Gustave Koerner – Travel in the Midwest
Gustave Koerner’s Memoirs Volume 1 – Koerner’s Travels in the U.S., particularly Kentucky, Illinois, and Missouri. Gustave Koerner arrived in the U.S. on the heals of the Uprising at Frankfurt. He explored the Utopia known as Missouri described in Gottfried Duden’s book for emigrants. Read Koerner’s first reactions to “The Far West” as the Mississippi River Valley region was known ca. 1833.(See section “Koerner practices law” for commentary on Duden’s promotion of Missouri to attract German immigrants.) Come with him as he struggles to establish himself in a career in a world where English was the main language and Law was patterned after the English court system.
Koerner wrote a response to Duden’s book which described Missouri as a paradise. He also advised immigrants to have enough money to make it through their first year as they adjusted to life in a new land. Koerner would also write a book for immigrants explaining the laws in their native German language.
Koerner attended lectures at Transylvania University in Kentucky and while there, he met Mary Toddd, who would marry Abraham Lincoln ten years later.
Gustave Koerner decided he did not want to be a “latin farmer”- a term given to university educated Germans who desired to own land, the possibility of which was denied them in their homeland. Koerner attended lectures at Transylvania University in Kentucky to become fluent in English and learn more about the American legal system. He married Sophie Engelmann in 1836 and rented a home near the law office of Adam Snyder where he worked. Snyder was a Democrat office holder and Koerner’s business association with Snyder would be Koerner’s entrée to politics. Koerner later opened an office with James Shields, who became Koerner’s “best American friend.”
Gustave Koerner’s Early Years in America: Koerner’s Concern for German Immigrants and Their Understanding of American Life and Law
We are pleased to post the scholarly writings of University of Missouri–St. Louis Professor Steven Rowan. His translations and perspectives, more fully described below, add greatly to our understanding of Koerner’s intellectual activity in the 1830s.
Links to these pages may be made, and one copy for your personal use is permitted by law. However, you must obtain permission from the original author to make any other reproduction, distribution, or other form of publication.
An Illumination of Duden’s Report on the Western States of North America Translation ( 62 pp.; 244KB ) German to English Professor Steven Rowan University of Missouri–St. Louishref=”https://gustavekoerner.org/travel/” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>university of missouri st louis href=”https://gustavekoerner.org/travel/”>
Presented at the 33rd Annual Symposium of the Society for German–American Studies’ Annual Symposium, New Ulm, Minnesota, April 17, 2009.
In Gesetzbuch, Koerner translated the laws of Illinois (1833) into German for newly-arrived immigrants.
Professor Rowan’s article, “Gustav Körner’s IllinoisGesetzbuch: A Legal Handbook for Illinois Germans in 1838″ summarizes the content of Koerner’s book with readers after first translating it back into English.
This Gesetzbuch article first appeared in Der Maibaum (Spring 2009) published by the Deutschheim Association, P.O. Box 16, Hermann, Missouri, 65041, digitized here with permission of the editor and author.
In Gesetzbuch, Koerner translated the laws of Illinois (1833) into German for newly-arrived immigrants.
Professor Rowan’s article, “Gustav Körner’s IllinoisGesetzbuch: A Legal Handbook for Illinois Germans in 1838″ summarizes the content of Koerner’s book with readers after first translating it back into English.
This Gesetzbuch article first appeared in Der Maibaum (Spring 2009) published by the Deutschheim Association, P.O. Box 16, Hermann, Missouri, 65041, digitized here with permission of the editor and author.
Read Page 1, 2, 3, 4
The Gustave Koerner House
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