Do you know where the Klappenbach House is located? From Landa St., turn onto Fredericksburg Rd. and go straight until you get to a hill, Klappenbach Hill. The house on the left is the Klappenbach property. The story of the Klappenbach family is indeed interesting.

The story begins in Sorenbohm, Germany, where in the 1820’s, Johann Heinrich Voelcker was called to be an evangelical Lutheran preacher. He was married to Caroline Wilhelmine Wirth and they had four children, Friedrich, Julius, Franciska, and Eugen Voelcker. In1834 their oldest son, Friedrich, died and then two years later Rev. Voelcker died, possibly of smallpox from parishioners he was tending. The young mother was left alone with three children. She moved to Anklam, a seaport town in far North Germany near the Baltic Sea. Here she eventually married Georg Jochim Jacob Friedrich A. Klappenbach.

Klappenbach, born in 1810 in Lenzen, had studied “Legal Science” at the University of Griefswald. While there he joined a radical reform protest movement, was arrested and sentenced to six years in prison. A year passed and his sentence was commuted. Friends who were in this movement said that Georg was nicknamed “Rebell” and the group was a democratic reform group that met at a pub to drink beer and make speeches. This movement eventually led to the later revolution of 1848 in Germany.

After his arrest, Georg moved to Anklam. He took several municipal jobs. Apparently the political situation was in chaos because the mayor’s position was perpetually vacant. Klappenbach ran for mayor and won, but that didn’t end the discord.

Now here’s a familiar name: John O. Meusebach (as he was later called in Texas) was called on to help sort out the reforms in Anklam and a bond grew between the two men. This friendship ultimately led to Klappenbach’s coming to Texas.

In Anklam Klappenbach married the widow Voelcker, and together they produced a child, Rosa, born in 1840 who died in 1842. Another child, Bruno, was born in 1845.

The Klappenbachs were familiar with the fact that Meusebach emigrated to Texas and Julius Voelcker, Caroline’s oldest living son, emigrated first. Meanwhile the Adelsverein contacted Georg offering him free passage and land in New Braunfels if he would come as an assistant to John Meusebach. He accepted the offer in 1846 and the family pulled up stakes and moved to Texas.

Although Klappenbach received the traditional half acre lot in town (on the corner of Seguin Ave. and Garden St.) he also claimed 50 more acres. This property was bounded by Landa St., which was then called County Road, up Fredericksburg Rd., adjacent to the Balcones Escarpment, and down Parkview Blvd.

On this property in 1846 the Klappenbachs buried Caroline’s child, Franciska Voelcker, 22 years of age. Dr. Ferdinand Roemer describes the funeral in this manner: “According to a North American custom in the rural districts, all people in the funeral procession were mounted (on horses) which appeared unusual ….” The burial was on the property of the stepfather, beside the springs of the Comal, in view of the river and shaded by forest trees.

Stepson Eugen Voelcker constructed the dog-trot style homestead for the Klappenbachs near the springs. He had been trained in carpentry and home building in Anklam. Three feet thick walls of native fieldstone rubble with mortar made of caliche and straw were then covered with stucco. The roof is supported by two unjointed cypress beams the length of the house. The floors are cedar.

Klappenbach farmed and ranched on this property. He used the “GK” brand. He didn’t give up his interest in politics, being elected mayor in 1851 and then on the school board of the NB Academy. He was elected chief justice of Comal County in 1861.

Carl and Augusta Buehler bought the property from Klappenbach in 1881. It was Buehler that terraced the property next to the hill below the house. Buehler was known for his horticulture and the soil was so rich, and the area so perfect for growing fruits and vegetables, that even today many plants spring forth on their own – herbs such as horehound and mustang grapevines.

The most unusual trees are the anaqua trees. They are an old variety that grow close to water (aqua is water). There are many in Landa Park. About this time of year these trees are covered with tiny fragrant flowers that soon turn into berries. Indians concocted a dried food call pemmican. The berries of the anaqua were mixed with dried venison and made into paste for easy carriage.

Buehler’s grandson, Edward Penshorn, took ownership of the farm and then Melvin and Juanita Johnson bought it in the 1930’s. Finally the present owners, Tim and Elisabet Barker, bought the remaining 3 1/2 acres in 1984. Barker is a Master Gardener who grows magnificent flowers on the five terraces. Two small historic buildings have been moved on to the property blending in with the historic dog-trot house still in existence.

Much of the information for this article column has been collected from the Sophienburg Archives. There is a collection of about 450 family books, one of which is “Fink, Voelcker, and Klappenbach Families” by Albert Henry Fink. These family books are a real plus for researchers!

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By Keva Hoffmann Boardman —

The forty-eighters were refugees of the failed German Revolution of 1848. They were idealists. They fought to establish a liberal and unified Germany using liberty, democracy and unity as their main tenets. The designation “forty-eighter” excludes the hundreds of thousands who emigrated from 1848-1852 for mostly economic reasons. It also does not include political refugees from previous periods of political unrest.

There were as many as 4,000 forty-eighters who came to America. Many of the Forty-eighters were young men in their twenties and thirties willing to risk their future. Many of them came from the southwestern Germanic states, from towns like Baden, Hesse, Wurtemburg, the Palatinate, and the Rhineland. Many were highly educated professionals: journalists, soldiers, physicians, pastors, bankers, engineers, lawyers, innkeepers and merchants. And many were “free-thinkers” or even atheistic in their views.

In the book, The Forty-eighters, edited by A.E. Zucker (1950), eleven professors put together a list of several hundred of these men who fled to America. The list includes six who emigrated to Texas — and interestingly enough, five of them have ties to New Braunfels. Let’s take a look at these guys.

Eduard Degener (1809-1890) was the son of a wealthy banker in Braunschweig. He was privately tutored and studied in England. He ran in aristocratic circles even though he favored liberal, democratic ideals. In his elected government positions, he voted for proposals pushing a German republic. He was a member of the first German National Assembly at Frankfurt in 1848. When the revolution failed, Degener emigrated to Maine and in 1850 he made it to Texas. He lived near New Braunfels, and then in Sisterdale, as a gentleman farmer. Degener was a German Unionist and vocal abolitionist. Two of his sons were in the group of young men who tried to get to the North via ship from Mexico in 1862. Overtaken at the Nueces River by a force of Confederate soldiers, many of the men, including the Degeners, were killed. Eduard was put in prison in San Antonio for several months. After the war, he was a wholesale grocer in San Antonio, elected to two constitutional assemblies in Texas and also served in the Forty-first Congress for two terms. In 1865, Degener, with William Steves and William Heuermann, bought land in Comfort. There, they buried the remains of those massacred at the Nueces and put up the “Treue der Union Monument” in their honor.

Carl Daniel Adolf Douai (1819-1888) was born in Altenburg. He studied at the University of Leipzig, got his doctorate and then travelled to Russia where he became a private tutor. He also married a baroness. From 1846 to 1850, Douai was in and out of prison five times! His revolutionary writings and his experimental school made him a target. Leaving Germany in 1852, he settled in New Braunfels and founded his own school. By 1853, he had become editor of the San Antonio Zeitung in which he advocated the gradual abolishment of slavery. Public outcry against his editorials necessitated the help of the Sam Antonio Turnverein (Athletic Club) to protect his offices. He moved to Boston in 1856. He founded a kindergarten and school but after several years this closed due to his atheistic articles. Moving to New York in 1866, he opened another school and edited a socialist newspaper. Through it he became one of the first to popularize Marxist philosophy in the US. Douai wrote articles on philosophy, German grammar, world history and education, as well as short stories and a novel. He was “a brilliant and courageous writer, unafraid of offending his readers’ opinion.” He was also a musician who composed over 60 songs.

Julius Dressel (1816-1891), born in Geisenheim, Rhineland, was the son of a prosperous wine merchant. He studied history, literature and law in Heidelberg. Julius joined his father’s wine business and promoted Rhenish wines around Europe. The Dresel home welcomed guests with radical political ideologies; Julius soon joined the ranks of these revolutionaries and was present at their major meetings. At the failure of the 1848 Revolution, Julius was exiled and he emigrated to Texas where his brother Gustav was employed by the Adelsverein (The Society for the Protection of German Immigrants) as general agent. He was good friends with Lindheimer and many of the early New Braunfelsers. He bought land in Sisterdale but he first worked the New Braunfels farm of John O. Meusebach. Several years later, he moved out to the Sisterdale property. During the Civil War, his abolitionist leanings caused the Confederates to place him in prison in San Antonio. After release, Julius did business in the city until his brother Emil died in California. He became heir to the estate and moved his family to the Sonoma Valley where he took over his brother’s vineyard until his own death. Dressel wrote and published essays and poems in various journals and newspapers, many dealing with the subject of homesickness for his Vaterland.

Gustav Wilhelm Eisenlohr (1811-1881) was born in Loerrach, Baden. He studied theology in Karlsruhe, Halle and Heidelberg. He became the vicar in Emmendingen. Eisenlohr was very outspoken in his support of the 1848 Revolution. Accused of high treason and imprisoned, Gustav was given the choice of being sentenced or to leave Germany. Fleeing to Switzerland, he then emigrated to America in 1850 with his young son. He first took a pastorate in Richmond, Ohio. Eisenlohr then answered an advertisement for the pastorate of the German Protestant Church in New Braunfels. He was installed by Hermann Seele in 1851. After six years, he accepted a pastorate in Cincinnati. He edited and wrote many poems for the Protestantische Zeitlaetter (newsletter) for 20 years. It was “for the instruction and edification of thinking Christians.” Educated in Greek and Latin, this liberal theologian also translated the poems of Petrarch! Pastor Eisenlohr and his second wife returned to New Braunfels 22 years later to retire. Both he and his wife are buried in Comal Cemetery.

Oskar von Roggenbucke (1811-1883), born in Suhl, Thuringia, was a career soldier who attained the rank of major in the Prussian army. Like many other soldiers, he resigned his commission and joined the forty-eighters. A political refugee, he emigrated and came to Texas in 1854. He and his family stayed six months in New Braunfels before settling on a farm in Comfort. He was also an abolitionist. His two sons refused to become soldiers for the Confederacy. They joined the group of Germans headed for Mexico and were among those slaughtered on the Nueces River. Von Roggenbucke lived in Comfort until his death.

Sources: Sophienburg Museum & Archives: Oscar Haas Collection; Dresel Family History; The First Protestant Church Its History and Its People, O. Haas; The Forty-Eighters, A.E. Zucker; A Hundred Years of Comfort in Texas, G. E. Ransleben.

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Have you heard of Dr. Wilhelm Remer? He was an early medical doctor with the Adelsverein for the protection of German immigrants in Texas and he was a friend of Hermann Seele. Here is the story of how they met and their lifetime friendship.

First a little reminder of Seele’s arrival in Texas. Twenty one year old Hermann Seele came to Texas in 1843. He didn’t originally join with the Adelsverein, but after two years in the coastal area, he joined the second group of immigrants who eventually arrived in New Braunfels in May of 1845, two months after the very first group crossed the Guadalupe. While at Indian Point a group of Texan teamsters from Victoria arrived to accompany this second group and take freight belonging to the Adelsverein to the new settlement, fifteen miles north of Seguin.

In April 1845 when the group left Indian Point, the whole coastal area was flooded as a result of too much rain, leaving behind mud in the trails. Even on the first day they traveled only 12 miles. It took four weeks to get as far as Seguin. Mud is very hard on oxen pulling wagons full of goods. To give the oxen rest, they were unyoked and turned out to pasture. A roof type tent of sailcloth was set up to prepare a fire to cook cornbread, bacon, and coffee.

In the evening while sitting around the fire, a tall, strongly built young man with brown hair and beard approached the men around the fire and in German asked, “Guten Abend, meine Herren. Kann ich bei Ihnen bleiben?” (Hello, gentlemen, can I join you?) Although Seele and the others were surprised by the stranger’s arrival, they were very pleased to hear him speak in their native German. The wagoners were American and spoke no German.

The men welcomed this stranger and thus began a lifetime friendship between Hermann Seele and Dr. Wilhelm Remer. From this point on, Seele and Remer were together on their trek inland.

Dr. Remer said that he had arrived in Texas from Breslau, Germany and first practiced medicine in Memphis. From there he went to New Orleans and in April headed back to Texas intending to join the colony. Immediately Remer and Seele began talking about the colonization project and the Adelsverein.

After a terrific thunderstorm, from the north, the group moved on and soon Seele and Remer were witnesses to a barbaric orgy in which a group of Tonkawa Indians had fried and boiled a Waco warrior. Ritual cannibalism was part of their way of life. The Tonkawa squaws felt that if they ate the flesh of the warrior that they admired, that they would pass his good qualities on to their children. For the whole story, see the Sophienburg.com Archives column for August 29, 2008.

As they made their way to the Guadalupe, they were detained because it was impossible to cross the flooding river. All the freight and personal belongings were unloaded. In the distance across the river they could see shimmering white tents of the settlers. On a hill that would later become known to them as the Sophienburg, a black and yellow flag of Germany had been placed there by Prince Carl. At the same time, some of the early settlers had strung up a flag of the Republic of Texas on the area where the Plaza would be. There has been much speculation about the significance of this action.

Waiting on the north side of the Guadalupe until the water had receded, Seele and Remer were finally carried across the river in a canoe hewn from the trunk of a cypress tree by the Smith brothers of Seguin who were cutting cypress shingles. They crossed approximately where the Faust Street Bridge would later be constructed.

They walked into the beginnings of the town and visited with some Germans that they had known in the old country. Remer remained in town and Seele went to pick up meat from the Society’s butcher, H. Burkhart.

According to historian and author Everett Fey, surprisingly Dr. Remer did not receive a town lot. According to others who were First Founders, he should have received a lot since he was a First Founder. Records show that he was listed as an Adelsverein doctor but was not on their payroll. This has caused much speculation especially since he presented a petition to the Colonial Council asking to be treated more fairly. The Council took no action on his request.

During the arrival of thousands of new immigrants in 1845 and 1846, Remer was sent by the Adelsverein to the coastal area to care of the sick immigrants. Dr. Remer eventually set up his medical practice in New Braunfels and married Franciska Kuehn in 1850.

In 1855 a gruesome crime took place in New Braunfels. One of the original founders of NB, Christoph Moeschen, was murdered during the night by his wife, daughter, and son-in-law. Dr. Remer was the doctor called upon to examine the victim and pronounce him dead. According to Hermann Seele, the doctor asked the coroner, “What am I supposed to do now?” to which the coroner replied, “You are to state if the man is dead”. He pronounced that the man was indeed dead and the coroner called for an autopsy right there. After the autopsy, Remer said, “The old man has been murdered. Put the people under arrest.” Seele felt that Remer’s remarks were strange. In the end, mother, daughter, and son-in-law were arrested, tried, and sentenced to nine years in prison. The mother died in prison, the daughter paroled in 1860 and the son-in-law paroled in 1862. For the whole story see Sophienburg.com, Feb 7, 2012.

Not much more is known about Dr. Remer except that he died in 1870. Seele in his writings shows a great deal of respect for the medical profession. Although we don’t have much personal information about Dr. Remer, we can conclude that Seele and he continued a friendship that began in their early days in Texas and lasted throughout their lives.

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