Schurz Carl



Carl Schurz, Civil War General, ALS: "I should be glad to deliver a lecture at Newark"  

1p ALS inscribed overall and signed by Major General Carl Schurz (1829-1906) as "C. Shurz" at lower right. Written in St. Louis, Missouri on May 22, 1869. On cream blue-lined stationery paper. Extensively annotated in pencil at top and verso in an unknown hand. Expected paper folds and a few minor edge chips. The left edge is slightly darkened, and there is surface residue verso probably from a scrapbook, else near fine. 5" x 8.125".  

In part:  

"I should be glad to deliver a lecture at Newark, but I do not know yet whether my engagements will permit me to do so. The fact is, I am so overwhelmed with business at present, that I shall hardly have time to prepare anything. I can, therefore, not make a reliable promise now.  

I thank you most sincerely for the kind things you say concerning my election to the Senate, and shall do all I can to justify your expectations."  

The retired Civil War general had been elected as a U.S. Senator from Missouri in November 1868, assuming the office just a few months before this reply to Hays in March 1869. The last remarks of Schurz's letter were similar in sentiment to those he had delivered in front of a joint session of the Missouri General Assembly on January 20, 1869: "I shall not entertain you with pompous promises as to what I am going to do and to accomplish, but believe me when I say that I stand here with the profoundest consciousness of the duties and obligations I owe to you and to the country, and that I shall faithfully devote the best energies of my manhood to the great task of justifying your choice." Schurz was the first German-born national to be elected to the U.S. Senate; his six-year term ended in 1875.  

Carl Schurz had participated in the Revolution of 1848, an event which greatly shaped his later political views. After immigrating to the United States in 1852, he passed the bar and became involved in Wisconsin Republican Party politics. In April 1862, Schurz was commissioned Brigadier General of a volunteer regiment, and was promoted to Major General in 1863. Schurz fought in the Second Battle of Bull Run, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, and Chattanooga before resigning from the army in 1865. After the war, Schurz worked in newspapers and further advanced his political career. As a Senator, he promoted civil service reforms and later co-founded a new political party named the Liberal Republicans. Schurz served as Secretary of the Interior in President Rutherford B. Hayes's cabinet between 1877-1881.  

Schurz's correspondent, James L. Hays, was a New Jersey state senator who served between 1867-1869.  


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