Why Emigrate To Pottsville, Pennsylvania?

To take a look at any photograph, put your cursor on that particular photograph and left click. This will bring the photograph into a new window. As you can read the photograph of the ship's manifest, written by Captain Cornelius Anderson of the barque "Emigrant", on the second page several passengers including Franz Hillenbrand provide their final destination as Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Why would anyone from the small town of Hosenfeld, Germany want to go to the small town of Pottsville, Pennsylvania? The answer lies in coal.

By 1817, a number of small individual coal mines had been opened in Schuylkill County. By 1822 it was reported that 1488 tons of anthracite had been shipped by canal from the Schuylkill region, and the industry, as a business, had its official beginnings. Development was rapid, and by 1825, the Schuylkill Navigation Company had completed the Schuylkill Canal, which allowed for the transport of anthracite from Pottsville to Philadelphia in barges capable of holding 200 tons. In 1842, the first train by the P. & R. Railroad (Philadelphia & Reading) from Philadelphia made the trip to Pottsville to compete for the coal trade. Trains were able to haul three times as much anthracite than barges.

Thus with an economic boom in Schuylkill County competing for labor, foreign advertisement enticed immigrants to promises of a paycheck and economic freedom. It is quite apparent that Franz Hillenbrand took this gamble. Several members of our extended family emigrated from the Fulda region to end up in Schuylkill County. As Franz Hillenbrand stepped onto the docks at Fells Point in the Baltimore Harbor, a new life beckoned and pulled his destination to Pottsville. Next installment, Franz Hillenbrand's trials and tribulations in the New World.

The Barque "Emigrant"

The picture on the right is the only photograph that I was able to identify as the ship "Emigrant". Though it appears to have seen better days, this photograph was taken at Bristol, England when it ran aground. Franz Hillenbrand boarded this ship (actually called a barque or bark) to emigrate to America. A barque is a three masted square rigged sailing ship that traversed the Atlantic Ocean.


On this particular passage, the Captain of the ship was Cornelius Anderson. The ship was measured at 379 tons. All of the passengers were of German descent. There appears to have been over 200 passengers on this particular trip. That sounds amazing, in that there is precious room onboard. The bottom deck housed ballast, supplies and possessions. The middle deck was the steerage where the passengers were cramped during the journey. The photograph below portrays what the inside of a barque would look like in the mid 1800's. The next installment will be the arrival of Franz Hillenbrand in Baltimore, Maryland.

A reason to leave

I ponder why Franz Hillenbrand would leave this small community of farmers in the year 1847. The political and economic situation was dynamic during this period of Germany's history, with massive emigration to the United States by the intelligentsia. This upheavel became known as the German Revolution. But somehow, I fail to link this phenomenon to the village of Hosenfeld.

The most likely reason, that I was able to research, is that during the year of 1847, there was a famine in the region. No doubt the famine impacted the family hard enough for Franz to leave his occupation as a farmer and start anew in America. According to Hessische Auswanderer (Hessian Emigration), Franz Hillenbrand left with 100 gulden and his possessions.

He traveled to Bremer-haven, which is the port city and emigration gateway to America, situate in north Germany. We don't know if relatives (?) George and Gertrude Hillenbrand of Hosenfeld, who left Germany in 1837, had sent letters back home extolling the virtues of a new life. As Franz neared the port city, he could see the many sails of barques and schooners waiting to take their human cargo to a promising life abroad. Staying overnight in the locality, I wondered if deciding to leave his homeland must have played upon Franz's mind. Was he making the right decision? The future lies ahead, aboard the barque "Emigrant".