The OHIO HISTORICAL Quarterly
VOLUME 68 ?? NUMBER 1 ?? JANUARY 1959
Friedrich Hassaurek:
Cincinnati's Leading Forty-Eighter
By CARL WITTKE*
THE ABORTIVE GERMAN REVOLUTIONS OF 1848
and 1849
led to an exodus of political refugees
from Europe to the
United States which was unique in the
history of American
immigration. Among the German
immigrants who crossed
the Atlantic in the 1850's in quest of
greater economic
opportunities and political liberty,
there were a significant
number of journalists, lawyers, and other professional
men,
men with a good education and social standing, who
were
able to assume political and cultural
leadership for their
fellow immigrants in America and
provide a cultural leaven
and a vitalizing intellectual
transfusion for the entire German
immigration. In the 1850's, when
nativism was rampant in
the United States and the foreign-born
were on the defensive,
the "Forty-Eighters," as the
political refugees were known,
furnished a proud and aggressive leadership
for the German
group. They were convinced that they
had a mission in
America to counteract the blighting
effects of Puritanism
and to inject the more liberal views of
the European En-
lightenment, and it was during their
ascendancy that the
* Carl Wittke is chairman of the
department of history and dean of the graduate
school at Western Reserve University. He
is the author of a number of books on
the German immigrant in the United
States.
2 THE OHIO HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
Germans of the United States
experienced what has been
described as their "Hellenic
Age."
For many of the refugees their first
years in America
were a period of "storm and stress." Intellectuals, poorly
prepared to make a living in any
practical way in a new
land, had to find new roots for their
uprooted careers. Their
gradual Americanization, and the
conversion of rabid young
radicals into conservative, successful
citizens, is one of the
most illuminating chapters in the
history of American immi-
gration. Friedrich Hassaurek, one of
the youngest of the
Forty-Eighters, who left Austria when
he was a mere lad
of sixteen, to settle in Cincinnati,
became one of the city's
respected and influential citizens. His
experiences in America
were typical of those of many of his
fellow countrymen.1
Hassaurek was born in Vienna on October
9, 1832.2 His
mother, Johanna Abele, was a sister of
the Austrian general
Baron Vincenz von Abele. His father,
Franz Hassaurek,
was a businessman and banker by
vocation, and a litterateur
by avocation, who wrote comedies,
poems, and librettos for
operas, and acted as host to a
distinguished literary circle
which met regularly at his home, and
included such well-
known figures as Grillparzer. Probably
because the elder
Hassaurek was more attentive to his
literary interests than
to his business activities, he lost
large sums of money and
died poor in 1836. His widow married
Leopold Markbreit,
a businessman of sufficient means to
provide her young son
Friedrich with a good education.
Young Hassaurek had just completed his
preparatory
studies for the university at the
Piarist Seminary in Vienna
when the revolution broke out in 1848.
The sixteen-year-
1 For details on the Revolution of 1848
and its effects upon the United States,
see Carl Wittke, Refugees of
Revolution: The German Forty-Eighters in America
(Philadelphia, 1952). The most recent
account of the Viennese uprising is Reuben
J. Rath, The Viennese Revolution of
1848 (Austin, Tex., 1957).
2 This account is based largely on a
collection of Hassaurek papers made avail-
able to me by the widow of the late
Charles Monroe Coffin, professor of English
at Kenyon College, who brought the
papers to Ohio from California. They are
now in the library of the Ohio
Historical Society in Columbus.
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 3
old lad immediately joined the
"student legion" of the Uni-
versity of Vienna, took part in the
skirmishing in and
around the city, and was twice slightly
wounded. When the
imperial army put down the uprising and
reestablished the
authority of the emperor, Hassaurek
left for the United
States to join his mother and her
second husband, who had
settled in Cincinnati in August 1848.
The boy arrived in
April 1849. His stepfather had died the
previous December.
Not yet seventeen, Hassaurek began a
notable career in
journalism which eventually led to the
editorship and presi-
dency of Cincinnati's most influential
German - language
paper, the Cincinnati Volksblatt. His
first articles dealt with
events in the Austrian capital during
the stirring days of
1848, and they were written for Der
Deutsche Republikaner,
a radical paper edited by Emil
Klauprecht, who denounced
priestcraft and capitalism with equal
vigor. In one of his
contributions Hassaurek brashly
attacked Johann Bernhard
Stallo, already a well-known leader of
the earlier German
immigration to Cincinnati, for a speech
the latter made in
Covington on the Negro question, and
thereby precipitated
several bitter exchanges between the
radical Republikaner
and the more conservative Cincinnati
Volksblatt.
Before the close of 1849 Hassaurek
secured more steady
employment, at $3.50 a week, as
translator and assistant
editor of the Ohio Staatszeitung, a
paper started by four
German book printers, and later owned
by Captain Henry
Roedter. Before long the enterprising
young journalist
acquired a paper of his own. With the
help of friends
Hassaurek was able to raise a hundred
dollars in cash and
credit to buy the Hochwachter, a
German weekly which had
been established in Cincinnati by Georg
Walker, a graduate
in theology from the University of
Tubingen who preferred
newspaper polemics to sermons, and who
had been engaged
in several earlier and unsuccessful
journalistic ventures,
including the founding of the
Louisville Volksbuhne, Ken-
tucky's first German-language paper.
Walker died while
4
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
working on the Hochwachter, and
Hassaurek, in association
with Wilhelm Wachsmuth, a former
publisher of the Ohio
Staatszeitung, acquired control. The youthful Forty-Eighter
soon became the sole owner. His office
was located in the
old "Railroad Building," at
Court and Main streets, above
the printshop of the Cincinnati
Volksblatt. At the time, there
were four German papers in Cincinnati,
the Volksblatt, the
Ohio Staatszeitung, Der
Republikaner, and the Union, which
was later merged with the better-known
Cincinnati Arbeiter
Zeitung.
Hassaurek described the Hochwachter as
an "organ for
intellectual enlightenment and social
reform," and a special
sounding board for the
"younger" German immigration.
The paper definitely belongs in the
category of radical, anti-
clerical journals which Forty-Eighters
launched by the
dozens during their "storm and
stress" period in America.
Hassaurek's violent advocacy of
socialistic measures and
anti-clericalism antagonized many of
the older Germans, for
the Hochwachter, in its head-on
assault upon America's
"primeval forest of churches and
dogma," attacked every
form of clericalism, supernaturalism,
and priestcraft. In
association with Karl Obermann, another
extremist, Has-
saurek organized the "Free Men's
Society" of Cincinnati,
which was dedicated to humanism,
rationalism, and ethical
culture. The organization soon had its
own hall at Vine and
Mercer streets, and Hassaurek undertook
an extended speak-
ing tour to recruit members for the
movement in other cities,
and to solicit subscriptions for his
paper. In December 1852
he engaged in a week of public debates
on the morality and
rationality of Christianity in the
Mechanics Institute of
Cincinnati with Wilhelm Nast, the
patriarch of German
Methodism. The gentle, pious Nast was
no match for Has-
saurek's slashing attacks on organized
religion in a hall
packed with the latter's supporters,
and after the first en-
counter Nast turned over the assignment
to debate with the
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 5
fiery young radical to another German
Methodist minister.3
The climax of the Hochwachter's violent
anti-clericalism
came in 1853, when Archbishop Gaetano
Bedini, the papal
nuncio, visited Cincinnati. To liberals and radicals like
Hassaurek, Bedini was the incarnation
of all the evil forces
of reaction. The papal nuncio was
charged with having
supported the Austrian reaction against
Italian liberalism,
and with direct responsibility for the
execution of Italian
revolutionists in 1848. In inflammatory
articles the Hoch-
wachter alerted its readers to the forthcoming visit of the
"Bloodhound of Bologna." An
editorial, written by Hassa-
urek's associate, F. A. Hobelmann,
whipped up such excite-
ment that on Christmas Day from eight
hundred to a
thousand German radicals, recruited
largely from the mem-
bership of the Free Men's Society,
marched to the residence
where Bedini was staying. The
demonstrators carried ban-
ners with such inscriptions as "No
Papacy" and "Down with
Bedini," and the nuncio was hanged
in effigy. A contingent
of Irish police arrived to break up the
riot, shots were fired,
one man was killed, and others were
wounded. The next
day Hassaurek was arrested for inciting
the riot. The inci-
dent was widely discussed in the
German-language press of
the country, and a number of more
conservative editors
denounced Hassaurek's extreme
anti-clericalism and attacked
him especially for precipitating the
disturbance on Christmas
Day. The Hochwachter blamed the
police for the shooting,
and eventually the prosecution dropped
the case.
The decade of the 1850's was marked by
a number of
disgraceful feuds and much personal
abuse among German
radical journalists. Editors used vile
expletives to give spice
to their articles; there were a number of libel suits,
and
several physical encounters; and the Hochwachter
was in-
volved in several bitter
controversies. On one occasion
Hassaurek and a competitor threatened
to extinguish each
other in a duel, and a Cincinnati court
had to intervene with
3 See Cincinnati
Commercial, January 6, 1853.
6
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
a restraining order. Karl Heinzen,
another ultra-radical
who published his Pionier in
Cincinnati from November 1854
to June 1855, on November 22, 1854,
attacked Hassaurek
for misrepresenting his position, in a
letter which virtually
was a challenge to a duel, and he
repeatedly referred to his
rival in radicalism as
"Hasendreck" and the "beer hall
Demosthenes." In turn, the Hochwachter
was extremely
critical of Heinzen's "Louisville
Platform," which constituted
the latter's blueprint for reform, and
as a result Hassaurek
and Heinzen became enemies for life.4
The Hochwachter also feuded with
Wilhelm Weitling's
Die Republik der Arbeiter, primarily because Weitling re-
ferred to the whole Free Men's Society
movement as but
another device to lead the common
people back "into the tute-
lage of the confused . . . German
philosophers." Hassaurek,
in turn, denounced as a "brain
storm" Weitling's utopian
dreams of a communist society and
accused its author of
being "a slave of the
priesthood" and an embezzler of the
hard-earned dollars of German working
men, which he spent
to support his colony at Communia,
Iowa.5 Die Menschen-
rechte, another radical organ published for a short time in
Cincinnati, in 1853, by Wilhelm
Rothacker, fought with the
Hochwachter about all sorts of trivial issues, and espoused a
form of humanism which challenged
Hassaurek's leadership
of the seven hundred members of his
Cincinnati Free Men's
Society.6 Feuds of this kind
finally reached the point that
other German papers like the Columbus Westbote
and the
Philadelphia Freie Presse proposed
an armistice among the
battling journalists, in order to raise
the tone of German-
American journalism, and the Hochwachter
approved the
suggestion.
On the more constructive side,
Hassaurek's organ urged
4 For Heinzen's career, see Carl Wittke,
Against the Current: The Life of Karl
Heinzen (Chicago,
1945).
5 See
Carl Wittke, The Utopian Communist: A Biography of Wilhelm Weitling,
Nineteenth Century Reformer (Baton Rouge, 1950) especially p. 149.
6 See, for example, Die
Menschenrechte of November 19, 1853. There is a
small file of this paper in the library
of the Ohio Historical Society in Columbus.
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 7
the Free Men's Society to close its
bar, and pay less attention
to beer and social events and more to
the higher things of
the mind. Hassaurek helped organize a
German theater in
Cincinnati, known as Das Deutsche
Institut, which gave four
performances weekly until 1861. The Hochwachter
also
waged war against the fraudulent
practices of immigrant
"runners," railroad companies
which sold tickets to immi-
grants, and other individuals and
companies that cheated
and exploited the new arrivals in the
American port towns.
Hassaurek singled out the New York firm
of Rischmueller
and Loescher for special attack, and
several libel suits were
filed against him in the court of
common pleas of Hamilton
County, but the cases finally were settled
without a trial.
Hassaurek's papers contain an undated
agreement signed by
both parties to end the controversy.
In 1856, Hassaurek, now widely known
through his paper
and his lecture tours among the Germans
of the Middle
West, had a chance to buy the Illinois
Staatszeitung of Chi-
cago "for a song." He had
been led to believe that Joseph
Medill and M. C. Vaughan of the Chicago
Tribune were
willing to help finance the purchase,
and he corresponded
with George Schneider of the Illinois
Staatszeitung about a
figure of eight thousand dollars. The
transaction was never
completed, partly because, according to
Hassaurek's version,
the latter was too busy making speeches
for the Republican
party in that year to give the matter
proper attention. In
1857 Hassaurek sold the Hochwachter to
Moritz Jacobi and
Otto Reventlow. Sometime later the
purchasers were in a
violent controversy with the former
owner over the payment
of a chattel mortgage of six hundred
dollars.7
The sale of the Hochwachter marks
the end of the ultra-
radical period in Hassaurek's career.
His interests shifted
to law, the Republican crusade against
slavery, and public
service. Years later he referred to
this "storm and stress"
period as the "rabid" portion
of his life, and characterized
7 Hochwachter, March
17, 1859.
8
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
F. A. Hobelmann, his associate on the Hochwachter,
as "one
of the most rabid of the rabid"
and a "dead beat" in money
matters.
Meantime, Hassaurek had been reading
law with Judge
W. M. Dickson of Cincinnati, and in
1857 he was admitted
to practice. His first partner was
James Elliott, his second,
Christopher von Seggern. Thereafter he
practiced alone,
or in close association with his half
brother, Leopold Mark-
breit, who for a time had a loose
partnership with Rutherford
B. Hayes. Hassaurek developed a
lucrative practice, and
counted many Cincinnati Germans among
his clients. His
successful defense of a demented German
murderer on a plea
of insanity attracted wide attention
and proved excellent
advertising for the rising young
attorney.
The crusading energies of many of the
Forty-Eighter
radicals were eventually drained off
into the controversy
over slavery and abolitionism. Here was
a moral issue into
which their fiery radicalism could be
channeled, and on which
they could work shoulder to shoulder
with their American
brethren. Hassaurek's career followed a
common pattern
among the Forty-Eighters. He was
uncompromisingly op-
posed to slavery, and his first
affiliation was with the Free
Soilers. In 1854 he spoke against the
Kansas-Nebraska bill
at a mass meeting of Germans in
Cleveland. In 1855 he faced
a hostile audience in Quincy, Illinois,
when he spoke on "Slav-
ery and Jesuitism."8 From
1855 to 1859 he was a member
of the Cincinnati City Council, and
fought against Sunday
closing laws. In 1856 he stumped the
Middle West for
Fremont and the Republicans. In 1860 he
was a delegate to
the Chicago Republican convention and
played a prominent
part in the pre-convention conference
of German delegates
who demanded specific assurance that
the new party would
not be dominated by nativists and
Puritans. Hassaurek
made a vigorous speech to the
convention pointing out that
8 See Columbus Westbote, December
7, 1855.
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 9
the German vote would be crucial in the
coming campaign.9
In 1860 Hassaurek stumped Ohio for
Lincoln, and spoke
eloquently in German and English to
large audiences. In
Cleveland he held a German audience
with a speech that
lasted two and a half hours. Letters
from Republican leaders
throughout the Middle West begged him
to come into their
territory where the German vote was
thought to be decisive,
and the twenty-eight-year-old campaigner filled as
many of
these requests as his health
permitted. Hassaurek corre-
sponded with such prominent Ohioans as
Salmon P. Chase,
Ben Wade, Jacob D. Cox, and John
Sherman, and Chase had
written him as early as 1857 to inquire
about what the
reactions of the Germans would be to a
proposed constitutional
amendment which would require
immigrants to Ohio to wait
one year after naturalization before
they could vote.10
On the slavery question Hassaurek's
views remained un-
changed. He was an abolitionist. In
1864 he delivered a
long speech on the philosophy of the
issues in that campaign.
In it he examined the history and
culture of the warring
sections, and maintained that the
civilization of the North
was far superior to that of the South,
primarily because of
the corrupting effects of the
institution of slavery upon the
Confederate States. As late as 1867 the
Republican party
reprinted a speech Hassaurek made in
Columbus on June 19
of that year demanding the right to
vote for the Negro.
Lincoln was fully aware of the
political influence of the
Forty-Eighters in the campaign of 1860,
in persuading many
of their countrymen to desert their
Democratic allegiance for
the Republicans, and the German
leadership was not hesitant
about reminding the president of his
obligation to remember
them in the distribution of the
political spoils. Hassaurek
9 See also F. L. Herriott, "The
Conference in the Deutsches Haus, Chicago,
May 14-15, 1860," Transactions
of the Illinois State Historical Society, XXXV
(1928), 101-191.
10 Chase to Hassaurek, April 7, 1857. A
similar "two year amendment" in
Massachusetts two years later aroused
the entire German element and precipi-
tated a crisis for the new Republican
party. See Wittke, Against the Current:
The Life of Karl Heinzen, 289-291.
10
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
wanted a diplomatic post, preferably in
Switzerland, and many
prominent politicians endorsed his
claims for an appointment.
Timothy C. Day of Cincinnati wrote to
Francis P. Blair;
others wrote directly to Lincoln, or
agreed to speak to him
about the matter. A letter from
Indianapolis gave him the
support of the Republican organization
in Indiana. Hassaurek
was assured that Chase was favorably
disposed toward him,
and members of the Ohio congressional
delegation, with the
exception of Tom Corwin, signed a
petition on his behalf.
While busy pressing his own case,
Hassaurek also received
many letters from fellow Germans asking
for his support
in presenting their claims to the new
administration. Has-
saurek was appointed minister to
Ecuador, instead of Switzer-
land. He is supposed to have thanked
Lincoln for "appointing
him to the highest position the
administration had to give," a
reference to the fact that Quito had
the highest altitude of
any capital city in the world, and the
president is said to have
enjoyed the comment and passed it on to
his cabinet.1l
Hassaurek made the most of his
relatively unimportant and
unexciting post. He quickly became
proficient in Spanish,
as he already was in German, English,
and French, and he
carried on much of his correspondence
in Spanish. He sent
geographical and scientific data to the
American Geographical
and Statistical Society in New York. He
learned to know
and understand the Ecuadorians, made a
number of important
personal connections, and eventually
wrote a significant
volume based on his experiences in
South America. He ren-
dered excellent service in bringing
about a settlement of
claims between Ecuador and the United
States, worked out
the procedures for adjudication and
arbitration by a joint
commission, and himself served as the
American commis-
sioner.
Unfortunately, Hassaurek's sojourn in
Ecuador was seri-
ously complicated by divorce proceedings instituted by
his
11 Harry Barnard, in his Rutherford
B. Hayes and His America (Indianapolis,
1954), p. 212, attributes the remark to
Hayes, who is supposed to have said
"the highest office, viz., nine
thousand feet above the sea at Quito."
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 11
first wife on grounds of adultery. The
affair might easily
have resulted in a public scandal, and
at one point Hassaurek
thought the time had come to resign.
The whole sorry tale
can be reconstructed, at least from
Hassaurek's point of view,
from the long letters he wrote to his
mother, his wife, and
Judge Dickson, who handled the case for
him. Only the
barest outline need be included here,
but it is significant that
while the case involved much that was
damaging to both
parties, Hassaurek did not destroy the
correspondence which
deals with the main events in this
unpleasant affair.
In a nineteen page letter written to
Judge Dickson from
Quito on March 6, 1863, Hassaurek
explained that he had
married after a violent quarrel with
his mother, to whom he
was deeply attached, and who was about
to take a third hus-
band. Hardly eighteen at the time, the
emotionally disturbed
young man, eager to get out of his mother's house, got
a sym-
pathetic hearing from a woman somewhat
older than he was,
who, according to Hassaurek, had left a
husband in Mexico
and had lived with an Irish soldier in
New Orleans and Cin-
cinnati. According to Hassaurek, his
wife had a violent tem-
per, was exceedingly jealous and
possessive, and was consumed
with a desire to dominate her brilliant
young husband. She
kept him away from his mother for
several years and inter-
cepted her letters, and the son had to
take secret leave of her
when he departed for Ecuador. Hassaurek
seemed to be com-
pletely helpless in the hands of his
emotionally disturbed and
hypercritical wife, who made life
unbearable for him but
would not let him go. Matters became
worse in Ecuador, and
in June 1862 Mrs. Hassaurek and her
daughter left for New
York, where she apparently convinced
Friedrich Kapp, an-
other distinguished Forty-Eighter, that
her husband had sent
her off so that he could live
undisturbed with a mistress in
Quito. Hassaurek tried to effect a
reconciliation, and proposed
a trial separation, but to no avail. He
informed Judge Dick-
son that the charges about his conduct
in Ecuador were
groundless, but admitted that in his
despair he had found
12
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
consolation for a time from an equally
distraught and lonely
woman in Cincinnati. Dickson took the
precaution of writing
Chase to forestall any hasty action on
the part of the admin-
istration in Washington. The case ended
in a divorce. Judge
Stallo, no friend of Hassaurek, handled
the litigation for the
plaintiff. There were some damaging
letters, but Judge
Dickson managed to keep the story out
of the papers, and the
attorneys worked out a financial
settlement, by which Mrs.
Hassaurek received a house and lot, and
substantial alimony.
In 1864 Hassaurek returned to the
United States to cam-
paign for the Republican party and to
work for the release
of his half-brother, Col. Leopold Markbreit,
who was being
held as a hostage in a Confederate
prison. After the election
he went back to Ecuador to resume his
duties, but resigned
in 1865 to become editor and part owner
of the Volksblatt,
the leading German paper in Cincinnati,
which has the dis-
tinction of having been the first
German daily in the United
States.
In 1872 Hassaurek joined other
Forty-Eighters in the
Liberal Republican revolt against
"Grantism." The year
before, he corresponded about the
possibilities of staging a
revolt against the Republican regulars,
with such prominent
Ohioans as Jacob D. Cox, George
Hoadley, and Stanley
Matthews. Hassaurek was interested in
civil service and
tariff reform, sound money, an end to
the turmoil over
southern reconstruction, and above all,
he wanted to rid the
country of inefficiency and corruption
in Washington. The
Cincinnati Volksblatt called for a special convention of the
reformers, and Hassaurek organized a
"Reunion and Reform
Association" in Cincinnati, which
cooperated with similar
groups in Missouri and elsewhere. When
the Liberal Re-
publican convention which met in
Cincinnati in 1872 nomi-
nated Horace Greeley, Hassaurek and his
paper gave him
strong support, and Greeley carried
Hamilton County by
four thousand. After Grant's triumphant
reelection, Has-
saurek corresponded with Thomas Ewing,
Cox, and others in
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 13
an effort to keep the Liberal
Republican movement alive, but
his attempt in 1873 to organize a new
"People's Party" in
Ohio failed.
By this time Hassaurek had become
almost ultra-conserva-
tive, and the Republican party had
become too paternalistic
for his tastes. He was opposed to
government intervention in
all matters that could be left to
private initiative and enter-
prise. He denounced the growing
bureaucracy as inefficient,
wasteful, expensive, and likely to
become corrupt; he was a
free trader; and he opposed temperance
legislation, laws to
regulate interest, and government
favors to private business.
He favored the short ballot reform; he
wanted fewer elective
and more appointive offices; and he
advocated a simple, eco-
nomical government, without
"artificial political nostrums
and patent medicines." Like
Jefferson, he believed that that
government is best which governs
least--a far cry from the
socialistic attitude of his younger
years!
In 1876, disgusted with
"Grantism" and the developments
in his own party, Hassaurek endorsed
the Democratic can-
didate, Samuel J. Tilden, even though
his fellow townsman,
Rutherford B. Hayes, was the Republican
choice, and he
advocated Tilden's election in a speech
delivered at a ratifica-
tion meeting in Cincinnati on July 8,
1876.12 However, the
majority of the stockholders of the Cincinnati-Volksblatt
company, of which Hassaurek was
president, Charles P. Taft,
vice president, and Colonel Markbreit,
business manager,
decided to throw the support of the
paper to Hayes. There-
upon Hassaurek took a year's leave of
absence for travel
abroad. Upon his return he resumed his
duties as editor-in-
chief. In 1880 he was finally
reconciled with Carl Schurz,
the most prominent of the
Forty-Eighters and a member of
President Hayes's cabinet. He had
dinner with the secretary,
and joined forces with him in the
common cause--of opposi-
tion to a third term for Grant.
Hassaurek was a man of many talents. He
wrote a lucid
12 The
Washington Sentinel, July 15, 1876, reprinted the speech on the front
page.
14
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
and lively prose, and while abroad in
1876-77 sent accounts
of his experiences to the Volksblatt,
where they were printed
serially under the title
"Europaische Kreuz und Querzuge."
They still make interesting reading.
Hassaurek intensely
disliked Bismarck and Prussianism, and
regretted that Ger-
many had not been united along more
liberal lines. He hated
the class system of the German
railroads, and found German
officials insolent and high-handed.
With such criticisms he
combined fascinating descriptions of
the German landscape
and life in cities and countryside, and
he was particularly
impressed with the beauties of
Switzerland. He admired its
simple governmental structure, but
deplored the fact that the
Swiss Republic had borrowed its system
of military service
from Prussia.
While still with the Hochwachter, Hassaurek
had published
a novel entitled "Hierarchy and
Aristocracy." It was without
particular merit, and appeared serially
in his paper only. On
the other hand, his years in Ecuador
produced a substantial
volume, Four Years Among the
Spanish-Americans, which
went into three editions, and appeared
in a German translation
in Dresden as late as 1887. The four
hundred page book,
published by Hurd and Houghton of New
York in 1868, is
far more than just another superficial
travel book. The
author devoted many pages to South
American geography,
geology, history, and ethnology, and
the book contained
fascinating accounts of mule-back trips
into the interior,
where Hassaurek found alligators,
volcanoes, Inca ruins, and
the life of the natives of almost equal
interest. He wrote of
agriculture and the mechanic arts,
government, social customs,
the influence of Spanish civilization,
and the engrafting of
what he called Romish religion on
ancient idolatry, and he
had much to say about the ignorance and
immorality of the
monks, and the illiteracy and degraded
condition of the
natives. Hassaurek thought he had
enough material for a
whole history of Spanish colonialism,
but he never got
around to writing a second volume.
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 15
About sixteen hundred copies of
Hassaurek's major work
were printed in the first edition, and
about half had been
sold by May 1869. Hassaurek had
subsidized publication,
and later he and his publishers became
involved in a dispute
over royalties. The proud author sent
copies to Charles
Nordhoff of the New York Evening
Post, Henry Raymond
of the Times, and Horace Greeley
of the Tribune. The Ger-
man-language press took notice of the
book, and even Nast's
Methodist Christliche Apologete carried
a favorable review.
The Nation described the author
as a "capable observer and
trustworthy narrator."
In 1865 Hassaurek had published an
article entitled "Tupac
Amaru, the Indian Martyr of Peru,"
in Gazley's Pacific
Monthly.13 In 1879 Robert Clarke and Company published
his The Secret of the Andes, a
romance, the scene of which
was laid in Peru two generations after
the Spanish Conquest.
The story dealt with the career of an
Indian queen who
guarded the hidden treasure of the
Incas, and devoted her
life to the service of her downtrodden
people. The male hero
of the story, who turned into a
villain, was a young cavalier,
Don Julio, whom the queen led
blindfolded to the Inca
treasure, on the promise that he would
liberate her starving
subjects from Spanish oppression.
Instead, Don Julio be-
trayed his benefactress, took up with
another woman, and
became the commander of the Spanish
army which fought
with the queen's native forces. When
her former lover was
captured by the natives and was about
to be torn to pieces,
the queen ended his faithless career by
shooting an arrow into
his heart, an act which was intended to
symbolize the final
triumph of love over revenge.
The novel was reviewed in leading
German and English
papers. The Washington Chronicle found
the story thrilling
but believed the author needed more
practice in writing.
The Atlantic Monthly and the New
York Tribune carried
favorable reviews, and the New York
Times referred to the
13 (New York), II (1865), No. 1, pp. 9-18.
16
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
"blossoming out of a great
novelist." The Cincinnati West-
liche Blatter, the Sunday edition of the Volksblatt, ran the
novel serially, and in 1880 a German
edition was published.
The Baltimore Correspondent of
April 19, 1879, referred to
Hassaurek as "another Charles
Sealsfield." Impressed by
his success, the author resolved to
write another novel, but
if the book was even begun it was never
finished. A plan
to do a biography of Simon Bolivar met
the same fate.
One other publication must be included
in a discussion of
Hassaurek's activities in the field of
belles-lettres. It was a
collection of nearly forty poems,
written in German and
published by M. & R. Burgheim of
Cincinnati, under the
title Welke Bluthen und Blatter (Faded
Blossoms and
Leaves). Some of these poems originally
appeared in the
Cincinnati Volksblatt and the Westliche Blatter; a few were
translations of English, French, and
Italian poems. Most of
them were highly romantic and sentimental;
the meter was
not always perfect; and through many of
them there ran
a strain of melancholy, the musings of
a man in the fall of
his life who is awaiting the final
sleep of winter. One or
two suggest the bitterness of a
Schopenhauer.
Until his last illness Hassaurek
continued to fill many
speaking engagements, for he loved the
public platform,
and he was an earnest, direct, and
vigorous speaker, and
especially successful in after-dinner
oratory, a field in which
the Cincinnati Enquirer thought
he had no equal in the United
States.14 In the spring of
1882 Hassaurek gave the Lincoln
memorial address in Cincinnati, and the next month he
made
the main address at the Turnfest in
that city.15 Shortly there-
after he left for his final visit to
Europe, on a bridal tour
with his third wife.
Hassaurek drank the waters at Carlsbad
for what he
thought was a liver complaint. Although
his health steadily
deteriorated, he and his wife visited
most of the leading
14 September 20, 1885; see also March
16, 1882.
15 Cincinnati Volksblatt, April
15, May 28, 1882.
FRIEDRICH HASSAUREK 17
cities of Western Europe, from which he
sent back interest-
ing and well-written accounts for the Volksblatt.
Hassaurek
attended a Sangerfest in
Switzerland and was in Paris for
the interment of Victor Hugo in the
Pantheon. In Frank-
furt, Germany, he visited the Paul's
Kirche, where the Ger-
man liberal parliament had assembled in
1848 to unify
Germany along republican lines. He was
disturbed by the
anti-German feeling which he found in
France, and in his
observations on Germany he continued to
contrast American
democracy with Prussianism, to the
great disadvantage of
the latter. Hassaurek's last illness
turned out to be cancer,
and after two unsuccessful operations
he died in Paris on
October 3, 1885, at the age of
fifty-three.16
16 For obituary notices, see Cincinnati
Commercial Gazette, October 4, 1885;
Wachter am Eric (Cleveland), October 5, 1885. See also Cincinnati
Enquirer,
September 20, 1885; and "Friedrich
Hassaurek," in Der Deutsche Pionier (Cin-
cinnati), XVII (1886), 3-25.