GermanAmericanHistory7

German-American History - 7

   George Washington
     February 22, 1732 - December 14, 1799
First President of the United States of America

On April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street
in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States. "As the first of
every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent,
" he wrote James Madison, "it is devoutly wished on my part,
that these precedents may be fixed on true principles."

Born in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the
morals, manners, and body of knowledge requisite for an 18th
century Virginia gentleman.

He pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western
expansion. At 16 he helped survey Shenandoah lands for
Thomas, Lord Fairfax. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in 1754,
he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the French and
Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock,
he escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two
horses were shot from under him.

From 1759 to the outbreak of the American Revolution, Washington managed his lands around
Mount Vernon and served in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Married to a widow, Martha
Dandridge Custis, he devoted himself to a busy and happy life. But like his fellow planters,
Washington felt himself exploited by British merchants and hampered by British regulations.
As the quarrel with the mother country grew acute, he moderately but firmly voiced his
resistance to the restrictions.

When the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in May 1775, Washington,
one of the Virginia delegates, was elected Commander in Chief of the Continental Army. On
July 3, 1775, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, he took command of his ill-trained troops and
embarked upon a war that was to last six grueling years.

He realized early that the best strategy was to harass the British. He reported to Congress, "we
should on all Occasions avoid a general Action, or put anything to the Risque, unless compelled
by a necessity, into which we ought never to be drawn." Ensuing battles saw him fall back
slowly, then strike unexpectedly. Finally in 1781 with the aid of French allies--he forced the
surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

Washington longed to retire to his fields at Mount Vernon. But he soon realized that the Nation
under its Articles of Confederation was not functioning well, so he became a prime mover in the
steps leading to the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia in 1787. When the new
Constitution was ratified, the Electoral College unanimously elected Washington President

He did not infringe upon the policy making powers that he felt the Constitution gave Congress.
But the determination of foreign policy became preponderantly a Presidential concern. When
the French Revolution led to a major war between France and England, Washington refused to
accept entirely the recommendations of either his Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, who
was pro-French, or his Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who was pro-British.
Rather, he insisted upon a neutral course until the United States could grow stronger.

To his disappointment, two parties were developing by the end of his first term. Wearied of
politics, feeling old, he retired at the end of his second. In his Farewell Address, he urged his
countrymen to forswear excessive party spirit and geographical distinctions. In foreign affairs,
he warned against long-term alliances.

Washington enjoyed less than three years of retirement at Mount Vernon, for he died of a
throat infection December 14, 1799. For months the Nation mourned him.

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Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben
   September 17, 1730 - November 28, 1794
     From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Baron von Steuben portrait by Ralph EarlFriedrich Wilhelm Ludolf Gerhard Augustin von
Steuben (September 17, 1730 – November 28, 1794) was a German-Prussian army officer who
served as inspector general of the Continental Army
during the American Revolutionary War. He is
credited with teaching the Continental Army the
essentials of military drill and discipline, helping to
guide it to victory. He wrote the book that became
the standard United States drill manual until the
War of 1812, and essentially served as General
George Washington's chief of staff in the final
years of the war.

Early life:

Steuben was born at Magdeburg, Duchy of
Magdeburg, the son of Wilhelm Augustin
Steuben (1699-1783), a lieutenant of engineers.
His mother was Elizabeth von Jagvodin. Steuben
accompanied his father to the Russian Empire
when Friedrich Wilhelm I, King of Prussia and
Elector of Brandenburg, ordered Wilhelm into the service of Czarina Anna I. The family
returned to Prussia after the accession of Frederick the Great to the throne in 1740.

Steuben was schooled in Breslau by Jesuits and by the age of 17 was a Prussian officer in the
military. During the Seven Years' War he was a member of an infantry unit but served
primarily as a staff officer. By 1761 he had risen to the rank of captain and was serving in the
Prussian general headquarters. The army was greatly reduced in size at the end of the war, and
Steuben was one of many Prussian officers suddenly without work. His Prussian military career
would later be exaggerated—he was not one of Frederick the Great's generals—but his
experience on a professional general staff, an agency then practically unknown outside of
Prussia, would prove to be valuable in his American career.

Between the wars:

In 1764 Steuben became chamberlain at the petty court of Hohenzollern-Hechingen. In 1769 he
started using the title of baron, based on a falsified lineage prepared by his father.[1] He was
the only courtier to accompany his incognito prince to France in 1771, hoping to borrow money.
Failing to find funds, they returned to Germany in 1775, deeply in debt.

In 1776, Steuben's career at Hohenzollern-Hechigen ended in scandal: he was alleged to be
homosexual and was accused of improper sexual behaviour with young boys.[1] Whether or not
Steuben was actually homosexual is not known, but the rumors compelled him to seek
employment elsewhere.[1] Steuben tried employment in several foreign armies including
Austria, Baden, and France.

Statue of Steuben at Valley ForgeSteuben traveled to Paris in the summer of 1777. As luck
would have it, he had formerly made introduction with the French Minister of War, Claude
Louis, Comte de Saint-Germain. The Count fully realizing the potential of an officer with
Prussian general staff training, further introduced him to Benjamin Franklin. Upon the Count's
recommendation, Steuben was introduced to George Washington by means of a letter from
Franklin as a "Lieutenant General in the King of Prussia's service," an exaggeration of his
actual credentials that appears to be based on a mistranslation of his service record. He was
advanced travel funds and left Europe from Marseilles.

American Revolution:

On September 26, 1777, he reached Portsmouth, New Hampshire and by December 1, was
extravagantly entertained in Boston. Congress was in York, Pennsylvania, after being ousted
from Philadelphia by the British advance. By February 5, 1778, Steuben had offered to
volunteer without pay (for the time), and by the 23rd, Steuben reported for duty to Washington
at Valley Forge. Steuben spoke little English, but German and French were known by many
officers. Many troops were immigrants and therefore spoke German. Colonels Alexander
Hamilton and Nathanael Greene were of great help in assisting Steuben in drafting a training
program for the Army, which found approval with Washington.

Training program:

Steuben's training technique was to create a "model company", a group of 120 chosen men who
in turn successively trained other personnel at Regimental and Brigade levels. Steuben's
eclectic personality greatly enhanced his mystique. He trained the soldiers, who at this point
were greatly lacking in proper clothing themselves, in full military dress uniform, swearing and
yelling at them up and down in German and French. When that was no longer successful, he
recruited Captain Benjamin Walker, his French speaking aide, to curse at them for him in
English. Steuben introduced a system of progressive training, beginning with the school of the
soldier, with and without arms, and going through the school of the regiment. This corrected the
previous policy of simply assigning personnel to regiments. Each company commander was
made responsible for the training of new men, but actually instruction was done by selected
sergeants, the best obtainable.

Another program developed by Steuben was camp sanitation. He established standards of
sanitation and camp layouts that would still be standard a century and a half later. There had
previously been no set arrangement of tents and huts. Men relieved themselves where they
wished and when an animal died, it was stripped of its meat and the rest was left to rot where it
lay. Steuben laid out a plan to have rows for command, officers and enlisted men. Kitchens and
latrines were on opposite sides of the camp, with latrines on the downhill side. There was the
familiar arrangement of company and regimental streets.

Statue of Steuben at Monmouth Battlefield State ParkPerhaps Steuben's biggest contribution to
the American Revolution was training in the use of the bayonet. Since the Battle of Bunker
Hill, Americans had been mainly dependent upon using their
ammunition to win battles. Throughout the early course of the
war, Americans used the bayonet mostly as a cooking skewer
or tool rather than as a fighting instrument. Steuben's
introduction of effective bayonet charges became crucial. In the
Battle of Stony Point, American soldiers attacked with unloaded
rifles and won the battle solely on Steuben's bayonet training.

First results of Steuben's training were in evidence at Barren Hill,
20 May 1778 and then again at the Battle of Monmouth in June
1778. Steuben, by then serving in Washington's Headquarters,
was the first to determine the enemy was heading for Monmouth.
Washington recommended appointment of Steuben as Inspector
General on April 30; Congress approved it on May 5. During the
winter of 1778-1779, Steuben prepared Regulations for the Order
and Discipline of the Troops of the United States, commonly known as the "Blue Book."[2] Its
basis was the training plan he had devised at Valley Forge.

Southern campaign:

The following winter (1779-1780) Steuben's commission represented Washington to Congress
regarding the reorganization of the army. In 1780 Steuben sat on the court-martial of the
British Army officer Major John André, captured and charged with espionage in conjunction
with the defection of General Benedict Arnold. He later traveled with Nathanael Greene, the
new commander of the Southern campaign. He quartered in Virginia since the American
supplies and soldiers would be provided to the army from there. During the spring of 1781, he
aided Greene in the campaign in the south, culminating in the delivery of 450 Virginia
Continentals to Lafayette in June.

He was forced to take sick leave, rejoining the army for the final campaign at Yorktown, where
his role was as commander of one of the three divisions of Washington's troops. Steuben gave
assistance to Washington in demobilizing the army in 1783 as well as aiding in the defense plan
of the new nation. He was discharged from the military with honor on March 24, 1783.

Final years:

Steuben became an American citizen by act of the Pennsylvania legislature in March 1784 (and
later by the New York authorities in July 1786). With the war over, Steuben resigned from
service in 1784 and first settled on Manhattan Island, where he became a prominent figure and
elder in the German Reformed Church. His business acumen was not very keen and in the
depression following the War, found himself in difficult financial conditions, particularly
because Congress did not pay a promised pension nor compensate him for wartime expenses.
After his friend Alexander Hamilton became Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton, with support
of President Washington, submitted Steuben's expenses to Congress, which in 1790 finally
voted him a yearly pension of $2,500.

Steuben eventally settled on a small estate in the vicinity of Utica, New York, on land granted
to him for his military service. He later assisted in the founding of the Society of the Cincinnati
and was appointed a Regent for what evolved into the State University of New York. He never
married and had no children. He left his estate to Benjamin Walker and William North, who
had served as his aides-de-camp during the war, and with whom he had had a "extraordinarily
intense emotional relationship".[3] He is buried at what is now the Steuben Memorial State
Historic Site.

Legacy:

Steuben Monument by Albert Jaegers in Lafayette Park Washington, DCVon Steuben has a
holiday which takes place in September in the United States. It is often considered the German-
American event of the year. Participants march, dance, wear Germanic costumes and play
Germanic music, and the event is attended by millions of people. The largest event is the
Annual German-American Steuben Parade in New York City, which is traditionally followed by
a Volksfest (People's Festival) in Central Park as well as celebrations in Yorkville, Manhattan,
a traditionally German section of New York City. The German-American Steuben Parade has
been taking place since 1957. Chicago's von Steuben Day parade is featured in the American
movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off." Philadelphia is also known to host a very large von Steuben
Parade that runs throughout the Northeast of the city.
The post-World War I years were difficult times for the German-American community during
which they reorganized their main association into the Steuben Society, now the largest
organization for Americans of German extraction.
A warship, a submarine, and an Ocean liner (later pressed into military service) were named in
von Steuben's honor. In World War I the captured German ship Kronprinz Wilhelm was
renamed as the USS Baron von Steuben, and in World War II there was the Dampfschiff (DS)
General von Steuben, an ill-fated German luxury passenger ship which was turned into an
armed transport ship during the war. During the Cold War, a US Navy submarine was named
for him, the USS Von Steuben.

Several locations in the United States are named Steuben, most of them in his honor. Examples
include Steuben County, New York, Steuben County, Indiana, and the city of Steubenville,
Ohio.

Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center is a public high school in Chicago, Illinois.
Steuben is one of four European military leaders who assisted the American cause during the
Revolution honored with a statue in Lafayette Square just north of The White House in
Washington, DC.

The Steuben House presented to Steuben as a gift for his services in the Continental Army is
located in River Edge, New Jersey. Originally belonging to a Loyalist family, the house and
surrounding farmland were seized in 1781. It was bought by the county of Bergen in 1928 for
$9,000 and preserved as a national monument and public museum. The area around the house
is used for both Revolutionary and Civil War re-enactments.

The Hamilton College football team plays on Steuben Field constructed in 1897, one of the top
ten oldest collegiate football fields in the United States.[4] The field is named for Baron von
Steuben who laid the cornerstone of the school acting as Alexander Hamilton's surrogate. Upon
graduating, all Hamilton seniors receive a cane as a gift from the college. The cane's design
features a tricorn hat at the top of the cane to honor von Steuben.
The various depictions of Steuben in popular (American) media include portrayals by Nehemiah
Persoff in the 1979 U.S. TV Miniseries The Rebels, Kurt Knudson in the 1984 TV miniseries
George Washington, and being voiced by Austrian-American Arnold Schwarzenegger in the
animated series Liberty's Kids.

Steuben has been cited (most notably by Randy Shilts in his book Conduct Unbecoming) as an
early example of a gay man in the military, but the evidence in this matter is inconclusive.[5]

References:

^ a b c Philander D. Chase. "Steuben, Friedrich Wilhelm von". American National Biography
Online, February 2000.

^ This book is available for download at sgtstime.com

^ William B. Skelton. "North, William"; American National Biography Online, February 2000.

^ NESCAC Football Record Book

^ Uniform Discrimination. Human Rights Watch. Retrieved on 2007-09-18.

Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg
               January 1, 1750 - June 4, 1801
  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

1st & 3rd Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
In office
April 1, 1789 – March 4, 1791 (1st)
December 2, 1793 – March 4, 1795 (3rd)
President George Washington
Preceded by None; First in line (1st)
Jonathan Trumbull, Jr.
Succeeded by Jonathan Trumbull, Jr.
Jonathan Dayton

--------------------------------------------------------

Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Pennsylvania's At-large district
In office
March 4, 1789 – March 3, 1795
Preceded by None
Succeeded by John Swanwick, Richard Thomas, Samuel Sitgreaves, John Richards, Daniel
Hiester, John A. Hanna, John W. Kittera, Thomas Hartley, Andrew Gregg, David Bard, Samuel
Maclay, William Findley, Albert Gallatin

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Member of the U.S. House of Representatives
from Pennsylvania's 2nd district
In office
March 4, 1795 – March 3, 1797
Preceded by Thomas Fitzsimons, John W. Kittera, Thomas Hartley, Thomas Scott, James
Armstrong, Peter Muhlenberg, Andrew Gregg, Daniel Hiester, William Irvine, William Findley,
John Smilie, William Montgomery
Succeeded by Blair McClenachan

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Born January 1, 1750
Trappe, Pennsylvania
Died June 4, 1801 (aged 51)
Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Political party Pro-Administration
Anti-Administration
Alma mater University of Halle-Wittenberg
Profession Minister of religion
Religion Lutheran

This article is about the first Speaker of the U.S. House of Representative. For the 20th century
U.S. congressman also from Pennsylvania, see Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg.
Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg (January 1, 1750 – June 4, 1801), was an American
minister and politician who was the first Speaker of the United States House of
Representatives. A Delegate and a Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from
Pennsylvania and a Lutheran pastor by profession, Muhlenberg was born in Trappe,
Pennsylvania.

According to an urban legend, Muhlenberg as House Speaker prevented German from becoming
the official language of the United States.[1][2]

Early life and ministerial career:

Frederick Muhlenberg was the son of Henry Muhlenberg, an immigrant from Germany and
considered the founder of the Lutheran Church in America. His brother, Peter, was a General
in the Continental Army. Muhlenberg was born in Trappe, Pennsylvania.

He attended the University of Halle, Germany, where he studied theology, and was ordained by
the Pennsylvania Ministerium as a minister of the Lutheran Church on October 25, 1770. He
preached in Stouchsburg, Pennsylvania, and Lebanon, Pennsylvania, from 1770 - 1774, and in
New York City from 1774 - 1776. When the British entered New York at the onset of the
American Revolutionary War, he felt obliged to leave, and returned to Trappe. He moved to
New Hanover Township, Pennsylvania, and was pastor there and in Oley and New Goshenhoppen
until August 1779.

Political career:

Muhlenberg was a member of the Continental Congress in 1779 and 1780, and served in the
Pennsylvania House of Representatives from 1780 to 1783 and was elected its speaker on
November 3, 1780. He was a delegate to and president of the State constitutional convention in
1787 called to ratify the Federal Constitution. He was the first signer of the "Bill of Rights".

Elected to the First and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1789–March 4, 1797),
Muhlenberg was the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives for the First
Congress (1789-1791) and Third Congress (1793-1795). He did not seek renomination in 1796.

During Muhlenberg's second tenure as speaker, the House voted 42-41 in 1794 against a
proposal to translate some of the laws into German. Muhlenberg, who himself abstained from
the vote, commented later, "the faster the Germans become Americans, the better it will be."
[1] Despite not even voting for the bill, an urban legend called the Muhlenberg legend was
started, stating that he was responsible for not letting German become an official language of
the United States.[1]

Muhlenberg was also president of the council of censors of Pennsylvania, and was appointed
receiver general of the Pennsylvania Land Office on January 8, 1800, and served until his death
in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on June 4, 1801. He was interred in Woodward Hill Cemetery there.
After his death, the Township of Muhlenberg, Pennsylvania, was named for him.

In World War II the United States liberty ship SS F. A. C. Muhlenberg was named in his honor.

Continued on German-American History - 8