The Franco-Prussian War and Its Impact on my Alsatian family

In the last blog I typed I wrote about Alsace and its history, particularly the commune of Erstein where my great-grandfather and his father were both born.

I also hinted that the Franco-Prussian war was a blog all on its own, and was one of the reasons why I feel my family, though ethnically German, was more French than German.

While I love history in general, my forte is and has always been American History, particularly the Civil War.  As a child, European history kind of bored me (Sorry!) and I wasn't good at memorizing European history dates and the like as I was American events in history.  But after doing a great deal of extensive research on this side of the pond, I knew it was time to begin to focus my attention across the Atlantic as to why my European ancestors immigrated to the United States in the first place.

Since historically, my Waldspurgers were the LAST to cross the pond genealogically, they seem to be the first for my focus.  I actually was researching the area of Lorraine, as my ancestor Dominique Vautier was from that region, but the same works that focused on Lorraine also by default seem to include Alsace, so it just naturally evolved from research on Lorraine and Alsace to that of just Alsace at the moment.  Some future blog will likely tell the story of Dominique and the French Revolution.

Anyways, on to the Franco-Prussian War.

Alsace became a part of France in 1648 with the Peace of Westphalia, although parts of it were not joined until as late as 1670 or later, including Erstein, where Florian Waldspurger was born, and Eschau, where his wife Elizabeth Marie Hans was born.

But Germans never forgot their kin across the Rhine River.  After all, most Alsatians are ethnically German, even if some chose not to see it that way.

There was, as there always seems to be throughout history, some political drama going on in Europe.  After the Austro-Prussian War in 1866 was settled with the Peace of Prague, Prussia annexed several German states after signing the Augustbündnis (August contract).  It created a German federal state known as the North German Confederation.  The brain behind this was Minister President of Prussia Otto Von Bismarck.  While not all of the small German states had yet joined, Prussia hoped one day to unite all Germanic peoples into one empire.

France, on the other hand, was alarmed at the power the Germans were amassing.  They were afraid that should all of Germany unite into one empire, it would disrupt the balance of power in Europe, which was always delicately balanced.  They were also afraid because not only did they share a border with the German state of Baden, which hadn't joined the Confederation yet, but also had Germanic peoples living in the region of Alsace, which some Germans considered part of Germany.  France was afraid that Bismarck would seek to unite Alsace with the rest of the Germanic people in one empire.

There was also the fact that Europe was too small for the political powers of Germany and France to co-exist peacefully, and the rest of Europe seemed to realize that.

Another bit of drama was the small matter of the Spanish Succession.  In 1868, the Spanish government under the reign of the reactionary and ultramontane queen Isabel II was overturned and a new leader of the Spanish government needed to be picked, as the revolutionaries who overthrew Isabel lacked leadership to govern.  Several candidates from throughout Europe were nominated and debated as her successor, including her son Alfonso, who was France's pick, and Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern, who was Germany's pick.  For several months, speculations and rumors flew, including one that Leopold, a Prussian prince, had accepted the nomination as king and was about to be crowned.  France, angry at the thought of sharing a border with two Prussian-controlled countries, declared war on the North German Confederation on 16 July 1870, before the Spanish Succession issue was even resolved (Leopold actually had to withdraw from the nomination).

France was counting on support from Austria if the North German Confederation attacked, but Bismarck was shrewd.  He convinced Russia to ally itself to Germany.  Because of this alliance, Russia was able to prevent Austria from helping France during the conflict, as Russia threatened to mobilize troops and send them into Galicia should Austria attack Germany.

By 22 August 1870, the Prussians had invaded the town of Erstein.  They made demands of the citizens for requisitions, including 6000 cigars, food to feed nearly 150,000 troops, and other forage.  The tiny town, and other around, could not produce the required requisitions, and many faced punishments for the failure.  At the same time, the Germans laid siege to Strasbourg, and forced citizens in Ersein to assist in changing the course of the River Ill, which cut off a supply of water to Strasbourg during the siege, which lasted six weeks and cost the lives of hundreds of citizens, as well as thousands of soldiers.

While I don't know for sure what part Florian may have had in the war, I am certain he at least witnessed it.... as he was 25 year of age. Most likely, he has registered for the French version of the Selective Service.  I have an email out now asking the city archivist in Erstein if those records exist and how I might be able to locate them.

When an armistice was called on 10 May 1871, Prussian claimed the lands of Alsace and Lorraine as its territory in the armistice.  This claim was met with indignation from the rest of the powers in Europe, as many viewed the annexation of Alsace and Lorraine as a way to punish France for declaring war.  However, Germans saw it as a legitimate prize for winning the war.  They also saw the annexation as a way to keep the peace in Europe, as it would prevent French aggression in the future because the addition of both Alsace and Lorraine solidified German strength.

After the war ended and the treaty was signed, Germany had become an hegemonic empire, which later helped to set the stage for the World Wars that followed.  The Germans were ecstatic because their lost brethren that had been taken away into France had come back to the fold with the addition of the territory of Elsass-Lothringen to the German Empire.

But to the people living in this newly created territory, the idea of suddenly being German was not a good thing.  Germany sought to stamp out anything French.  Suddenly, German was the language taught in schools, and anything French was seen as an affront to the nationalist tendencies of the German empire.  This idea of German nationalism wreaked havoc on the Pro-French proclivities of the Alsatians who were used to having some autonomy in their lives.  The Alsatians in particular, while German ethnically, had thought of themselves as French, so the annexation was punishment for them.

Elizabeth Marie Hans Waldspurger
Florian's wife

Many moved away as soon as they could, but for some, like Florian Waldspurger, they couldn't leave their homeland right away.  Florian remained a citizen of Germany for eight years after the war until he had saved enough to migrate to the United States.  By then, he had a wife, Elizabeth Marie Hans, and two sons, Edward and Eugene.  On 3 April 1880, Florian left Le Havre, France aboard the mail steamer, SS St. Laurent, bounded for New York.  He arrived on 11 April 1880.  His wife and sons followed two months later, with an F. or J. Waldspurger (research seems to suggest this unknown male was Florian's brother Frank), aboard the steamer Amerique on 7 July 1880.  According to his grandsons, Florian vowed to leave his homeland because he could not reconcile himself to the atrocities that Germany had committed during the war, and did not want to remain under German Rule.

Edward Charles Waldspurger
 Florian's eldest son

The family settled in Philadelphia and moved around in the countryside of the counties surround Philly.  Florian renounced the German citizenship he detested on 9 June 1894 with the intent on becoming an American citizen.  However, he met with a disaster on 2 September 1900, when he was killed in the Hatfield train wreck.

Florian Walspurger's Renunciation of Germany, 9 June 1894,
Case number not listed, Court of Common Pleas; State of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

Personal genealogical research by the author was also used in this research, as well as the sources listed below.

Sources Used in Research
"Augustbündnis." Academic Dictionaries and Encyclopedias. 2019. http://deacademic.com/dic.nsf/dewiki/113536.

Barber, Christopher Ernest. "The 'Revolution' of the Franco-Prussian War: The Aftermath in Western Europe." Australian Journal of Politics & History 60, no. 3 (2014): 334-45. doi:10.1111/ajph.12061.

Blumenthal, Daniel. Alsace-Lorraine; a Study of the Relations of the Two Provinces to France and to Germany, and a Presentation of the Just Claims of Their People. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1917.

"Later War News: Prussian Requisitions - A Surprise," The Baltimore Sun (Baltimore, Maryland), 22 August 1870, 1; Newspapers.com. www.newspapers.com

Smith, Willard A. "Napoleon III and the Spanish Revolution of 1868." The Journal of Modern History 25, no. 3 (1953): 211-33. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1874741.

Putnam, Ruth. Alsace and Lorraine, from Caesar to Kaiser 58 B.C.-1871 A.D. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1915.

Vizetelly, Ernest Alfred. The True Story of Alsace-Lorraine. New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1918.

"The War in Europe," Daily Evansville Journal (Evansville, Indiana), 23 August 1870, 3; Genealogy Bank. www.genealogybank.com

Wells, Mike. "Russia and the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71." History Review, December 2006, 40-44.

Zimmerman, Thomas.  "Siege and Fall of Strasbourg." History of the Franco-Prussian War. 2008. http://francoprussianwar.com/Strasbourg.htm.

Alsace: Is it German or French?

My mother's paternal grandfather came from a small town in Alsace called Erstein.  He immigrated to the United States in 1880 as a young child with his mother and younger brother.  His father had already made the trip a couple months before.  Years later, my great-grandfather's nine sons had very loud debates about whether they were French or German.  Given the history of the region, it was no wonder they argued.

Alsace, or Elsass in German, is a small fertile valley of land between the Voges mountains and the Black Forest Mountains in Europe, located geographically smack dab between the two great nations of France and Germany. The Rhine river, now the border between France and Germany, runs through the region.  Today, Alsace is a French region, but historically it has been both, and both countries have very valid reasons for having laid claim to it over the centuries.

Because borders were often rapidly changing, the history of the region is somewhat muddled.  In fact, different history books often don't mention all of the varying kingdoms of which Alsace belonged to just because it changed rulers and kingdoms so often.

What is known is that what is now the Alsace area was inhabited by Celtic peoples called Gauls from from well before the modern era until the time of the Roman Empire.  The Romans colonized the area as well, and co-mingled with the Gauls.  The city of Strasbourg, in the Bas Rhin region, was founded in this period.  But by the fifth century, Germanic peoples known as the Alemanni began to cross the Rhine River and attack Gallic and Roman fortifications in an invasion attempt.  By 496, the Alemanni had been conquered by the another Germanic people, the Franks, under Emperor Clovis, and the area was on Christianized. By the ninth century, Alsace was combined into the kingdom of Lothringia and then the Duchy of Swabia.

In the twelfth century, Alsace was incorporated into the Holy Roman Empire, with who it would be united until the mid-17th century, passing from one landgravate to another.  After the Thirty Years War, Alsace was granted to the kingdom of France by the Treaty of Westphalia of 1648 and would become French in nature for more than two hundred years.  The region also became a hotbed of Reformation and religious freedoms, and Strasbourg was known as the capital of these radical ideas.

Because it was peopled by the Gauls, the Romans, the Alemanni and the Franks at various points in history, both France and Germany felt a kinship to the people who lived there, who were distinctly French and German and distinctly their own culture all at the same time.  The upper classes spoke or at least understood French, traders spoke both German and French given that both traded quite frequently in that region, while most everyone spoke Alsatian, a High Germanic language.  While many had German sounding last names, they had very French first names.  In the case of my great-great-grandfather, he was named Florian Waldspurger.  He was also the father of the man who later had nine sons.

Florian Waldspurger

Florian Waldspurger was born at 10 at night on 5 May 1845 in house number 66 of the quartier blanc in the small commune of Erstein in Alsace.  He was born the sixth of nine children to a stocking maker (faiseur du bas) named Francois and his wife, Sophie Egermann.

Erstein was an old fortified town just along the Rhine river and is located just south of the capital of Strasbourg. In the Middle Ages, a Benedictine Abbey was located in the commune.  During the time of its union with the Holy Roman Empire, Erstein became part of the Archdiocese of Strasbourg when the Bishop of Strausbourg, John of Lichtenberg, purchased the landgrave of Erstein in 1359 for 32,000 gold florins.

Erstein, due to its proximity to Strasbourg, saw conflict during the Thirty Years War, when over half its population was wiped out.  While the Treaty of Westphalia ended the war in 1649, Erstein, because it was attached to Strausbourg, did not join Fraince until the 1670s.

During the late 18th and throughout the 19th century, Erstein was the location of a number of textile manufacturers, including stocking makers, but also was known for its tobacco farming.  A number of people migrated from other areas to take advantage of the manufacturing jobs.  In the case of the Waldspurgers, they immigrated from the small village of Dibolshiem, south of Erstein about 20 kilometers.

Some wonderful historical maps of the area can be found on Wikimedia Commons.

Erstein, and indeed all of Alsace, saw a great deal of conflict during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.  The Franco-Prussian War and the fallout from it was the reason my Alsatian ancestors immigrated to the States in the end. But that's a story for another blog.

To answer the question my pop and his brothers would argue over many times, ideally Alsatians are both French and German.  While culturally, the area is a mix of French and German, genetically, at least in the case of my Waldspurger family, they were closer to the Higher Germans and the Alemanni than to the Celts and Franks, at least  according to DNA tests done by myself and my first cousin.  But, as a future blog will demonstrate, the Waldspurgers were more aligned with the French ideals than they were with German ones, even if genetically they were German.

Sources Used for Research

"Alsace." Encyclopædia Britannica. December 31, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/place/Alsace.

Braun, Célia. "Histoire Et Patrimoine." Site Officiel De La Ville D'Erstein. http://www.ville-erstein.fr/se-divertir/decouvir-erstein/328-histoire-et-patrimoine.

"Erstein." Revolvy. https://www.revolvy.com/page/Erstein

"Kings of Lotharingia." The History Files: European Kingdoms, The Franks. January 02, 1999. https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/KingListsEurope/FranceLorraine.htm.

Putnam, Ruth. Alsace and Lorraine, from Caesar to Kaiser 58 B.C.-1871 A.D. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1915.

Vizetelly, Ernest Alfred. The True Story of Alsace-Lorraine. New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1918.