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Note: Nothing concrete is known about August's (as he was called) life in Ger., but in 1848 he emigrated to the U.S., departing from London. As suggested by the Graners in their biography of Dr. Adolf and Mina Widenmann (see above, no. 75 and Bibliography), he may have left "because of dissatisfaction with economic and political conditions, a need of freedom, a lust for adventure, or refusal to accept an extended military service." He could not afford a substitute to avoid conscription. (However, see no. 85 below.) Whatever the case, he settled in Germantown, PA, to learn agriculture from Quaker farmers, and here he met his future wife while on a boating trip. Pastor Mann, the minister who married them, convinced August and Pauline that opportunities were better in Michigan, so on 9�Apr 1851, the day after their marriage, the couple left for Ann Arbor, which was already the home of numerous Swabians. August opened a hardware business, probably in 1852 and certainly with the aid of his fellow German immigrants, at the corner of Main and Washington Streets under the style of "A. Widenmann, General Hardware." On 2�Apr 1852 he filed an intention to become a citizen and on 30 March 1855 received his naturalization papers. When his brother Johann Karl (no. 85) joined him in 1852, he changed the name to "A. Widenmann & Bro." This arrangement failed to work out, however, and Karl (later anglicized to "Charles") moved on to California. August wrote a letter dated 1�Aug 1856 to the W�rttemberg general consulate in New York requesting that a consulate be established in Michigan, outlining why it should be placed in Ann Arbor, and urging that he himself be appointed consul. Although the letter is obviously in August's handwriting, his name does not figure among the 143 signatories, all of whom were immigrants from W�rttemberg. He received the appointment eight years and reams of correspondence later, in a letter from King William II of W�rttemberg dated 11�Mar 1864. His credentials were recognized in a letter of 9�May 1864 signed by President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of State William H. Seward (a document that has a history of its own; see below). His consular duties frequently entailed week-long trips to sparsely settled territories such as Illinois, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, and so on, through areas that were pure wilderness at the time. The hardware store prospered, and in 1867 Jacob Schuh was taken in as partner and the name of the store changed to "August Widenmann & Jacob Schuh." By 1872 August was also running a "Banking, Passage & Foreign Exchange Office," and issuing under his own name international drafts and circular letters of credit, as well as passage tickets for the major international shipping companies. His brother Heinrich's firm, Schmidt & Dihlmann (see no. 88), served as his chief European associate. His business also included debt collections, as the German title indicates: Europ�isches Wechsel, Passage & Incasso Gesch�ft. He and his wife were active members of the community and regular church-goers at the German Bethlehem United Church of Christ. In 1859 they helped to organize a Sunday School and then in 1867 August was cofounder of a Sunday School Society for which he served as the first Librarian, an important position in view of the fact that the society's principal concern was to supply the school with a good German library. Pauline taught at the school, while August also served on the school board and the town council. The family moved from modest rooms above a store in North Main Street to a spacious house at the corner of South Fourth Avenue and Packard Street. Their new home also came to serve as a refuge for young immigrants and at times for wayward children. They were now affluent, able both to make trips to the native country and even to send their oldest son to Biberach and Stuttgart to study (see below, no. 108). According to the census of 1870 they possessed total assets of about $68,500, at that time a small fortune. There is moreover evidence in the form of deeds recorded at the Washtenaw County Court House in Ann Arbor that August and Pauline were speculating in real estate. Between September 1852 and October 1855 they purchased plots in Ann Arbor to the amount of $6,150, and on 5 June 1861 they bought a plot from the estate of August's deceased father, Johann Jacob (no. 62), for $2,400. Between December 1859 and May 1875, on the other hand, they made twenty sales of plots to the amount of $18,482. Although not all the deeds are extant, it would nevertheless seem that August and Pauline derived considerable profit from their ventures About 1874, however, the family encountered serious financial reverses, while it appears that August also lost the respect of the German section of the town. There are three versions of what happened, all handed down orally and finally ending up in letters. None is confirmed. According to one version he was the victim of the Panic of 1873, a particularly pernicious depression that caused the failure of hundreds of small businesses around the country. Another story has it that he acted as financial trustee and adviser for many German immigrants, and was accused of misusing funds that had been entrusted to him. Unfortunately no details have as yet surfaced to aid in research. The third version, supplied by Edith Staebler Kempf, provides more details. According to it, August entered into illicit relationships, and as this circumstance became known he rapidly lost his respect among his fellow immigrants, who now began to avoid his businesses. He allegedly fathered an illegitimate child on a young woman whose parents demanded a sizable indemnity, threatening prosecution in default of settlement. Unable to make payment, August found himself compelled to accept an offer made by Friedrich (Fritz) Rettich, the owner of a saloon adjoining the hardware store, who lent him the money against a mortgage on his share of the hardware business. As the effects of the Panic of 1873 took hold, August suffered further losses and was now incapable of repaying the loan. Rettich foreclosed, promptly selling August's share of the business to Jacob Schuh, the former partner. At about the same time the banking business folded. Since the consulate had been abolished on 14�Nov 1871, as a consequence of Otto von Bismark's success in unifying Ger., the family no longer had any source of income and by 1874 was ruined. Whatever the cause, there is at least no doubt that August's financial situation became desperate, and that he lost both his hardware store and his hitherto good reputation among his fellow Germans Letters indicate that in an effort to pay his creditors August was borrowing heavily from his brother Charles in Vallejo, while he had sold most of his real estate and possessions in auctions recorded on 11 Feb 1876 and on 24 May and 19�Mar 1877. Pauline wrote in a letter dated 3 Dec 1874 that the year had been long and difficult, and she asks her brother-in-law for a loan of $3,000. Apparently their problems reached a climax in 1876, for on 2 Mar of that year August wrote to his brother, I stayed indoors for three days after the catastrophe, and when I finally did decide that I had to go out into the world again, I wandered the streets all day long, from one place to another, with my eyes cast down, no longer daring to look anyone in the eye. August's wife, Pauline, made desperate efforts to overcome the family's difficulties, but without success (see below). They finally left Ann Arbor, moving some twelve miles north to Whitmore Lake, where August did a bit of farming while Pauline established and ran a vacation resort. August had been suffering from severe head and stomach pains for about two years, and then on 12�Dec 1883, while on a train bound for Preston, Ontario, Canada, he was seized by intense paroxysms of head and stomach pains, and lost control of his movements. He remained under treatment at the home of his daughter Mary (no. 109) in Preston until March, when he returned to Whitmore Lake. Here his condition declined steadily until death finally brought relief, the immediate cause of death apparently having been a brain tumor, or "inflammation of the brain," as the death certificate states. Dr. Conrad George of Ann Arbor, the family physician, later performed an autopsy, the results of which he submitted in a paper, "A Case of General Atrophy of The Gray Matter of The Cerebrum�," The Physician and Surgeon, Vol. VII, no. XI (November 1885), pp. 481-89. Doctor George describes August as intellectually talented "but of an uncontrollable, violent temperament," an energetic man who "had always enjoyed the pleasures of the table." From his few extant writings it is clear that, like his wife, he was a true lover of nature and an enthusiastic supporter of everything German, especially the reunification in 1871, even though it cost him his consulate. August took a passionate interest in the events of his time, as is evident from letters written to his brother Charles in early 1861. He watched in frustrating impotence as "ambitious and fanatic" politicians from both sides were plunging the country into civil war. "Put 20 southern and 20 northern leaders on the gallows and the Union would be saved." (Letter dated 30 Apr 1861.) He possessed some musical talent, and accompanied his wife (who played the piano) with the violin whenever the family and friends gathered to sing German folk songs. And he seems to have been a poet. A poem dated 24�Jan 1865 and titled Meine lieber Pauline von meine Abrei� auf Deutschland ("[To] My Dear Pauline on My Departure For Ger.") is among papers belonging to The New Mexico Historical Society, Lincoln, NM. Another poem written on consulate letter paper and titled "Auf das Begr�bniss eines Preussischen Verwundeten in der Stadt Ulm," and a three-dollar bill issued in 1871 by his banking office are now in my possession (no. 165). A considerable collection of August's correspondence with German officials from 1856 to the close of the consulate in 1871 is in the Hauptstaatsarchiv, Stuttgart, file E 73 Verz. 62 B�. The Vallejo Naval And Historical Museum of Vallejo, California, has a collection of letters written by August and Pauline in the 1860s, 1870s, and 1880s to August's brother Charles (no. 85). Two photos purported to be of August, one of which includes his wife Pauline, were printed by Alger Buell Crandell in Anns' Amazing Arbor: The Growth And Groans of a Great University Town, page 127. However the captions under these pictures are incorrect. Strangely enough, no likeness of August-neither photo, painting, nor drawing-has yet to emerge, despite my frenzied efforts to locate one. The hardware store had a fairly long history of its own. Jacob Schuh sold it to one Edward Eberbach who in turn sold it to John C. Fischer, most likely about 1889. It then passed through several hands-including those of The Good-year Tire Company-finally ending up in the ownership of John Dillon, who in November 1982 was forced to close the business when a bank failure tied up his assets. President Abraham Lincoln's letter dated 9�May 1864, recognizing August's consular credentials and co- signed by Secretary of State William H. Seward, also has an interesting history. Stolen from August's office in 1874 when he was ill, it turned up in 1944 at an auction in New York City and was bought by an Ann Arbor dealer, from whom Mrs. Edith Staebler Kempf subsequently purchased it. I am ignorant of the document's current location.
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