Der Katholische Gesellenverein in der Diözese Rottenburg von 1852 bis 1945: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Katholizismus in Württemberg by Ansgar Krimmer (review)

268 BOOK REVIEWS change between Bishop Jules-Marie Courcoux and Dom Fulbert Glories: the bishop chagrined that a secretary of Charles Maurras—thus an important member of the condemned Action française—should be allowed to receive Communion publicly at the parish church. And the writer Max Jacob has an important walk-on part, in that this flamboyant gay and earnest convert treasured his moments at the ancient abbey. (For another off-angle look at the convert Jacob, see the extraordinary Correspondence ofJean Cocteau and Jacques Maritain with essential notes by Michel Bressolette and Pierre Glaudes [Paris: Gallimard, 1993]). After the drôle de guerre (here again, readers can view localized experience of a nationally traumatic event), the modern Benedictine community at St.Beno ît-sur-Loire was established, finally, October 11, 1944. Important examinations of the reputed relics of St. Benedict (and St. Scholastica) were conducted by church and medical authorities, verifying that the bones were those chronicled at the founding of the monastery in the seventh century. The results of the brief, sound reports of these examinations, previously available only locally, are reported by the author. This is a necessary book. We cannot understand the significance of major events if we cannot see how they impinged on individual lives and concrete events of local significance. Fortunately for us, St.-Benoît-sur-Loire has an erudite chronicler and a genial interpreter in Alphonse de SaintVincent. Joseph F. Byrnes Oklahoma State University Der Katholische Gesellenverein in der Diözese Rottenburg von 1852 bis 1945:Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Katholizismus in Württemberg. By Ansgar Krimmer. [Veröffentlichungen der Kommission für Zeitgeschichte, Reihe B: Forschungen, Band 66.] (Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh. 1994. Pp. xxx, 306.) This is a well-researched regional study of the Catholic journeymen's associations , which were of considerable, if underappreciated, significance in the development of working-class culture and consciousness in the nineteenth century. The socialist August Bebel, for example, first came to an awareness of the plight of German workers while a member of various Catholic journeymen 's associations in southern Germany. Krimmer's work is an important contribution to our understanding of this long-neglected aspect of both Catholic and working-class history in Germany. The work gives a thorough introduction to the history, organization, and work of the journeymen's associations. The Gesellenvereine were clerically led organizations devoted to preserving religious faith and providing economic assistance among the young artisans ofGermany . The milieu of the Catholic journeymen's associations is also well fleshed out: the function of the various association houses as meeting place, temporary BOOK REVIEWS 269 shelter, and employment register; the creation of savings and insurance funds; and the sponsorship of libraries, lectures, theater presentations, dances, and athletics. Krimmer does an excellent job delineating the serious organizational conflicts between journeymen's associations, Catholic Arbeitervereine (workingmen 's associations), and Christian trade unions. Krimmer's perspective on the divisive Gewerkschaftsstreit (trade union controversy) of the early twentieth century reveals how the journeymen's associations were jealous of their role and skeptical of the democratic and interconfessional practices of the unions. About 1907, a compromise was reached wherein religious-cultural work was left to the journeymen's associations, and economic work delegated to the unions. At the same time, an accommodation with the workingmen's associations was established, transforming the journeymen's associations into organizations for young, unmarried workers of all kinds. The delay in resolving the crisis, as Krimmer rightly points out, severely damaged the entire Catholic labor movement. Krimmer falters, however, on two counts. First, the consistently positive portrayal of the internal life of the associations glosses over any conflict between the clerical leadership and the artisanal/working-class members. Krimmer presents the question ofwhether the associations functioned as charitable welfare organizations, or as instruments for the emancipation of craftsmen, as a nonquestion , arguing that these two perspectives worked hand-in-hand with each other. If the history of the Catholic workers' associations is any indication, such peaceful relations within the associations were an illusion. Workers and journeymen wanted organizations that were more than paternalist bulwarks for the defense of traditional occupations and religion; yet this conception was what the...