Michener, James A. (90 page)

In this way the lands of Axel Vexter, veteran of San Jacinto, found an owner.

To HELP THE ALLERKAMPS MAKE DECISIONS, ALOIS METZDORF

loaned them A Practical Guide to a Wealthy Life in America, in which sixteen German families advised newcomers as to how they could strike their fortune in the New World. It advised travelers as to what they must take for areas such as Pennsylvania, 'the most hospitable of the States and the most like Germany'; Missouri, 'the State with the most attractive free land and the greatest opportunity for getting rich'; and Texas, 'the most exciting land, an independent nation now but likely to become a part of the United States.'

'We shall need tools, and medicines, and all the clothes we can carry,' Ludwig said after studying the recommendations.

'Books?' Thekla asked, and here her husband had to make painful choices: 'Our Bible, Goethe, Schiller, the book on agriculture.' By curious choice, upon which the family would often comment in later years, he added: 'It'll be a practical land. I'll take along my two mathematics books.' These would prove to be more useful, ultimately, than all the others, but it would be the books of poetry that would echo most strongly and persistently, for they represented the soul of the Germany they were leaving.

When the secret packing was completed and hidden away so that guests could not see, the Allerkamps invited into their home for the last time the members of a singing group with whom they had known so much enjoyment, and when the various families gathered that last Sunday afternoon, the four strong-voiced Allerkamp men led the others in songs that had echoed through the town of Grenz for centuries. Ludwig had a strong baritone and Theo had a clear, ringing, high-voiced tenor, with the two younger boys filling in nicely; others of the group had fine voices too, and the air was rich with music. But Franziska saw that as her mother played the accompaniments, tears filled her eyes, and the child knew that she was saying farewell to this splendid piano over which both mother and daughter had studied so diligently. No more would this instrument guide them in song, and the realization that a glorious part of her life was ending was almost too painful to bear.

They sang till midnight, and in some mysterious way, without a word having been spoken, it became apparent to many of the older people that a requiem was being sung. Some profound change was under way; someone was departing; some new force was arriving; some secret aspect of Germany was being modified; but if certain canny men suspected what Allerkamp was up to, they did not reveal it.

Accepting what money they could get from a surreptitious sale of their possessions, they slipped out of town before dawn one Wednesday morning and slowly made their way toward the port of Bremerhaven, negotiating one passport and customs barrier after another. They moved from one petty kingdom to the next, where the rulers of each tried to prevent the entry of refugees from other principalities, lest they become squatters and a financial drain, but Ludwig, by means of cajolery, lies and even small bribes, maneuvered his caravan across half of Germany, coming at last to the busy city of Bremen, some distance from the harbor from which the ships sailed. Here he reported to the offices of the Atlantic and Caribbean Lines, which owned two sailing vessels plying to Texas, the Poseidon and the Sea Nymph. Captain Langbein, in command of the latter, assured the Allerkamps that they

had chosen wisely and that he would personally oversee their pleasant trip across the Atlantic. Since his ship would not be departing for nine days, he directed the family to lodgings utilized by his firm and then extended them the courtesy of his home, where Frau Langbein proved to be a gracious, motherly lady and a superb cook.

'The captain wants me to serve you the best food,' she explained, 'so that you'll get homesick and sail back to Germany some day with him. That way he earns double fares.' She said that she had sailed once with him to Galveston: 'I was seasick, but it passes quickly. I loved the voyage, and would go tomorrow if he'd allow me.'

As guests of the Langbeins the Allerkamps attended two operas in Bremen, Mozart's Figaros Hochzeit and Weber's Der Freis-chiltz, and the emigrants showed such appreciation of the robust singing that Captain Langbein volunteered advice: 'Take plenty of music with you. It tames the wilderness.'

'We'll have no piano,' Thekla explained, but he was insistent: 'There will be many pianos in Texas. You'll find one. And then you'll be sorry you didn't bring music for it.' This posed a problem, for the family had only the most meager funds, with not a pfennig to spare for luxuries, but as they prowled the back streets, seeking bargains, Thekla came upon used scores of Beethoven and Schubert and a collection of Mozart piano sonatas, and they were so reasonable that she cried: 'I cannot cross the ocean without them.' But when Ludwig approached the owner, even the reduced price was forbidding, and he was about to lead his family from the shop when to his amazement Franziska intruded: 'Sir, we are sailing to a far land and we must have the music'

The man stooped till his face was level with hers, and asked: 'But can you play Mozart?' and she went stiffly to a piano, adjusted the stool, and began to play with youthful skill the Mozart sonata in C major—known as the 'Easy Sonata'—with such grace that he cried: 'Buy the Beethoven and Schubert, and I'll give your little princess the Mozart.'

Next day the Allerkamps sailed for Texas.

It was not till the rickety, swaying Sea Nymph reached midocean that Franziska Allerkamp felt well enough to make her first entry in the diary she had acquired in Bremerhaven:

Monday 31 October. This ship is a leaky tub. It is tossed about by every wave. There's not enough water and the food is horrible.

To save his leaky ship, Captain Langbein had all men passengers operate the pumps twenty-four hours a day.

I have thrown up so much that I can no longer be sick. How pitiful man is upon an ocean like this.

Despite the inconveniences of shipboard life, Franziska found ways to care for her appearance, combing and braiding her hair each morning and doing everything possible to present the picture of a well-bred German lass. Her neatness was remarked by many, and several older women, when they were well enough to move about, congratulated Thekla on her daughter's cleanliness: 'And charm, too. She's a fine child.' Since Franziska secretly coveted such approbation, she took extra pains, and inevitably some of the young men began to pay attention, but her mother, obsessed with creating in Franziska a model German girl who could sew, play the piano, cook, and observe what Thekla called 'the niceties,' quickly-disciplined the would-be suitors: 'No, she cannot sing with you. And she certainly can't walk the lower decks, either.'

Wednesday 9 November. Grandmother taught me always to be neat and Grandfather warned me many times: 'You must smile at young men, to show them respect and make them feel important, but you must never flirt.' 1 don't think 1 would care to marry before twenty-one, because the village girls who did so and who then came in to Grenz were never happy. I could tell from looking at their long faces that they yearned to join our dances in the town square, but with babes at the knee they could not.

Obedient to her mother's standards, she had stopped being a young girl and had already become a poised little woman. As she moved about the upper decks she avoided conversation, preferring to listen to others, but on the rare occasions when she did speak she could be quite firm. Sometimes when she eavesdropped, which was not very ladylike, she picked up bits of information that confused her:

Saturday 10 December. Mother and Father did not think I was listening, but I heard the elders discussing Captain Langbein, whom I like very much A man who lives in Texas but had business in Germany told them that Captain Langbein has a wife in Texas, as well as the one in Bremen whom 1 met and liked so much

I am worried about this and would like to ask Mother whether it could be true, for if it is, Captain Langbein must be a very bad man, which I find hard to believe.

Two days later, as they were approaching Cuba, a storm more violent than any they had known in the European seas overtook them from the east, throwing their pitiful craft about as if it were a cork adrift in a whirlpool. Nearly everyone was wretchedly sick and often too weak to stagger from the cabins, but Franziska, one of the few able to stand, volunteered to clean up the smelly messes.

She had no inclination to feel sorry for herself because Captain Langbein, in obvious distress, called for all men to return to the pumps, and for three perilous days, 21 December through the night of 23 December, she knew that all four of her family's menfolk were toiling in the bowels of the ship, straining at the powerful German pumps, but almost to no avail, for an incredible amount of water continued to stream in through the many cracks, and toward midnight on the twenty-third, Ludwig staggered topside to speak with his wife: Thekla, if anything happens, look first for Franziska. The boys and I will have done all we could.'

At about four that morning the frail ship plowed headlong into a huge series of waves which swept a sailor and two passengers overboard. Their screams were heard briefly, then only the howling of the terrible wind. Thekla, in the cabin, was sure the ship must come apart under the dreadful strain, and so did her husband at the pumps. But these towering breakers marked the end of the violence, and by sunrise on 24 December the Caribbean had begun to subside, so that when Christinas Eve approached, a weak sun actually appeared through the clouds.

Sunday 25 December 1842. We had a quiet Christmas. Father took me down into the ship, and when I saw the holes through which the sea came at us, I wondered why we did not sink. I was not afraid during the storm, because I kept busy helping the women with children, but tonight I am terribly afraid I know this ship cannot last much longer, and I think Father knows it too. And from the look on Captain Langbein's face, he knows it better than any of us.

I no longer care if he lias two wives. He was very brave during the storm, always taking the wheel when the waves were worst. When I marry 1 would want my husband to be much like Captain Langbein, but I would not be happy if he took another wife, too.

When the limping Sea Nymph, her backbone almost shattered by the storms, staggered into Matagorda Bay, all hands cheered. But the sudden onset of a howling wind from across the bay prevented them from landing that day:

Monday 2 January 1S43. After breakfast this morning we finally landed, and it was lucky that we did, for although we got quite dampened by the heavy spray, no great damage was done. But when almost everyone was ashore, and I was looking inland to see our new home, one of the young men who had been nice to me cried in a loud voice 'Jesus Christ!' And all of us turned to look back at the sea, where our Sea Nymph rolled quietly over and sank.

Captain Langbein swam ashore, and when he joined us he said 'For the past two weeks I thought we'd probably sink.' And I asked him what others were afraid to ask. 'Did you think so during the bad storm 7 ' And he said 'I expected to go down any minute, little girl.'

This afternoon some of the women told Mother 'The sinking of that ship was God's curse on the Captain for having two wives,' and 1 thought about this for a long time. Suppose the ship had sunk six days ago, with all of us passengers lost. Would that still have been God's way to punish one immoral Captain? What about us? I think the ship sank because the company took too great a risk in sending out such a rotten crate.

When the six Allerkamps stood with their luggage on the shore of Matagorda Bay, they had no specific idea of where they would sleep that night, or where they would travel in the days ahead, or where they would locate the land on which they would build their permanent home. If ever the word immigrant meant one who comes into a new country, it applied to the members of this family.

A man who built handcarts with solid wooden wheels approached Ludwig: 'You'll have to have one. Three dollars.'

'Have you ever heard of Hugo Metzdorf?'

'All the Germans have. You can trust him. Lives at a place called Hardwork,' and in the sand the wagonbuilder showed them in general how to find their way first to Victoria, forty miles to the west, and from there to Hardwork, ninety miles to the north.

'Everyone,' Ludwig cried, assembling his family and pointing to the sand, 'memorize this map.' And with no aid but that, the Allerkamps loaded their handcart, tied a rope to the front, put Theo at the handles, and set out, with Ludwig hauling on the rope and leading the way.

It was simpler than it sounded, because even in the earlier days when Otto Macnab and his father traversed this route, there was a kind of path to Victoria; now it was a dusty road. From there, another rough-and-ready trail led north, so there was little chance of getting lost. But to walk a hundred and thirty miles with a handcart and sleep on the bare ground in January was not easy. However, in due course the pilgrims reached a slight rise, and there they looked down upon a sight that warmed them. It was a replica

of a German village, complete with rough stone houses, a central square, and prosperous fields that stretched out to thick woodland.

'It was worth it!' Ludwig cried as he started down the slope, and Franziska asked: 'Is this where we'll take our land 7 ' and her father said: 'We'll find even better.'

Until they located the land they wanted, they would stop temporarily at Hardwork, but they were surprised to find that earlier German arrivals already owned the locations in town and that in the surrounding countryside, for many miles in every direction, the attractive rolling land was also taken. 'I thought,' Theo said, 'that everything was free.'

It wasn't. Hugo Metzdorf, the acknowledged leader of the community, explained that there were millions of acres to which the Allerkamp certificates could be applied, but they were always 'out there,' meaning to the west. The newcomers were assured, however, that their papers were authentic: 'None better than these four sold by Toby and Brother in New Orleans, and of course your two military ones are best of all.'