Mapping the Home-front: Gettysburg and the Great War

In order to help me make sense of my research throughout the summer, I have been working on a Google map of the town and mapping sites pertinent to the war in Gettysburg. The purpose of my map is to visually display how a small American town thousands of miles away from the war could be literally surrounding by the war on a daily basis.

The map features three layers. The first layer, with red pins, maps the areas of war relief work and home-front support. Even before America entered the war in April of 1917, citizens were raising money and sending donated items to war-torn villages in Belgium. After the war, the county’s newly formed chapter of the Red Cross became extremely active with fundraising drives, rummage sales, and sewing days. The Women’s Liberty Loan committee organized and canvassed the county raising money for the each of the four Liberty Loan Campaigns, and churches sponsored dinners and recreational activities for soldiers stationed at both the 1917 Infantry Camp and 1918 Camp Colt. The second layer features military sites, anything have to do with the battlefield training camps or drafted solders heading to Camp Meade is included in this layer. The third layer represents sites of memory, such as the Roll of Honor Memorial and burial sites of various soldiers.

 

Follow this link to view how the war affected Gettysburg:

Gettysburg and the Great War

Earning Americanism: The End of the German-American

 

As my previous posts have shown, identifying as a German-American in Gettysburg from 1914-1918 rapidly became a very negative identification. German-Americans came to be viewed as suspicious, looking for any chance to sabotage the war effort. “American Kaiser-Wilhelms” were dangerous and not true Americans. However, mid-war, a new discussion arose. President Wilson urged German-Americans that they must choose one ethnicity or the other. Teddy Roosevelt similarly argued that one is either German or American, and cannot be both. Those who demonstrated patriotism, often having to strongly overcompensate to prove their “Americanness,” were accepted as they proved their mettle in war.

On example of this phenomenon occurring in Gettysburg is the evolution of Adolph Weidenbach. Mentioned in an earlier post, Weidenbach made front page headlines simply for becoming an American citizen in 1914. Born in Heidelberg, Germany and reportedly the son of a Junker Baron, the naturalized German became something of an oddity in town. Just over two years later, when America declared war on Germany, Weidenbach again made headlines for being one of the first to volunteer for service. Primarily identified as the German who had been naturalized in Gettysburg, the article went on to explain how he had chosen to volunteer for Uncle Sam’s fledgling Air Service. By 1918, the Times reported that “Captain A. C. Weidenbach…who has seen three months of service as a flier with the American Forces in France, has been appointed supervisor of the airplane mail service between Washington and New York.” No longer “the German”, or even “the naturalized former German”, Weidenbach’s service earned him recognition as a loyal American citizen. Through service to his new county, Weidenbach earned his acceptance into mainstream Gettysburg society. The photo below is a Liberty Loan advertisement funded by the teachers of Adams County demonstrating the same phenomenon: 

Taken from the Gettysburg Times

In the words of reporter Arthur Dunn in late April, 1918, “The war may be worth everything it costs, because it will tend to unify the country. That is, it will make the “melting pot” a reality instead of a phrase. Never again will this country tolerate organizations of foreign-born citizens such as the Germans maintained up to the time of the entry of the United States into the great war. The hyphen will have to go. There will be no more German-Americans.”

“The Curse of Kultur”: Anti-German Sentiment In Gettysburg, Part II

America in the First World War is known for her deeply anti-German sentiment. In a previous post, “To Hell With the Kaiser: Anti-German Sentiment in Gettysburg,” I mentioned some inklings of evidence for anti-German sentiment in the town and surrounding area. My research since that time has yielded even more evidence for anti-German activities in Adams County.

In his book, Over Here: The First World War and American Society, historian David Kennedy presented early twentieth century America as akin to George Orwell’s Oceania in the book 1984, a society with unparalleled censorship and blind hatred towards perceived enemies. At the outset of this study, it seemed doubtful that the kind of rabid censorship and paranoia of Washington, D.C. officials could have made a huge impact on a community as small as Gettysburg. I was wrong. In 1917, German spies and conspiracies were seen in anything and everything. When the Remington Arms Company located in Philadelphia blew up, Gettysburg was quick to blame German-American sabotage. No mail coming from or going to Germany would be accepted by posts offices, Gettysburg’s included. On April 21, 1917, two Adams County boys, Charles Keagy and Albert Kline, were arrested as German spies because they were overheard speaking Pennsylvania Dutch at a train station. In the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country, suddenly  heritage became suspicious and dangerous. After being questioned and released, the “American Kaiser-Wilhelms” were followed by Secret Service agents to verify the boys had told the truth about where they were headed.

Gettysburg, a town rife with German names and Pennsylvania Dutch heritage, seems to have made an effort to overcompensate to prove their Americanism. The irony is profound. At any given week, somewhere in Adams County there were three or four patriotic rallies filled with citizens with German last names damning the Kaiser and his Kultur.

Gettysburg Times, August 17, 1918

In January of 1918, President Wilson passed a proclamation that all male German aliens (still holding German citizenship) over fourteen years of age must be registered. Each man had to present himself to the local post office on the specified day, be photographed, fingerprinted, and provide personal information and business contacts. The registrant than had to carry a card showing he had been certified and authorities could ask to see the card. If the registrant wanted to move from one house to another, he first had to obtain permission from the local chief of police before he could move. One would not expect to find this kind of surveillance in rural Adams County, but on the appointed day, four aliens residing in the county were registered. The names and places of employment of each of the four men was printed in the Gettysburg Times. Only one, Rudolph Adolph Schultz, resided in Gettysburg and was employed as a chef at the Hotel Gettysburg.

Continuing their patriotic efforts, on May 6, 1918, a Liberty Parade was held in Gettysburg. In addition to the marching soldiers, maypoles, and children in patriotic outfits that is to be expected at such events, the parade featured sinister undertones:

                “The high school pupils had a burial party which was conveying a coffin on a bier labeled, “Bill, the Hun; the old dog is dead,” while immediately behind came three grim looking grave diggers each armed with a business-like spade. Another Kaiser was carried about suspended from a rope while the third was dragged along without much ceremony.”

Although this is not Gettysburg, displays such as this would have been seen in town throughout the war. LC-DIG-ggbain-26914

Grave displays such as this makes one wonder what was going through the mind of Rudolph Schultz, the only card-carrying registered alien in Gettysburg, as the Kaiser was hung in effigy and paraded through the streets. Barely a month earlier, Robert Prager, a German coal miner living in St. Louis, was lynched in front of a crowd of 200 people. Did Schultz feel threatened? Did he avoid the parade altogether? Was  he actually a target for anti-German sentiment? These questions cannot be answered, but one gets the impression that pro-German sentiments would not be dealt with kindly in Gettysburg from 1917-1918.

 

“To Hell with the Kaiser”: Anti-German Sentiment in Gettysburg

 

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Gettysburg, located in the center of Adams County, finds itself in the heart of traditional Pennsylvania German territory. East Berlin, Germany township, and Germany Road are only a few of the German-related names one would find on a map of the county. Last names throughout town and especially of the farmers on the outskirts of town reflect German ethnicity. So how did a town like Gettysburg respond to sudden and intense anti-German sentiments and even outright racism towards all people and things German?

So far, I’ve only gotten small glimpses. The front page headline on the Gettysburg Times, August 22, 1914 a few weeks into the war in Europe read “GERMAN BECOMES CITIZEN HERE.” Adolph Weidenbach, a Gettysburg College student, was finally awarded his naturalization papers after being the process since 1910. Why did The Times feel the need to single out a lone German college student? Although there is no overt racism or anti-German sentiment in the article, it is interesting that that would make front page headlines only a few weeks after the German invasion of Belgium. My second glimpse comes from Germany Elementary School, located north of Gettysburg in Reading Township. In 1920, the name of the school was changed from “Germany” to “Victory.” I’m still in the process of tracking down more documentation of the process of the school’s name change, but merely looking at the name change is revealing about the way attitudes towards German-related things had shifted by the end of the war.

Hopefully, this is only the beginning of an interesting ethnic component to my study. I hope to continue looking at some of the German Churches in the area and see what their participation or exclusion from the war effort looked like.