter 13. The Adelsverein, the Plantation, and Slavery

183 ChaPter 13 The adelsverein, the Plantation, and Slavery It has become accepted usage to refer to the military conflict between the Northern and Southern states in the period 1860 through 1865 as the “Civil War.” This terminology, especially as it applies to Texas, is unfortunate because it is inaccurate and misleading. For Texas, the conflict represented a Second War of Secession. The First War of Secession had seen a successful struggle on the part of the Anglo colonists (with some support from disaffected Mexicans) to separate from Mexico. The preservation of the institution of African slavery in the colonies was undoubtedly an important underlying factor in this rebellion, but other important considerations played roles as well. It is the belief of this author that the unsuccessful Second War of 184 James C. Kearney Secession was above all about slavery. The slaveholding power elite in Texas joined with the other Southern states to withdraw from the Union for the primary purpose of maintaining and expanding slavery when it had become clear to them that they would not be able to take their slaves with them into the new territories of the West which were then opening up. To be sure, Texas (as did two other Southern states) held a referendum on the question of secession and close to 70 percent of the male population cast their vote in favor. This left a substantial minority , however, including the governor of the state, Sam Houston, who were opposed to secession, and this produced a cauldron of seething tension, hostility and, at times, naked violence, representing the true “Civil War” for Texas of the period. Indeed, with the surrender of the Confederacy at Appomattox on April 9, 1865, the bloodshed did not come to an end in this other civil war. Rather, it ushered in another phase where the “lost cause” became a pretext and cover for terror and lawlessness, rendering Texas the most violent state in the Union for a decade after the war had ended. It is clear that the German element in Texas, although joined by many Anglos and Hispanics, stood in the forefront of this other conflict. The true position of the Germans in Texas in relationship to slavery and secession has, therefore, been the object of a tremendous amount of scholarly and lay interest. The point of emphasis here has been almost exclusively on the settlers themselves, while little attention has been given to the role of the organization which brought most of them over, namely, the Society for the Protection of German Emigrants in Texas and to their first possession in Texas, the slave plantation Nassau. It will be the purpose of this chapter to discuss the role of Nassau Plantation and the Society for the Protection of German Emigrants in Texas in the contemporary debates about slavery, immigration, and secession. Though not disputing the fundamental assertion that a substantial portion of the German settlers in Texas were opposed to slavery and/or secession, it will be the purpose of this chapter to show the variety of responses among the emigrants and to explore the complexity of the situation. The anomaly of Nassau Plantation provides a convenient forum for doing this. Nassau Plantation 185 Despite authoritarian traditions, the various states that made up Germany in the nineteenth century, unlike England, France, Belgium, Spain, or Portugal, had no history of association with slavery, either through colonial activities or through commerce and trade. Germans, therefore, had to confront a system that was alien to them, and this confrontation demanded painful choices and compromises. The noblemen who came together in the spring of 1842 to consider forming a company to underwrite and promote emigration to Texas obviously had not come to a consensus among themselves about slavery, and they lacked a full appreciation of the explosive significance of the issue. For Joseph Count of Boos-Waldeck and several others in the Society, the choice had been obvious: adapt the Negro slave paradigm to their own conception of hierarchy and authority. For others, especially Prince Solms-Braunfels, the firsthand confrontation with slavery led to a different conclusion. In any endeavor, conflicting goals can be a root cause of failure. This dissonance had serious repercussions for the Society. Already by 1844, the question of slavery in North America had become a focal point of intense discussion in the German press. Hans Carove, for one, had published a series of decidedly...