Another Unknown Story of the American Frontier

[CeliaHayes]

All right, then - my other three novels are about the German settlements in the Texas Hill Country; has anyone outside of Texas ever heard about how 7,000 German immigrants were essentially dumped on the farthest frontier - as one of my characters says "like a basket of unwanted kittens"?

Right then - so they were, in the mid 1840s. My "Adelsverein Trilogy" originally started as one book: Adelsverein - Book One: The Gathering


This tells the story of how the Steinmetz and Richter families signed on with the Mainzer Adelsverein, a quasi-charitable foundation started by a group of high-minded German noblemen to start an entrepreneur colony in Texas. Once arrived in Texas, after a horrific journey, the eldest Steinmetz daughter meets and is courted by a young Texian frontiersman with a dangerous past.

Book Two is Adelsverein - Book Two: The Sowing which carries the story up through the Civil War, which was as tragically eventful in Texas as anywhere else in the South.

The German settlers were Unionists, and very much opposed to chattel slavery... as well as to the draft. Martial law was declared in the Hill Country, and a pro-Confederate lynch gang, known as the 'hangerbande' terrorized those citizens who had been outspoken against secession.

The final volume, Adelsverein - Book Three: The Harvesting carries the story of the Steinmetz, Becker and Richter families through the post-war recovery, and the start of the Texas cattle industry.

Even though the war is over, tragedy still haunts the families;  the older generation is passing on, and a generation of children growing to maturity who know nothing but living in America. But Hansi Richter and his sons and nephews have a plan to invest in trailing cattle from Texas to the north, which sets their feet on - as Hansi himself says "a path of gold and silver."

I actually didn't make up very much of the plot, or the cast of secondary characters - the history of the German settlements in Texas was full of totally dramatic happenings and fascinating and eccentric people.

[MichaelS]

Well.... can I reply even though I AM from TEXAS???

I love these stories. I love the Fredricksburg area of Texas and love to learn more about Texas history. Most people think the ALAMO is the ONLY Texas history story there is. I am Texas thru-n-thru and love going on weekend trips. I live in the San Antonio area (so of course I LOVE the Alamo) and I travel most weekends to somewhere within about 200 miles, spend the weekend in a hotel and my wife and girls do "free stuff". Mostly stopping at parks, historical markers etc... Yea, we have that book "Weird Texas" and "101 Things to do around San Antonio" SO, if these are available on Kindle then a person traveling in the area could easily pull up all of the historical stuff... things that did not get a Historical Marker.

Thanks for the heads up. 

[CeliaHayes]

Heck, Michael - knock yourself out! and yes, most people only think "Alamo" when they think of Texas history! I wanted to write about practically anything else, so I even started "The Gathering" with an account of the Goliad Massacre - the "other Alamo" just to get things off on the right foot!

And I have included so much local history and folklore that the Trilogy was blessed by the local heritage society, and the Gillespie County Pioneer Museum sells it in paperback in their museum store. I have a friend who is planning to do a walking tour of Fredericksburg, and locating all the places that I wrote about.

Including the tree next to the Nimitz Hotel where the villainous J.P. Waldrip was shot down by person or persons unknown, two years after the end of the Civil War. He was a leader of the Hanging Band, and had many enemies in Fredericksburg, but no one ever revealed who killed him.

But I put my version of the Waldrip killing into Book Three...

[Kathy]

Is the location for the book New Braunfels? I have spent many vacations there and love the area. I will definitely be reading these books. 

[Meredith Sinclair]

Is the location for the book New Braunfels? I have spent many vacations there and love the area. I will definitely be reading these books. 

Have you done the hot air balloon weekend? I am not for sure if they still have it, but when I was younger we'd go to San Antonio and on the way back to Houston we would see all the balloons... It is a beautiful area. I am So getting this book.

[CeliaHayes]

Cool - I didn't know about the hot-air balloon weekend! And, yes - there are a couple of scenes in the Trilogy set in New Braunfels; the German family I wrote about comes there first, but there are so many people already settled there, they catch the next wagon train    for a-then-unnamed community that will be called Fredericksburg. Eventually, one of the daughters settles with her husband in Comfort. I've pretty well got the Hill Country covered.

I even put in a couple of chapters set in Indianola, the city on the Gulf Coast that isn't there any longer!

CH
www.celiahayes.com