USA > Missouri > St Louis County > St Louis City > History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men > Part 8
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In St. Louis there were many intelligent and en- terprising Germans prior to the great influx which began in 1848. The greater part of these were in trade, though many prosecuted intellectual pursuits with characteristic vigor and success. Charles Mu- egge's oil-cloth factory was started in 1841; Thomas J. Meier's cotton-factory-a pioneer enterprise of great value and importance-in 1839. But 1848 is the year in which the tide set in. The soil and cli- mate of Missouri suited the Germans, always inhabi- tants of the interior ; they found themselves heartily welcome, protected and befriended, and abundant labor waiting for them. They did not fear the com- petition of slavery, and the "peculiar institution" never interfered with them, reduced the value of their work, or traversed their opinions. The arrivals of Germans at the port of St. Louis were :
March 18, 1848, to saine day 1849 ..
9,000
66
" 1849, "
66
1850.
14,403
" 1850,
66
66
1851.
10,815
Total in three years .. 34,218
Of these about two-thirds found employment in St. Louis. In 1851 this city was counted as the prin- cipal port for the debarkation of Germans to the val- lcy of the Mississippi, great numbers coming by way of New Orleans. It was at this time that the well- known and most useful German Society of St. Louis
1018
HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.
was incorporated, its objects being to protect and dc- fend the immigrants from Germany, provide them employment when needed, and care for the sick and destitute. Nobly has it done its work, burying the dead, finding homes for the orphan, and securing medical attendance, medicine, and hospital room for indigent invalids. The trustees named in the orig- inal act of incorporation of this society were John Wolff, Adolplı Abcles, Thomas J. Meicr, Edward Eggers, Henry W. Gempp, Andrew Krug, Charles Muegge, Louis Speck, and John C. Meyer ; J. Reich- ard, secretary and agent. The Germans in St. Louis to-day, forming a large proportion of the population, and including many of the best and most wealthy citi- zens, do not necd an association of this sort to protect them. They constitute a potent and fully recognized industrial, mercantile, social, and intellectual force in the community. They are leaders in opinion and leaders of men. The German press of St. Louis is a power throughout the country. It has contributed states cen, soldiers, and scholars to reinforce the national wealth. A German of St. Louis has been mayor of the city, another senator in Congress, am- bassador to foreign lands, member of the cabinet, moulder of parties, and leader of men. The St. Louis Journal of Speculative Science, the only periodical in the country devoted exclusively to the exploitation of metaphysics, is a direct product of German thought and German culture, and it is claimed that St. Louis is the only place on this continent where the philoso- phy and the comprehensive philosophical system of George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel is read, understood, and appreciated.
At the same time as this German immigration, St. Louis received an accession of population from the French West Indies, as is told in a paper rcad before the Missouri Historical Society in 1878 by Mr. Col- let, the author being Mr. Edward De Laureal. This paper is in substance as follows :
" Guadeloupe had scarcely recovered from a terrible disaster which had covered the entire colony with ruins.
"On Feb. 8, 1843, about ten o'clock in the morning, Pointe- à-Pître, the capital of the colony, was destroyed by an earth- quake more violent than previously known. What the reeling earth spared the fire seized upon. The number of dead crushed beneath the ruins or calcined by the flames was so great that there were not sufficient persons to bury them, and as a matter of necessity the remains were transported to the open sea and entombed in the deep.
"Their wounds scarcely healed, they began to breathe, when of a sudden they found themselves inenaced with ruin from another cause. A political upheaving threatened to destroy in their hands the very instruments of all prosperity.
" In the month of March, 1848, a sinister rumor spread like a pall over the country, and caused a thrill of terror through-
out. A war-vessel appeared on the horizon. It came to an- nounce to the country momentous news. A revolution had broken out in France, the king, Louis Philippe, driven from his throne, and been obliged to take refuge in England. The people, sovereign by revolt, had proclained the republic, and constituted a republican government in the Hôtel de Ville at Paris. The authorities of Guadeloupe, as well as those of all the other French colonies, were enjoined for the future to obey no other orders than such as emanated from the republic, one and indivisible.
"These news, however we may look at them at a distance and after a lapse of twenty-nine years, when received in the colony were of a nature to trouble the country and to excite the population to deplorable excesses.
" Many colonists yet living who had passed through the or- deal of the first French republic felt the presentiment of what was to be dreaded from another, the outcome of the barricades. If the colony were not as completely upturned during the short duration of the second essay at republicanism, it was not the fault of those who made it their business to persuade the blacks that the supreme object of liberty was not only enfranchise- ment from all labor, but to trample in the dust that which they had heretofore respected.
" The new agents of power in the colony, doubtless to give proof of their zeal, casting aside every precaution so indispen- sable nevertheless in such grave circumstances, suddenly pro- claimed the abolition of slavery. This precipitation was most ruinous to the country. Of a sudden the master and the slave found themselves face to face in a position embarrassing to both parties, impossible yet to define distinctly, and which created a real social peril.
" After the first moments of astonishment at their new re- spective situation there were compromises between the newly enfranchised and the proprictors, who had at heart the con- tinuation of work, compromises which, without satisfying the laborers, were initiative to the ruin of the proprietors.
"In presence of this state of things, which could not last long, in presence of the alarming rumors which night and day kept the population on the alert, a common thought came at the same time to the heads of families, who, without exchanging views, felt the urgency to fly from a coming danger.
" This unanimous thought had Auierica for its object. By a singular chance St. Louis, in Missouri, was the converging point of all projects of emigration. Consequently, in the month of July, 1848, there were seen disembarking on the Levee of St. Louis the first families wandering in search of a security which their native country no longer offered themn.
"Soon these families were followed by a great number of other emigrants, so that in 1849 an agglomeration of French from Guadeloupe formed almost a little colony. They had just rea- son to congratulate themselves on their reception on American soil.
"But almost immediately after their arrival the emigrants were doomed to undergo a rude trial. The cholera, which during the spring and the summer of 1849 desolated the eity of St. Louis, did not spare them. Their numbers were sadly diminished.
" But this time again courage was not wanting in the colo- nists from Guadeloupe. Then were these people, accustomed to the eleganee of luxury, the comforts of an easy life, seen to make courageously the sacrifice of their past in burying the souvenir iu the depths of their hearts, to begin a life of fatigues, of rude occupation to which they were far from having been accustomed. More than one mother of a family, thrown entirely upon her own efforts, by a prodigy of economy and courageous patience, was enabled to bring up her family and to place her
1019
SAINT LOUIS AS A CENTRE OF TRADE.
ehildren in a position to contract allianees with honorable fami- lies of her adopted city.
" To-day the fusion is complete, and tho descendants of the French colonists coming from the West Indies, strangers to their maternal tongue, no longer make nse of any other language than that of the country of which they are citizens, or are in any respeet distinguishahle from those around them."
The numbers of this immigration have been left to conjecture or the imagination. The allusion to the cholera year of 1849, however, recalls a period of great suffering to St. Louis, and great afflictions, under which its people bore up as if conscious of their destiny. The pestilence was fol- lowed by the most destructive fire whichi ever raged in St. Louis, and the press of the period, in comment- ing upon it, said, " Emerging as we are from two calamities which have no parallel in this country, suffering alike in the destruction of property and the still greater destruction of life, having lost in a single night houses and goods enough to constitute a town of very considerable size and commerce, and in two months buried five or six thousand human beings, it may be pardoned those who have so far survived thesc calamities to look around and ahead at their condition."
That condition was mot pleasant to contemplate. Just before the outbreak of cholera a corporation census had been taken, yielding the following statistics of the population in February, 1849:
Ward 1.
9,972
! Ward 5. 10,933
6 12,930
3
10,233
4.
9,221
Total. 63,482
In 1850 the regular government census showed a falling off of 6668, chiefly in consequence of the epidemic. The figures are,-
" White males in St. Louis County, Missouri :
20 years and under 30
17,187
30
40.
11,413
40
50.
4,573
50
60
1,804
60
66
80
160
80
90
66
100
6
100 and upwards
2
Age unknown.
35,816
Females.
20,987
Total 56,803
"Suppose the number of males between twenty and twenty- one to he equal to one-tenth of the number between twenty and thirty, and that numher will he 1718, which taken from the whole male population over twenty-ono will leave 34,088 over twenty-one.
" Assuming that there were 34,088 over twenty-one years of age, calculate from census returns of 1850 the number under that age, so as to get a proportion upon which to proceed in the calculation at this time.
" White females in St. Louis County, Mo., according to een- sus (U. S.) 1850 :
20 years and under
30.
10,189
30
40
5,917
40
50
2,785
50
66
60
1,346
60
66
70
572
70
80
142
80
60
90
27
90
66
100
3
100 and upwards
0
Age unknown
Total
20,987
" These figures include foreigners not naturalized, hut as the eensus referred to is that of 1850, all not naturalized at that time have since taken out their papers."
The excess of males over females revealed the re- cency of a large proportion of the city's population. In spite of losses by the cholera, however, the St. Louis press was not afraid to make comparisons, and this is the way it was done :
Cities.
1830.
1840.
Ratio for last 1850. ton years. Per cent.
New Orleans.
49,826
102,193
119,461
17
Cincinnati
24,831
46,338
115,436
149
St. Louis.
4,977
16,469
77,860
373
Louisville.
10,341
21,210
43,196
104
Pittsburgh
12,568
21,115
46,601
130
" A like ratio of inerease between 1850 and 1860 as there was between 1840 and 1850 would produce the following re- sults in 1860 :
Cities.
Ratio of increase from 1840 to 1850.
Results.
New Orleans.
17 per cent.
190,769
Cineinnati
149 per eent.
. 287,433
St. Louis
373 per cent.
368,271
Louisville.
104 per cent.
88,119
Pittsburgh ..
130 per eent.
107,182
" It is hardly right to suppose that the ratio of inerease will continue as large as the cities grow in size, hut it is altogether reasonable to helieve that their relative ratio will be nearly preserved, which is sufficient to show that St. Louis is destined to be the largest eity in the valley of the Mississippi in 1860, if she be not now, upon two years' increase.
" It is to he rememhored that in the census of 1850, St. Louis lost some eight or nine thousand population from the fact of her outgrowing her chartered limits. All north of Rocky Branch, including Bremen and Lowell additions, were left out, and on the west all heyond Eighteenth Street and Second Ca- rondelet Avenue, which, if included, would swell her popula- tion more than a tenth, and also her percentage of increase.
"It is also well to remember that her census was taken the year immediately following the two greatest calamities that ever befell her,-the cholera and the great fire of 1849,-and hefore she had time to recover from their effects.
" If her chartered limits embraced the whole city, she is now prohahly the largest city in the great valley.
" This is no sudden or impulsive start in hier growth, for she held nearly the same relative position towards her sister cities of the valley hetween 1830 and 1840, as the following will show :
" New Orleans increased from 1830 to 1840, 105 per cent.
Cincinnati
86 per eent.
St. Louis
231 per eent.
Louisville
105 per eent.
Pittsburgh
68 per cent."
70 ..
624
70
90. 32
15
2 .. 10,193
6
1020
HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.
The city census of 1851 is very interesting as show- ing the nationality of the inhabitants and the rapid accession of immigrants from foreign countries.
" The population of the eity proper is 77,716. We now give the divisions of that population as ascertained by the census. It will be seen by the following summary that more than one-half of the population is of foreign extraction :
German.
Irish.
Other Free English. Nations. Negroes.
First Ward.
8,792
699
202
276
13
Second Ward ..
3,124
1,151
277
489
352
Third Ward ..
2,147
1,732
536
656
227
Fourth Ward.
1,528
3,330
528
310
464
Fifth Ward ..
3,858
1,948
481
277
96
Sixth Ward.
4,385
2,417
897
451
107
23,814
11,277
2,921
2,459
1,259
" The whole number of foreigners is 40,471 ; the number of free negroes, 1259. It appears from the records of the county courts that the whole number of free negroes licensed to remain in this county from September, 1841, to December, 1850, amounts to 575, leaving 684 in the city and county without license and in violation of law."
To the 77,716 people in the city proper were to be added the residents of " Bremen" and other suburbs, 5028, making a total population for the city of 82,744, and yielding an aggregate for city and county of 104,- 834.
Sheriff Wilmer's census, completed on Dec. 17, 1852, resulted in :
Population of the city ..
94,819
66
connty.
.... 29,034
Total population of the eity and county.
123,853
White males in the city.
51,251
66
females
40,791
66
males in the county
14,843
females 66
11,500
Free persons of color, male and female, in the city and county ......
1,341
Slaves, male and female, in the city and county ... 4,069
Comparative tables showing the increase from the month of June, 1850, when the United States census was taken :
In 1850.
In 1852.
Increase.
Total eity population.
77,465
94,819
17,354
county
27,369
29,034
1,665
Decrease.
Slaves in city and county. 5,914
4,069
1,845
At that time the California gold fever was raging and diverting population from all its ancient channels, but it did not long affect Missouri and St. Louis. In April, 1855, the newspapers of the day reported the subsidence of the wave and the beginning of a reac- tion. Said they,-
" The first effect of the gold discoveries in California seven years since was to attract a large emigration from the Western States. For some years previously we had lost many citizens, who thought they could see in the wilds of Oregon better oppor- tunities to improve their condition than they could find on our own teeming soil. But the Oregon emigrants comprised among their numbers a good many whose exit from among us was not a very serious loss, thriftless men, who did well if they pro- duced as much as they consumed, and whose reluctant labor yielded but little for export. A large proportion of the emigra- 1
tion to California was of a different character. Men of sub- stance, activity, industry, and energy, some of our best farmers, our best mechanies, our ablest merchants, sought the land of gold. This drain on the population of the West could not but be seriously felt in many localities, and though many went intending to return, and though many have since gotten home again, it is unquestionable that the population of Missouri did not inerease so rapidly from 1848 to 1854 as it would have done had gold never been discovered in California.
"We are happy to record, however, that this great exodus seems to be over almost if not entirely. We hear no more the notes of preparation for the great journey over the plains, of caravans of hundreds and thousands leaving homes and friends for new and untried scenes. On the contrary, we find that emi- grants to Western Missouri and Kansas and Nebraska are coming in, as they used to do in the days of the 'Platte Pur- chase,' fifteen years ago, and our western borders are now fast making up the losses incurred by the ' California fever.'"
In 1860 the Federal census was as follows for St. Louis County :
Townships.
White.
Colored.
Bonhomme
3,131
498
Central
5,272
576
Carondelet
3,827
166
Maramec.
2,060
408
St. Ferdinand
3,926
863
St. Louis,-
First Ward
21,750
95
Second Ward
13,686
110
Third Ward
10.185
337
Fourth Ward
14,616
837
Fifth Ward
12,172
517
Sixth Ward
7,664
394
Seventh Ward
12,731
374
Eighth Ward
22,451
312
Ninth Ward ..
19,705
115
Tenth Ward.
22,516
206
Eleventh Ward
Twelfth Ward.
.....
.....
Total
175,692
5808
The falsification of returns in 1870 makes that census worthless, except for classes of comparison and ratios. Its results are given herewith :
TABLE SHOWING THE WHITE AND COLORED POPULATION OF ST. LOUIS COUNTY.
ST. LOUIS COUNTY.
White.
Colored.
Indian.
Chinese.
Native.
Foreign.
Total.
Bonhomme.
5,304
858
4,704
1,458
6,162
Central
8.120
803
6,017
2.906
8,923
Carondelet.
5,000
297
3,609
1,778
5,387
Maramec
2,853
583
2,705
731
3,436
St. Ferdinand
6,262
952
5,346
1,868
7,214
St. Louis
8,395
805
3
...
5,817
3,386
9,203
St. Louis.
First Ward
32,099
1,607
2
23,389
10,319
33,708
Second Ward.
21,295
580
12,166
9,688
21,855
Third Ward ..
23,109
754 15
13,341
10,537
23,878
Fourth Ward
36,633
2,538
2
26,363
12,810
30,173
Fifth Ward.
26,257
3,510)
7
19,6:24
10,150
29.774
Sixth Ward.
20,408
1,104
15,116
6,396
21,512
Seventh Ward.
16,875
1,630
3
12,603
5,105
18,508
Eighth Ward.
19,659
7,051
18,600
8,110
26,710
Ninth Ward.
22,268
649
1
4
13,368
9,574
22,922
Tenth Ward.
19,430
1,173
...
12,298
8,325
20,623
Eleventh Ward
31,885
687
8
19,018
13,562
32,580
Twelfth Ward
18,787
834
...
12,722.
6,899
19,621
...
324,729 26,415 41
4 226,806 124,383 351,189
......
.....
...
1860.
.
SAINT LOUIS AS A CENTRE OF TRADE.
1021
TABLE SHOWING THE CENSUS OF THE CITY OF ST. LOUIS ACCORDING TO NATIONALITY AND COLOR.
BORN IN UNITED STATES.
BORN IN FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
STATES.
White.
Colored.
Indians.
COUNTRIES.
White.
Colored.
Indians.
Chinese.
Alabama
426
559
Africa
7
8
...
Arkansas.
246
274
...
Asia
27
1
California.
123
1
1
Atlantic Island.
3
...
...
...
Connecticut
625
6
Australia ..
27
...
...
...
Delaware
231
11
Austria
751
...
...
...
Florida
56
28
Belgium
254
...
...
...
Georgia
340
205
Bohemia
2,652
...
...
...
Illinois
6,720
174
7
British America :
Indiana
2,439
32
...
Canada ...
1,841
16
6
...
Iowa .....
1,424
26
...
New Brunswick
58
...
...
Kansas.
278
9
Newfoundland
4
...
...
Kentucky.
3,706
2,010
Nova Scotia.
74
...
...
Louisiana.
1,882
611
...
British America, not specified.
9
...
...
Maine
712
...
Maryland
1,502
174
Central America
4
1
Massachusetts
2,542
27
...
Michigan
746
66
...
Cuba
17
Minnesota
145
8
1
Denmark
178
Mississippi ..
554
911
2
England
5,366
...
Missouri.
121,931
12,281
9
Europe, not specified
94
8
Nebraska.
58
1
France ...
2,788
...
...
...
Nevada ..
1
1
..
Germany :
New Hampshire
343
3
Baden
5,881
New York
9,250
38
Brunswick
269
North Carolina.
190
243
...
Hamburg
310
...
Ohio
6,880
362
Hanover
8,858
Oregon.
2
......
Hessen
4,849
...
..
Pennsylvania
5,878
210
2
Lubeck
9
Rhode Island ..
150
3
...
Mecklenburg
186
South Carolina ..
150
148
Nassau
482
Tennessee.
1,439 129
1,764
...
Oldenburg
220
Texas
Vermont.
578
4
Saxony.
1,775
...
Virginia ..
2,235
1,647
1
Weimar
3
...
West Virginia.
45
9
...
Würtemberg ..
2,566
Wisconsin
660
8
...
District of Columbia
251
30
...
TERRITORIES.
Alaska
......
......
...
Arizona
......
......
Colorado
20
1
...
Dakota
5
1
Italy
985
Idaho
... ...
...
Mexico.
25
5
2
Norway
76
Montana.
9
......
4
Pacific Islands.
1
Poland .
292
Utah.
18
...
Washington
4
......
...
Russia .
86
...
...
Wyoming.
1
......
...
At sea under United States flag.
1
......
...
Not stated
625
53
2 Scotland.
1,202
...
South America.
15
2
...
Spain ..
45
...
Sweden.
237
...
Switzerland
2,949
...
Turkey .
Wales
147
West Indies
74
1
At sea ...
45
...
Not stated.
......
Chinese.
1
Natives
198,615
Foreign
112,249
Total foreign
112,197
43
8
Grand total
310,864 310,864
65
RECAPITULATION.
Total Whites.
288,737
6 Colored.
22,088
Indians
38
...
Portugal
14
...
..
Sandwich Islands
1
...
...
Sardinia
1
...
Total United States.
176,540
22,045
30
Greece
2
..
Holland
643
Hungary
126
Ireland
32,239
...
...
1
Indian
5
..
New Mexico.
27
9
...
Prussia ..
24,269
...
...
Germany, not specified.
2,933
Total Germany ..
59,040
Great Britain, not specified.
5
...
...
...
...
China
...
1
New Jersey
955
8
...
Bavaria
6,430
...
...
...
...
...
89
...
...
...
...
Total British America ...
..
1
...
...
...
...
.. .
...
...
...
1022
HISTORY OF SAINT LOUIS.
The above exhibition of nationalities was thus commented upon and analyzed by an intelligent jour- nalist at the time the statistics were made public,-
"St. Louis is indeed a cosmopolitan city, if there is any on earth. There is still a preponderance of about 85,000 natives over those born in other countries, of whom, however, 22,000 are negroes; but if the children born in St. Louis of foreign parents and who still speak foreign idioms were counted among the foreigners, the two categories would stand in a much closer proportion. At the time the last census was taken there were 198,615 natives and 112,249 foreigners in this city, the census- takers having, with propricty, classed as foreigners only those who were born abroad.
"Now, according to nativity, there are 176,570 whites and 22,045 colored Americans against 59,040 Germans, 32,239 Irish, and 6568 English and Scotch, the balance hailing from almost all countries on earth, even Australia, the Sandwich Islands, and China not excluded. A glance over the statistics of our school population proves the fallacy of these figures, so far as the ethno- logical character of the city is concerned. Of the 24,347 pupils enrolled in 1870 in our public schools, 10,600, or a little over two- fifths of the whole number, were children of German parents, while only 512, or one out of forty-eight, were born in Germany. Doubtless, therefore, the new arrivals are mostly adults; but inasmuch as the first generation born of foreign parents in this country retain more of the peculiarities of their ancestors than they get from the people into which they will be fused in the end, the ethnological character of St. Louis at present is not exactly determined by the statics of the places of nativity.
"Considering, therefore, the above-stated school statistics, and taking into account the fact that about twice as many of the children in the city of German parentage attend no school at all, or are enrolled in the various parochial schools, the German population, according to the standard of language and habits, amounts at least to 90,000.
" It is evidently more difficult to find the elements for a simi- lar calculation in regard to the immigrant Irish, English, and Scotch population, and those smaller numbers from various other countries. A large majority of these speak English, which enables them to amalgamate sooner with the American nationality. But even of these a sufficient number retain their native peculiarities in such a degree as to warrant the belief that, ethnologically speaking, the population of St. Louis is very nearly equally divided between natives and foreign- ers.
" No doubt this proportion will increase somewhat in favor of the foreign population during the next ten years, the amal- gamating power of the native inhabitants notwithstanding. Not only that the native population has no means to make up for the regular influx from abroad, even if, as it is supposed, it will be smaller than previously, but during the first generation the foreigners increased in a larger ratio by births than the natives.
" The increase of our population, however, has its rational limit, and the moment the limit is approached, the ethno- logical character of St. Louis will become more stationary and uniform.
" After the second generation people of every extraction ac- quire many of the physical and moral characteristics of the predominant race. The ratio of births gets to an equilibrium ; the large proportion of German children visiting the public schools gives predominance to the English language; the accu- mulation of wealth in the hands of families of foreign extrac- tion makes them build larger houses and in a style which is
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