The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 91, July 1987 - April, 1988 Page: 362
619 p. : ill. (some col.), maps (some col.), ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
lic of Texas.2 After organizing in 1842 and reorganizing in 1844 at
Biebrich am Rhein, this Adelsverein enlisted writers, scientists, philoso-
phers, politicians, merchants, and military, as well as students, artisans,
and peasants, under the titular leadership of such men as Prince Her-
mann of Wied-Neuwied (1814-1864), Prince Frederick of Prussia
(1794-1863), Grand Duke Adolph of Nassau (1817-1905), Duke
Ernst II of Sachsen-Coburg (1818-1893; brother of Prince Albert of
Great Britain), Prince Carl of Leiningen (1804-1856; president of the
society, first prime minister of the Frankfurt Parliament, and half-
brother of Queen Victoria), various members of the Solms family
at Braunfels and Lich, and Count Carl of Castell (18o1-1850; vice-
president of the society and aide-de-camp to Duke Adolph). These
nobles promoted a platform for social and economic philanthropy
through migration and trade, explicitly denying the political and eco-
nomic speculations they nonetheless discussed and seem in fact to have
practiced.
After the collapse of the venture in 1847, never yet satisfactorily ex-
plained in financial terms, German migration to Texas continued with-
out what had always been minimally effective leadership. The records
of the league were maintained in Wiesbaden until they were removed
on January 8, 1893, from the citadel at Biebrich and consolidated in the
castle of Braunfels. There, rubber-stamped in red as part of the Ffirst-
lich Solms-Braunfels'sches Archiv (not to be confused with Prince Carl
"of Texas," who was a Prinz, not the Fiirst, or Reigning Prince), they
remained until the collection was moved to Berlin in 1929, where about
40 percent of the contents were photostated under Georg Smolka's di-
rection. (Rudolph Leopold Biesele used these photostats in the Library
of Congress to make the 1933-1934 transcripts found in the Barker
Texas History Center, University of Texas at Austin, and the Sophien-
burg Museum, New Braunfels.) From Berlin the collection returned in
1931 to Braunfels, from whence, after protracted negotiations involv-
2Other names used by the society and its Texas affiliate included Mamzer Adelsverein
(so named because of headquarters in Mainz, or Mayence), Verein zum Schutze deutscher
Auswanderer in Texas (Society for the Protection of German Emigrants in Texas), Verem
deutscher Fdrsten und Edelleute (Society of German Prminces and Nobles), Texas and German
Emigration Company (used in Texas in negotiations with the Texas government), and-prob-
ably only a single occurrence in 1844-Verein fiar Auswanderer (Society for Emigrants)
3For additional descriptions of the collection and its provenance, see Eckhart G. Franz, "Die
merkwdrdigen Schicksale des Braunfelser 'Texas-Archiv,'" Mittezlungen aus den Hessschen
Staatsarchzven, XXII (1986), 5-6; Jeanne Willson, "Solms-Braunfels Archives, 1842-1862," de-
scriptive overview in Solrnms-Braunfels Archives inventory (Eugene C. Barker Texas History
Center, University of Texas, Austin); and the note on the archives in the Southwestern Hstorical
Quarterly, XC (Apr., 1987), 398-399.362
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 91, July 1987 - April, 1988, periodical, 1987/1988; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101211/m1/418/?rotate=270: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.