Voyage to North America, 1844-45: Prince Carl of Solms's Texas Diary of People, Places, and Events.

Translation from German and notes by Wolfram M. Von-Maszewski. Introduction by Theodore Gish. (Denton: German-Texan Heritage Society and University of North Texas Press, c. 2000. Pp. x, 244. $32.50, ISBN 1-57441-124-1.)

In 1842 twenty-one members of the German nobility formed a society, popularly known as the Adelsverein, to promote and direct German colonization in Texas. The following year the society appointed Carl, Prince of Solms-Braunfels, as commissioner-general to direct its colonization project in Texas. Solms's diary is an account of his trip to America from May 13, 1844, to June 30, 1845. This edition of the diary has an appendix that contains the passenger list from the steamship Caledonia, which Solms took from England to Boston; a "Memoir on American Affairs" that he wrote after his return to Germany; and a brief second diary kept by Alexander Bourgeois d'Orvanne, who had been hired by the Adelsverein as the colonial director of the Texas project.

Theodore Gish's introduction to Solms's diary provides relevant information on Prince Carl's life, the activities of the Adelsverein, German settlement in Texas, and the discovery and translation of the diary and the various items in the appendix. Wolfram M. Von-Maszewski has done an excellent job of editing the diary. He has gone to great lengths to identify the places and individuals Solms mentions, and he has drawn eight separate maps of Solms's Texas travels.

In common with other travelers in nineteenth-century America, Solms complained of poor to nonexistent roads, bad food, and filthy, vermin-infested lodgings, but he also noted exceptions. He occasionally offered pithy comments on the people he met, as in this interesting entry: "Visit in Dr. Anson Jones' office. He is a polite man with good manners but has cat eyes. I don't trust him" (p. 36). Solms also revealed much about himself. While traveling through the United States on his way to Texas, he appears to have mentioned every individual of German origin he met. Repeated entries clearly indicate that he loved and missed his fiancee, Princess Sophie von Salm-Salm. Love for Sophie, however, did not prevent him from commenting on the beauty of the Anglo American, German, African American, and Mexican women he met on his travels.

The diary ends abruptly just prior to Solms's return to Germany, where he wrote a "Memoir on American Affairs." Nothing in the diary prepares the reader for the depth of Solms's hostility toward America expressed in the "Memoir." He called the United States "the dirty American democracy" (p. 210) and wrote that "it can easily be said that the United States possesses the vices of all of the European nations without having inherited any of their good qualities" (p. 206).

For historians, the primary value of Solms's diary probably lies in the account he gave of the beginnings of German settlement in Texas. But for anyone interested in nineteenth-century America, there is much in this volume that informs and entertains.

D. HARLAND HAGLER
University of North Texas