Fritz Anneke
Encyclopedia
Friedrich 'Fritz' Anneke (January 3, 1818, Dortmund
, Germany
– December 6, 1872, Chicago
, United States
) was a German socialist and newspaper editor, owner, and reporter. He immigrated to the United States with his family in 1849 and became an officer in the Union army, and later an entrepreneur and journalist. He was the husband of Mathilde Franziska Anneke
, the older brother of Emil Anneke
, the first Republican
Michigan Auditor General
, and the father of Percy Shelley Anneke, well-known in Duluth
, Minnesota
, as co-founder and owner of the famous Fitger Brewing Company
, now registered as a U.S. National Historic Place.
in what is today Saxony-Anhalt
. Schadeleben is close to the Harz
mountains, one of the oldest mining regions in Europe. Like the family of Martin Luther
, whose birthplace, Eisleben
, is only a few kilometers away from Schadeleben, many of Anneke's ancestors had worked in mining, which is why the family moved to Dortmund in the early 19th century, when industrial coal mining
was beginning in the Ruhr district. Like his father, Anneke's brother Emil was a mining inspector, before he became involved in the 1848 revolution.
Anneke became a Prussian artillery officer, but was dishonorably dismissed in 1846 because of his democratic activities at his garrison in Münster
and also because he refused a duel
. While still in Münster he met the divorced Mathilde Franziska von Tabuillot
, who later became his wife. He was one of the leading figures of the Communist movement in Cologne together with his friends Karl Marx
, Friedrich Engels
, Moses Hess
(later the intellectual father of Zionism
and the State of Israel). He spent most of 1848 in jail for his political activities. In 1849 he joined the revolutionary campaigns in Palatinate and Baden, and was commander of the artillery there. Carl Schurz
served as his adjunct officer. After the fall of Rastatt
he fled to France, where he found refuge with his wife in the house of their mutual friend Moses Hess. Later on he worked as a correspondent for U.S. media in Europe, where he tried to join the Italian revolutionary movement under Guiseppe Garibaldi. In 1862 he returned to the USA to assume command of the 34th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment
as a colonel
. In 1863 he became the victim of blackmail and was dishonorably dismissed. His regiment was dissolved on September 9, 1863. Afterwards he tried in vain to be readmitted to Army service, supported by his brother Emil Anneke
, who was a leading Republican in Michigan and acting Michigan Auditor General
. Many of Anneke's friends and comrades from the 1849 campaign in Germany had become Union generals, including his own junior adjunct officer Carl Schurz
, August Willich
, Ludwig Blenker, Franz Sigel
, and Gustav Struve
.
After various failed commercial enterprises and the split with his wife Mathilde Franziska Anneke
(who became an eminent figure in the U.S. abolitionist and suffrage
movements, and lived together with the American feminist and writer Mary Booth
from 1860 until Booth's death in 1865), Fritz moved to Chicago, where he died in December, 1872, after an accident. The short-sighted Anneke had fallen into a construction pit. Lighting was very bad in Chicago in those days, and the city was, one year after the Great Fire of Chicago full of such pits.
A son of Fritz, Percy Shelley Anneke, was a local celebrity in Duluth
, Minnesota
, as co-founder and owner of the famous Fitger Brewing Company
, which is now registered as a U.S. National Historic Place.
Dortmund
Dortmund is a city in Germany. It is located in the Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the Ruhr area. Its population of 585,045 makes it the 7th largest city in Germany and the 34th largest in the European Union....
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
– December 6, 1872, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
) was a German socialist and newspaper editor, owner, and reporter. He immigrated to the United States with his family in 1849 and became an officer in the Union army, and later an entrepreneur and journalist. He was the husband of Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke was a German feminist, socialist, and newspaper editor, owner, and reporter. Born Mathilde Franziska Geisler, her first marriage to Alfred von Tabouillot, a rich wine merchant, ended in divorce...
, the older brother of Emil Anneke
Emil Anneke
Emil Anneke was a German revolutionary and Forty-Eighter and American journalist, lawyer and politician . From 1863 until 1866 he served as Michigan Auditor General, the first Republican serving in that position. Emil was the younger brother of U.S...
, the first Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
Michigan Auditor General
Michigan Auditor General
The Michigan Auditor General is the chief fiscal officer of the State of Michigan. The office was established in 1839 and has been made an electoral office in 1850. The first Michigan Auditor General was Robert Abbott, and the first elected Auditor General John Swegles, Jr....
, and the father of Percy Shelley Anneke, well-known in Duluth
Duluth
Duluth may refer to:*Duluth, Minnesota*Duluth, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta*Duluth , an album by Trampled by Turtles*Duluth , by Gore Vidal...
, Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
, as co-founder and owner of the famous Fitger Brewing Company
Fitger Brewing Company
The Fitger's Brewing Company brewed beer from 1881 to 1972, making it Duluth's oldest continually-operating industry. The brewery was located at 600 East Superior Street, on Lake Superior in the U.S. state of Minnesota. The complex included ten buildings including the garage/stable , which was...
, now registered as a U.S. National Historic Place.
Life
The Anneke family (usually spelled "Annecke"; Fritz changed the spelling of his name while still in Germany) originates from a small village called Schadeleben close to QuedlinburgQuedlinburg
Quedlinburg is a town located north of the Harz mountains, in the district of Harz in the west of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. In 1994 the medieval court and the old town was set on the UNESCO world heritage list....
in what is today Saxony-Anhalt
Saxony-Anhalt
Saxony-Anhalt is a landlocked state of Germany. Its capital is Magdeburg and it is surrounded by the German states of Lower Saxony, Brandenburg, Saxony, and Thuringia.Saxony-Anhalt covers an area of...
. Schadeleben is close to the Harz
Harz
The Harz is the highest mountain range in northern Germany and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia. The name Harz derives from the Middle High German word Hardt or Hart , latinized as Hercynia. The legendary Brocken is the highest summit in the Harz...
mountains, one of the oldest mining regions in Europe. Like the family of Martin Luther
Martin Luther
Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...
, whose birthplace, Eisleben
Eisleben
Eisleben is a town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is famous as the hometown of Martin Luther, hence its official name is Lutherstadt Eisleben. As of 2005, Eisleben had a population of 24,552...
, is only a few kilometers away from Schadeleben, many of Anneke's ancestors had worked in mining, which is why the family moved to Dortmund in the early 19th century, when industrial coal mining
Coal mining
The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...
was beginning in the Ruhr district. Like his father, Anneke's brother Emil was a mining inspector, before he became involved in the 1848 revolution.
Anneke became a Prussian artillery officer, but was dishonorably dismissed in 1846 because of his democratic activities at his garrison in Münster
Münster
Münster is an independent city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also capital of the local government region Münsterland...
and also because he refused a duel
Duel
A duel is an arranged engagement in combat between two individuals, with matched weapons in accordance with agreed-upon rules.Duels in this form were chiefly practised in Early Modern Europe, with precedents in the medieval code of chivalry, and continued into the modern period especially among...
. While still in Münster he met the divorced Mathilde Franziska von Tabuillot
Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke was a German feminist, socialist, and newspaper editor, owner, and reporter. Born Mathilde Franziska Geisler, her first marriage to Alfred von Tabouillot, a rich wine merchant, ended in divorce...
, who later became his wife. He was one of the leading figures of the Communist movement in Cologne together with his friends Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...
, Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels was a German industrialist, social scientist, author, political theorist, philosopher, and father of Marxist theory, alongside Karl Marx. In 1845 he published The Condition of the Working Class in England, based on personal observations and research...
, Moses Hess
Moses Hess
Moses Hess was a Jewish philosopher and socialist, and one of the founders of Labor Zionism.-Life:Hess was born in Bonn, which was under French rule at the time. In his French-language birth certificate, his name is given as "Moises"; he was named after his maternal grandfather...
(later the intellectual father of Zionism
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
and the State of Israel). He spent most of 1848 in jail for his political activities. In 1849 he joined the revolutionary campaigns in Palatinate and Baden, and was commander of the artillery there. Carl Schurz
Carl Schurz
Carl Christian Schurz was a German revolutionary, American statesman and reformer, and Union Army General in the American Civil War. He was also an accomplished journalist, newspaper editor and orator, who in 1869 became the first German-born American elected to the United States Senate.His wife,...
served as his adjunct officer. After the fall of Rastatt
Rastatt
Rastatt is a city and baroque residence in the District of Rastatt, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is located on the Murg river, above its junction with the Rhine and has a population of around 50'000...
he fled to France, where he found refuge with his wife in the house of their mutual friend Moses Hess. Later on he worked as a correspondent for U.S. media in Europe, where he tried to join the Italian revolutionary movement under Guiseppe Garibaldi. In 1862 he returned to the USA to assume command of the 34th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment
34th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment
The 34th Regiment Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment that served in the Union Army during the American Civil War.-Service:The 34th Wisconsin was organized at Madison, Wisconsin and mustered into Federal service December, 1862....
as a colonel
Colonel
Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...
. In 1863 he became the victim of blackmail and was dishonorably dismissed. His regiment was dissolved on September 9, 1863. Afterwards he tried in vain to be readmitted to Army service, supported by his brother Emil Anneke
Emil Anneke
Emil Anneke was a German revolutionary and Forty-Eighter and American journalist, lawyer and politician . From 1863 until 1866 he served as Michigan Auditor General, the first Republican serving in that position. Emil was the younger brother of U.S...
, who was a leading Republican in Michigan and acting Michigan Auditor General
Michigan Auditor General
The Michigan Auditor General is the chief fiscal officer of the State of Michigan. The office was established in 1839 and has been made an electoral office in 1850. The first Michigan Auditor General was Robert Abbott, and the first elected Auditor General John Swegles, Jr....
. Many of Anneke's friends and comrades from the 1849 campaign in Germany had become Union generals, including his own junior adjunct officer Carl Schurz
Carl Schurz
Carl Christian Schurz was a German revolutionary, American statesman and reformer, and Union Army General in the American Civil War. He was also an accomplished journalist, newspaper editor and orator, who in 1869 became the first German-born American elected to the United States Senate.His wife,...
, August Willich
August Willich
August Willich , born Johann August Ernst von Willich, was a military officer in the Prussian Army and a leading early proponent of Communism in Germany. In 1847 he discarded his title of nobility...
, Ludwig Blenker, Franz Sigel
Franz Sigel
Franz Sigel was a German military officer, revolutionist and immigrant to the United States who was a teacher, newspaperman, politician, and served as a Union major general in the American Civil War.-Early life:...
, and Gustav Struve
Gustav Struve
Gustav Struve, known as Gustav von Struve until he gave up his title, , was a German politician, lawyer and publicist, and a revolutionary during the German revolution of 1848-1849 in Baden...
.
After various failed commercial enterprises and the split with his wife Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke was a German feminist, socialist, and newspaper editor, owner, and reporter. Born Mathilde Franziska Geisler, her first marriage to Alfred von Tabouillot, a rich wine merchant, ended in divorce...
(who became an eminent figure in the U.S. abolitionist and suffrage
Suffrage
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply the franchise, distinct from mere voting rights, is the civil right to vote gained through the democratic process...
movements, and lived together with the American feminist and writer Mary Booth
Mary Louise Booth
Mary Louise Booth translator, writer, editor born in Millville, the present Yaphank, New York to William Chatfield Booth and Nancy Monswell. She was editor of Harper's Bazaar from its beginning in 1867 until her death...
from 1860 until Booth's death in 1865), Fritz moved to Chicago, where he died in December, 1872, after an accident. The short-sighted Anneke had fallen into a construction pit. Lighting was very bad in Chicago in those days, and the city was, one year after the Great Fire of Chicago full of such pits.
A son of Fritz, Percy Shelley Anneke, was a local celebrity in Duluth
Duluth
Duluth may refer to:*Duluth, Minnesota*Duluth, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta*Duluth , an album by Trampled by Turtles*Duluth , by Gore Vidal...
, Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
, as co-founder and owner of the famous Fitger Brewing Company
Fitger Brewing Company
The Fitger's Brewing Company brewed beer from 1881 to 1972, making it Duluth's oldest continually-operating industry. The brewery was located at 600 East Superior Street, on Lake Superior in the U.S. state of Minnesota. The complex included ten buildings including the garage/stable , which was...
, which is now registered as a U.S. National Historic Place.
External links
- http://www.library.wisc.edu/etext/WIReader/Galleries/Anneke.html