Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume One).djvu/239

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ

troops of the Palatinate. The Karlsruhe burghers, who had been accustomed to the trim appearance of the grand duke's soldiers, did not seem to relish the picturesque and romantic appearance of our Palatinate fighters for liberty, but were rather inclined to close their doors and shutters as though feeling the necessity of protecting themselves against the inroad of a band of robbers. At any rate, the faces of many of the people who stood on the streets watching our entering columns bore the unmistakable expression of anxious expectancy. We consoled ourselves with the thought, and gave that thought very vigorous utterance, that the population of this little capital consisted mainly of courtiers high and low, and of government officials, and that at the bottom of their hearts they hated the revolution and wished the grand duke to return, although many of them had, since his flight, talked like republicans. The wish of the people of Karlsruhe to get rid of their neighbors from the Palatinate, was so great that our troops were not even given sufficient opportunity to prove to those timid souls what honest and peace-loving beings were concealed under those wild beards, those red plumes, and those belts stocked full of daggers and dirks. On the same day a camp was assigned to us outside of the city, and on the 20th of June we marched northward to the aid of the revolutionary army of Baden, which in the meantime had got into a critical situation.

The army of Baden had defended the northern frontier of the grand duchy against General Peuker, commander of a corps formed of regular Würtemberg and Hessen troops. Just at the time when the hostilities broke out, the Badish army also received its Pole, General Mieroslawski, as commander-in-chief. He was still a young man, and had shown much ability as well as bravery in the last Polish uprising, but he possessed

[ 199 ]