(Excerpt from
the family memoir, Dear Gordon: Speaking of the Past.)
DYNASTIC
VISIONS
The
Honorable William Walter Phelps, Minister to Germany, 1890-1893
A residence established
– Mission celebrations – A revealing dinner with Samuel Clemens, Mark Twain – A
marriage sought – Yellow journalism – Chancellor Bismarck – The Minister
tackles the meat market – Tuberculosis – The diplomat pleases neither the
German court nor the American colony – Trade matters – Appointment to New
Jersey Court of Errors and Appeals –Chief counsel at the Bering Sea Tribunal of
Arbitration in Paris - His daughter,
Marian, is wed to Mr. Franz von Rottenburg – The Minister returns home, with
little more than a year to live.
His duties completed (the conclusion of the Berlin conference
on the Samoan islands), taking a train for Bremerhaven, William Walter
boarded the steamer, Fulda, for New
York. In Washington, he met with the President (Benjamin Harrison), who
appointed him Minister to Germany. At Teaneck (NJ), the Phelps Guards (self-appointed
fan club) sought to honor him
publicly, but he gracefully and modestly declined, claiming that he was but one
of three who had secured the treaty. Following a summer vacation at Teaneck, on
September 7, William Walter boarded the Elbe
for Germany.
On arrival, the new Minister took rooms at the Kaiserhof, a grand
metropolitan hotel in Berlin. His first act was to present his credentials to
the Emperor William II, in the company of Count Herbert von Bismarck. Finding a
home in the city proved difficult, despite a willingness to pay $20,000 (approx.$377,000)
a year in rent. It is unclear why this was so, given such an apparently
princely sum. Perhaps there were ill-feelings towards America in the aftermath
of the treaty. At last, a building at the corner of Dorotheen and Neue Wilhelm
Strasse was found. This housed several stores on the ground floor, which were
obliged to move, and a series of costly refurbishments were undertaken. While
thus engaged, the Minister received notice that an honorary doctorate had been
conferred on him by Rutgers University, following close on the heels of a
similar honorarium accorded by his alma mater, Yale.
As Thanksgiving Day neared, preparations were made for the
celebration traditionally conducted for the American colony by the Minister. A
group of disparate interests representing differing modes of worship and
lifestyle, which ran the gamut from temperance to hedonism, wealth to
near-poverty, these expatriates seldom found little harmony on the patriotic
occasions when they came together. William Walter was determined to change
this. Calling a meeting, he announced his plans for a banquet, a concert
performed by American students, and a ball. The price of admission was dictated
by his desire to include those at the lower end of the income scale. Because
expenses were far in excess of that derived from the tickets, he underwrote the
remaining costs without publicizing it, so as not to give offense. At the
dinner at the Kaiserhof, involving close to four hundred and fifty
participants, Count Herbert and Mrs. Phelps sat at the Minister's right, Prince
Radziwill and Miss Phelps to his left. William Walter used the occasion to
drape himself in the flag, metaphorically, while boasting that it was the
finest such celebration as had ever been given by the American colony in
Berlin, a mission noted amongst all the other American missions for its lavish
functions.
In 1890, the Empress Augusta died and public occasions were
curtailed in deference to her death. In the spring, William Walter moved into
his new quarters and, as he had done all his life, commenced a busy social
round despite the national mourning. Herrick's (Hugh M. Herrick, WWP’s
biographer by arrangement with the family) description of the Minister's
new home provides detail, while affording a revealing glimpse into his
personality. On the ground floor were situated the kitchen and servants'
quarters, state reception rooms were located on the first floor, and, above
them, the family's living quarters.
"The ladies
of the family carried out their own idea in making the rooms inhabitable and
agreeable, and it was no light task for the Berlin decorators to follow their
views, although they afterward acknowledged the effect to be charming. No dust
and darkness collectors were allowed. Throughout the second floor all the doors
were removed so that an unobstructed view through the entire suite of rooms was
given. Alcoves and arches marked the divisions of the rooms and light-colored
draperies and curtains furnished the windows. The walls were hung with
beautiful pictures and etchings. The floor was covered with wooden mosaic and
the ballroom was the wonder of the German nobility. The patriotism of the
Minister was manifested by a thirty-six foot American flag in the main
vestibule of the house. There was one picture in the house which Mr. Phelps
prized very highly and to which he frequently called the attention of his
visitors. It represented the scene in the Parliament Court, when the ill-fated
Charles I of England was tried and condemned. John Phelps, the ancestor of the
American Minister, was a clerk of the court, and he appears in the picture
sitting at his desk, with the king, as prisoner, sitting in front of him.
Prince Bismarck had the pleasure of viewing the picture, but his comments on
the court of regicides have not been preserved."
Not so another guest, Mark Twain, who used the occasion in his
autobiography to comment sardonically on the hunt for notable ancestors. He
begins with an explanatory preamble:
"Back of the Virginia
Clemenses is a dim procession of ancestors stretching back to Noah's time.
According to tradition, some of them were pirates and slavers in Elizabeth's
time. But this is no discredit to them, for so were Drake and Hawkins and the
others. It was a respectable trade, then, and monarchs were partners in it. In
my time I have had desires to be a pirate myself. The reader -- if he will look
deep down in his secret heart, will find -- but never mind what he will find
there; I am not writing his Autobiography, but mine. Later, according to
tradition, one of the procession was Ambassador to Spain in the time of James
I, or of Charles I, and married there and sent down a strain of Spanish blood
to warm us up. Also, according to tradition, this one or another -- Geoffrey
Clement, by name -- helped to sentence Charles to death.
"I have not examined
into these traditions myself, partly because I was indolent, and partly because
I was so busy polishing up this end of the line and trying to make it showy;
but the other Clementses (sic) claim that they have made the examination
and that it stood the test. Therefore I have always taken for granted that I
did help Charles out of his troubles, by ancestral proxy. My instincts have
persuaded me, too. Whenever we have a strong and persistent and ineradicable
instinct, we may be sure that it is not original with us, but inherited --
inherited from away back, and hardened and perfected by the petrifying
influence of time. Now I have been always and unchangingly bitter against
Charles, and I am quite certain that this feeling trickled down to me through
the veins of my forebears from the heart of that judge; for it is not my
disposition to be bitter against people on my own personal account. I am not
bitter against Jeffreys. I ought to be, but I am not. It indicates that my
ancestors of James II's time were indifferent to him; I do not know why; I
never could make it out; but that is what it indicates. And I have always felt
friendly toward Satan. Of course that is ancestral; it must be in the blood,
for I could not have originated it.
".... And so, by the
testimony of instinct, backed by the assertions of Clemenses who said they had
examined the records, I have always been obliged to believe that Geoffrey
Clement the martyr-maker was an ancestor of mine, and to regard him with favor,
and in fact pride. This has not had a good effect upon me, for it has made me
vain, and that is a fault. It has made me set myself above people who were less
fortunate in their ancestry than I, and has moved me to take them down a peg,
upon occasion, and say things to them which hurt them before company.
"A case of the kind
happened in Berlin several years ago. William Walter Phelps was our Minister at
the Emperor's Court, then, and one evening he had me to dinner to meet Count
S., a cabinet minister. This nobleman was of long and illustrious descent. Of
course I wanted to let out the fact that I had some ancestors, too; but I did
not want to pull them out of their graves by the ears, and I never could seem
to get the chance to work them in a way that would look sufficiently casual. I
suppose Phelps was in the same difficulty. In fact he looked distraught, now
and then -- just as a person looks who wants to uncover an ancestor purely by accident,
and cannot think of a way that will seem accidental enough. But at last, after
dinner, he made a try. He took us about his drawing-room, showing us the
pictures, and finally stopped before a rude and ancient engraving. It was a
picture of the court that tried Charles I. There was a pyramid of judges in
Puritan slouch hats, and below them three bare-headed secretaries seated at a
table. Mr. Phelps put his finger upon one of the three, and said with exulting
indifference --
"'An ancestor of
mine.'
"I put my finger on a
judge, and retorted with scathing languidness --
"'Ancestor of mine.
But it is a small matter. I have others.'
"It was not noble in
me to do it. I have always regretted it since. But it landed him. I wonder how
he felt? However, it made no difference in our friendship, which shows that he
was fine and high, notwithstanding the humbleness of his origin. And it was
also creditable in me, too, that I could overlook it. I made no change in my
bearing toward him, but always treated him as an equal."
Twain continues.
"But it was a hard
night for me in one way. Mr. Phelps thought I was the guest of honor, and so
did Count S.; but I didn't, for there was nothing in my invitation to indicate
it. It was just a friendly offhand note, on a card. By the time dinner was
announced Phelps was himself in a state of doubt. Something had to be done; and
it was not a handy time for explanations. He tried to get me to go out with
him, but I held back; then he tried S., and he also declined. There was another
guest, but there was no trouble about him. We finally went out in a pile. There
was a decorous plunge for seats, and I got the one at Mr. Phelps's left, the
Count captured the one facing Phelps, and the other guest had to take the place
of honor, since he could not help himself. We returned to the drawing-room in
the original disorder. I had new shoes on, and they were tight. At eleven I was
privately crying; I couldn't help it, the pain was so cruel. Conversation had
been dead for an hour. S. had been due at the bedside of a dying official ever
since half past nine. At last we all rose by one blessed impulse and went down
to the street door without explanations -- in a pile, and no precedence; and
so, parted.
"The evening had its
defects; still, I got my ancestor in, and was satisfied."
The
humorist, no doubt, quite correctly identified William Walter's Achilles' heel:
social insecurity, which gave rise to a vaunted sense of self, expressed in the
vain tones of snobbery. As he observed - "notwithstanding the humbleness
of his origin" - William Walter's origins were, indeed, closely and
directly related to working on the land, whether or not Twain knew this. His
father had been a brash entrepreneur who made a fortune at a time particularly
propitious to such careers; his grandfather, a cash-poor farmer of a line of
such farmers. It was this vulnerable aspect of William Walter's character which
gave rise to overreaching ambition for the family's future. This, in
conjunction with the unpredictability of fate, would ultimately consume the
family.
A
major aspect of William Walter's plans for the family's future revolved around
his daughter, Marian. Ever since his college days, he had nurtured the idea of
joining his family with that of a well-bred German. More than either of her
brothers, Marian had shown a great interest in her father's affairs and a
desire to please him. She was now twenty-one and in the flower of marriageable
age. In this connection, a scathing account of their activities written by a
longtime observer of the Berlin scene and published August 6, 1893, in the Chicago Mail may well be a product of
the yellow, partisan journalism that accompanied the age, but there remains a
whisper of truth in the excerpt:
"PHELPS LEGATION A LAUGHING STOCK
"America's
Representatives at Berlin Have Made Themselves Disliked.
"JERSEY GIRL'S MARRIAGE
"Even Bankrupt Nobles
Drew the Line - Mr. Coleman and the Ballet - Gossip"
"Snobs Represent
America
"Our country has not
always been fortunate in the selections of ministers accredited to the Berlin
court. Mr. Phelps, our recent minister to Berlin, made several breaks, and on
one occasion really put his foot in it. Mr. Phelps has not been a persona grata
in Berlin diplomatic circles, owing to his cynical temperament and --
indigestion. His avowed partiality for Bismarck naturally set the court against
him. By the way, Phelps-Bismarck partnership was all one-sided -- on the side
of Phelps. When the latter first came to Berlin he immediately set to work
introducing his daughter to Berlin society. His eye fell on Herbert Bismarck as
a likely marriageable candidate. The latter was invited to dinners at the
legation, to Mr. Phelps' box at the opera, but all in vain; Herbert would have
none of it. Mr. Phelps dropped the Pommeranian squire's son and caught on to
young Verdy du Vernois, son of the ex-minister of war of Germany. Young Vernois
is a very handsome chap, about 25 years of age, officer of the guards, and very
rich. He looked Miss Phelps over and found the Jersey maiden not agreeable to
his taste. It ended in a fizzle."
"Indigestion"?
Were William Walter's digestive tracts loud in their protest at the mission
fare?
The
New York Times, October 21, 1890, has
a confused report announcing the engagements of the "eldest daughter of
the United States Minister Phelps" to Herr von Reuter and the
"youngest daughter" to Baron Witzleben, both gentlemen in the
Imperial Guards. William Walter had but one daughter.
In
March, 1890, Prince Bismarck resigned the chancellorship - there had been a
complete break with the Emperor, who had opposed him from the start. Perhaps
unwisely for future relations with the German court, William Walter was
prominent in accompanying Bismarck to the railway station on the Prince's well
publicized departure from Berlin, joining him on the train with other members
of the American Legation.
As
with Whitelaw Reid (editor and publisher of the New Y0rk Herald Tribune,
then Minister to France, and a close friend of WWP), William Walter was
charged by Harrison with seeking the removal of obstacles to the European
importation of American pork. Pork, which represented ten percent of all
American exports, had been excluded, for protectionist reasons, from most
European markets for ten years. Germany, the other major market with France,
accounted for ten percent of European exports, and would only take ham and
bacon. In addition, there were regulations hindering the importation of
American beef.
William Walter set himself busily to pursuing his
mandate, engaging with any who might enable him to achieve his goals, while
constantly extolling to his distinguished guests the virtues of the American
pork and beef with which he routinely set his table. A moment of levity
occurred at the beginning of the Minister's two year campaign for the industry,
when Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show was denied entry because of its complement
of buffaloes. There were restrictions on the import of all American meats and,
no doubt, some officious custom's authority invoked them in respect of the
show's star animal attraction. While the resolution of this minor incident
occasioned some public mirth, it is hard not to imagine offense being taken at
an attitude which would later express itself, following the rescinding of the
German restrictions, in William Walter's observation that "(the American
pig) marched in triumph through the Brandenburger Gate."
Public
displays of support for the out-of-favor Bismarck, excessively lavish
demonstrations of wealth, a thirty-six foot American flag, overt husband-hunting
for his daughter, the need to demonstrate notable ancestors, the "American
pig"? What had happened to "Willy Wally," Henry Adams' (the
historian) "wise man," the discreet diplomat from Teaneck?
Clearly, he was still his own man, but now his behavior seemed to come
unbuttoned in the heady atmosphere of the powerful and historic capital city of
the German empire. This was Europe, seat of the great powers of the age;
America, far away, was but a hundred or so years in existence and yet to be recognized
as a major player in international affairs. Her flamboyant displays of wealth
and patriotism, such as those indulged by William Walter, were seen as
indiscreet. Diplomatic, they were not, and revealed a level of ignorance that
provoked contempt and dismissal. His transparent efforts to marry his daughter
off to a member of the German nobility surely invited mockery. Simply put,
William Walter was a man unwittingly out of his depth.
In
September, William Walter sailed home on the Elbe for a vacation. There was speculation in the press centered on
his availability for public office, again, to which he gave no response; there
were receptions involving the business and political communities; and, at a
large public meeting in Paterson (NJ), he made a strong speech in
support of Irish Home Rule. In December, he boarded the steamship Werra for the return voyage to Germany,
accompanied by his daughter, his wife remaining at home to oversee building
renovations.
Once more installed in his quarters, run, in his
wife's absence, by his daughter and a niece, Mabel Thorp Boardman (later a
leading organizer of the Red Cross), the Minister busied himself with a
seemingly endless round of festivities, involving both the American colony and
his hosts. His undisguised enthusiasm for German nobility provoked one
unimpressed American journalist to portray him as having gone so far as to don
"regulation court costume instead of the traditional dress-suit of
American diplomacy" at a German function.
It
is not known when William Walter's tuberculosis was first diagnosed, but there
are indications that he knew of it at this time.
In
1660, the author of The Pilgrim's
Progress, John Bunyan, wrote in reference to the fate of another, "the
Captain of all these men of death that came against him to take him away was
the consumption, for it was that brought him down to the grave." Pthisis
(wasting) or pulmonary consumption is an age-old disease. In 1689 Richard
Morton, a London physician, was the first to identify the lesion associated
with the condition, describing it as a tubercle. In 1839, Professor J. L.
Schoenlein at Zurich named it tuberculosis. Professor Robert Koch, a German
bacteriologist, identified the bacillus associated with the tubercle, mycobacterium tuberculosis, in 1882. In
1890, Koch presented the results of his findings showing that tuberculosis was
present in lymph, an alkaline fluid in the body. News that he had developed a
vaccine, referred to as "Koch lymph," created great excitement. Sums
of $2,000 (approx.$38,000) were offered for vials costing $6 ($115),
but Koch was loath to part with the "tuberculine," as it was also
called, because of lack of testing. In early 1891, William Walter persuaded
Koch to provide a supply of the remedy to interested American doctors, who
undertook tests. It would eventually be proved of little or no efficacy, though
later improvements would produce a useful diagnostic tool. A vaccine produced
in 1906 by two French researchers, Alberte Calmette and Jean Marie Guerin,
known as BCG, would be the first to demonstrate limited success. There is no
completely successful vaccine for tuberculosis to this day. Was William Walter's interest in Koch's
remedy a reference to his own condition?
A
further suggestion of the nature of William Walter's declining health occurred
in June, when, suffering from an extreme bout of exhaustion - a common symptom
of tuberculosis - he underwent an unspecified operation. This may have been the
first serious manifestation of his illness.
As
the Minister recovered and set about encouraging German manufacturers, with
mixed success, to exhibit at the Chicago World's Fair, his wife, who had joined
him earlier in the year, took the waters at Carlsbad with Mrs. John Wanamaker,
the Philadelphia clothier's wife, whose husband was then Postmaster-General.
Concluding his business, William Walter entrained with his daughter for
Homburg, there to take the waters in a stellar crowd including the Prince of
Wales.
Throughout
this year, William Walter pursued Harrison's initiative to clear the market for
the export of American meat products into Germany. The passage of the McKinley
Tariff Act, raising American tariffs while allowing for retaliatory measures
against any country applying prohibitive tariffs on American goods, was a spur
to his negotiations. However, the aggressive Secretary of Agriculture Jeremiah
M. Rusk's hasty actions in proposing imposition of such measures on Germany
made the Minister's job more difficult. Secretary of State James G. Blaine's resentment at Rusk's
interference was an additional complication. At the same time, the passage in
Congress of the Meat Inspection Act mandating government inspection of exports,
while also containing retaliatory measures, had the effect of reassuring German
concerns over trichinosis in pork and offering them a graceful retreat from
their position. In respect of American cattle imports, it was proposed that the
four week quarantine involving costly feeding expenses be obviated by the
building of abattoirs at Hamburg, the principal point of entry, thereby
enabling immediate slaughter and distribution via refrigerated railcars.
Secretary
Blaine's ill health combined with his poor relations with Harrison weakened his
grasp on the proceedings, enabling the administration to push its forceful
mandate. In these circumstances, William Walter found himself undercut, the
negotiations being taken out of his hands and transferred to a conference at
Saratoga, NY. There, the US agreed not to impose duties on the importation of
German beet sugar, worth $16,000,000 ($307,700,000) while reducing duty on
cereals, in exchange for the lifting of all German prohibitions. Credit for the
successful outcome, for which the Minister had worked hard, was taken by Rusk,
leaving William Walter with a sour taste, compounded by his belief that it
could have been achieved without sweetening the deal.
Miffed but undaunted, William Walter now sought the
introduction of American corn. Once again, his table was used to advance the
goal. Cornbread and bacon prepared "by a cook who could not be surpassed
in Virginia in the art of making cornbread toothsome" graced the
Minister's table and, following negotiations, a contract was secured with the
German War Department.
There
were also successful representations on behalf of the Standard Oil Company,
which was charged with establishing a monopoly in Germany, and American life
insurance companies, who sought more favorable financial conditions in the
investment of their premiums.
At
the annual Thanksgiving Day dinner, it would seem that William Walter's efforts
to bring all together were to be thwarted, either by the large number involved
or the intractability of the diverse temperaments of the members of the
American colony. Three dinner groups were organized - one for members of the
mission, another representing the Association of American Physicians, and the
remaining, the King's Daughters of the American Church - obliging the Minister
to appear at each. Mark Twain, presumably dining with the mission, gave an address.
In December, William Walter left Berlin for a two
months' leave of absence in Egypt. At Alexandria and Cairo he received the
hospitality of members of the International Appellate Court, before traveling
up the Nile to Luxor. Back in Cairo he was given a reception by the Khedive,
with whose father, Tewfik Pasha, he had become acquainted on a previous trip.
By March, he was back in Berlin.
Considerable
anti-American sentiment was voiced in Germany at this time by one of its more
prominent spokesmen, Dr. Hugo Jacobi, editor of the Allgemeine Zeitung. In April, enlarging on a rumor that America
intended to annex the Dominican Republic, he published a story alleging a sharp
exchange between the German Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Baron Marschall
von Bieberstein, and the American Minister. America had signed a reciprocal
trade agreement with the Dominican Republic the year before, drawing protests
from the Germans, French and British. Germany, Jacobi said, had, after
strenuous efforts, succeeded in extracting the same commercial terms from the
Dominicans. In response, Jacobi went on, the American Minister had called on
the German Secretary for a discussion, which he was curtly refused. There was
some truth to this. While discussing a new extradition treaty between America
and Germany with the German Secretary, William Walter jokingly referred to the
concessions America had just made to the Dominican Republic in a reciprocal
trade agreement. In the circumstances, it was, perhaps, an ill-advised remark.
In
1916, during Woodrow Wilson's administration, America established a military
government in the Dominican Republic. In 1924, sovereignty was restored under
the leadership of Horacio Vasquez Lajara. Then, in 1930, Rafael Trujillo
established a dictatorship that was to last thirty-one years. It was during
this that William Walter's grandson, Phelps Phelps, would be appointed
Ambassador to the Republic in 1952, following on his term as Governor in
American Samoa.
Back
home in America presidential elections were looming and Republicans, regarding
Harrison as unelectable a second time, some once more looked to Blaine. These
unwanted attentions posed a dilemma for the Secretary of State who resigned his
office. William Walter was proposed as a replacement, but he declined, refusing
to be seen as taking his friend's position.
In
January of 1893, William Walter's poor health exacerbated by the German
climate, he took another leave of absence, traveling through Spain, Morocco,
Algiers, Tunis, and Italy. While en route he received news of his appointment
as a judge to the New Jersey Court of Errors and Appeals by Governor George T.
Werts, an old friend.
His
business at the Legation in Berlin concluded, William Walter traveled to Paris
to act as the leading American counsel at the Bering Sea Tribunal of
Arbitration. This arose out of a long-standing and complex dispute with Canada,
involving seal harvesting rights in the Bering Sea. The Americans claimed the
rights to seals on islands in the region, while the Canadians, seals taken in
open waters. The tribunal, sitting from February into August, 1893, while
finding against the Americans and levying a fine of $473,151 ($9,277,000) to be
paid to the British, established regulations favorable to US interests.
As
with the Samoan conference, a commemorative painting was commissioned. Executed
by Carl Gutherz, an American longtime resident in Paris, it showed William
Walter addressing the tribunal in the person of its president, Baron de
Courcel, in the presence of other American and British arbitrators. This was
placed in the Corcoran Gallery in Washington.
In
early June, William Walter arrived back in New Jersey.
What
had become of his matrimonial ambitions for his daughter? Further acerbic
comment from the correspondent on the Chicago
Mail in August, 1893, has this to say:
"At last Mr. Phelps
realized that there were but few stars in the Berlin matrimonial market at his
disposal. Miss Phelps had tried, played, and lost. But one more ship hove in
sight. It is true it was a small coaster, but then it had a rudder, and that
was enough. It was Dr. Rottenberg (sic), now privy councilor in the
ministry of the interior, with a small salary, but a steady job. Mr.Rottenberg
is a native of Danzig, on the North Sea, whose parents were plain, modest, but
very respectable folks.
"Very Ordinary Young
Man.
"The young man
visited the higher schools, graduated as Dr. Phil, and served one year as
volunteer. After a long service in the ministry of the interior he received a
title of privy councilor, of which there are 700 degrees. Dr. Rottenberg is now
43, a widower with two children, and recently married Miss Phelps. The latter,
albeit very wealthy, is neither young nor pretty, but her father's cash has
scared away all Jersey mosquitoes and furnished her with elegant surroundings
in Berlin.
"Unfortunately the
American legation under Mr. Phelps was not a hospitable place for the American
colony."
Unfortunately,
the remainder of the correspondent's observations are unavailable. Presumably
they substantiate his charges concerning the quality of William Walter's
hospitality towards the American colony.
Though
William Walter had left Berlin, charges of his behavior there followed him to
the States. In early December, several newspapers reported that, while praising
Bismarck, he had disparaged the German government. No doubt the court would
have been offended, also. While there had been the customary complimentary
official effusions at his departure, there was no loss felt at the outgoing
high tariff, protectionist, party - the Democrats had beaten the Republicans,
bringing Grover Cleveland back into office.
On
June 1, 1893, the New York Times
published an announcement of the marriage of William Walter's daughter:
"MISS
MARION (sic) PHELPS'S MARRIAGE.
"The
Ex-Minister's Daughter to be Wedded To-Day in Berlin to Dr. von Rottenburg.
"The
marriage of Miss Marion Phelps, daughter of W. W. Phelps, ex-Minister to
Germany, to Dr. von Rottenburg, Secretary in the Department of the Interior, takes
place at 11:00 this morning in Berlin.
"The
ceremony will be performed in the "Yellow Room" of the legation on
the corner of Neu-Wilhelm and Dorotheen-Strasse, a beautiful and spacious
apartment, well-known to American visitors to Berlin. It takes its name to the
color of its exquisite furnishings. The wall hangings, ceiling decorations, and
even the picture frames, consist of or covered with yellow damask. For the
special occasion ex-Minister Phelps has placed in the room the valuable
presents which his German friends sent to him on the eve of his departure for
America.
"Among
them are a large and handsome portrait of Field Marshall von Moltke, presented
to Mr. Phelps by Count Waldersee; a wonderful crystal vase, the gift of Gen.
Verdy du Vernois, bearing his crest and monogram, and von Werner's painting,
'Bismarck Reading the Proclamation of the Empire at Versailles.'
"The
bride will be in traveling costume, and there will be as little ceremony as
possible. The Chaplain of St. George's, the Anglo-American church of Mon Dijou
Palace, will read the marriage ritual, and Mr. Elliott Schenck, son of the late
Dr. Noah Schenck, will furnish the music.
"The
number of invited guests has been limited to twenty-four, among them being a
brother and a nephew of the bridegroom, Mr. and Ms. Bennett Phelps, Chancellor
von Caprivi, Gen. and Countess Waldersee, Herr von Bötticher (sic), Minister of
the Interior; the Minister of Commerce and Baroness von Berlepsch, United
States Minister Runyon and Mrs. Runyon, and Mr. and Mrs. Poultney Bigelow.
"The
legation will be represented by Mr. Chapman Coleman, for 24 years First
Secretary; J.D. Jackson, Second Secretary; Mrs. Jackson, and Mr. Evans,
military attaché.
"After
the service the doors will be thrown open and a party will be asked to partake
of the wedding breakfast in the grand salon. There will be no speeches, except
the toast to the bride and groom, proposed by Minister Phelps. At 1 o'clock the
couple will leave for a brief honeymoon. The elections will require the speedy
return of Dr. von Rottenberg (sic) to his duties in the Ministry.
"The
presents brought the bride and groom are very numerous, the gifts in silver and
precious stones being of unusual magnificence. All the many branches of the
Phelps and Sheffield families are represented among the donors, and the Dodges,
the Jameses, the Stokeses, the Atterburys, the Boardmans, the Porters, and
others.
"The
numerous political and social friends of the father had not forgotten Miss
Phelps. Whitelaw Reid sent three beautiful punch bowls, Joseph Pulitzer a
diamond star, ex-Speaker Reid a magnificent silver vase, Mr. George Bliss an
emerald necklace, Mrs. Blaine a silver set, Gail Hamilton and Samuel Clemens a
complete set of their works, and the Baroness von Bussen a valuable oil
painting.
"Ex-Minister
Phelps and Mrs. Phelps will leave for New York on the steamship Spree June 6.
Mr. Phelps intends to preside at the opening of the Court of Errors and Appeals
at Trenton June 20. Upon their arrival here Mr. and Mrs. Phelps will go
directly to their country seat, Teaneck, N.J."
Evidently, the "Pommeranian squire," the ex-Minister of
War, General Verdy du Vernois, harbored no ill-feelings stemming from his son's
previous courtship with the bride. The bridegroom's brother was quite likely
Walter von Rottenburg, for whom Franz had arranged a position with the firm of
Krupp and who would be a technical adviser to the Sultan of Morocco.
A second announcement from the New
York Times the following day adds the name of "Herr Frederick Krupp,
the great gun manufacturer" to the list of guests, while noting that
"Gen. Count von Waldersee was not present." "Herr von Bötticher
(sic), Minister of the Interior and official superior of the bridegroom, signed
the wedding certificate in behalf of Dr. von Rottenburg,……The bride was attired
in a dress of white silk covered with silk and mull. Her traveling gown is of
blue cloth."
In a newspaper interview conducted with William Walter on his
return to New York relating to the German Emperor's parting words in a context
extolling German virtues over all others, he noted that, "The Emperor
jokingly referred to the fact that one of his subjects had succeeded in
capturing my daughter. He seemed to enjoy my loss far more than I did." William Walter had, nevertheless, achieved
his cherished ambition.
Dr. Franz Johannes von
Rottenburg, the designated sire
Franz Johannes von Rottenburg, the "small
coaster" that "hove in sight" in the Phelps' marriage
stakes, was born, 1845, in the Baltic city seaport Danzig.
A
thriving trade center of cosmopolitan character, Danzig belonged to the
Hanseatic League, a dynamic organization of cities around the Baltic Sea. While
formally Polish since the 15th century, the city's cultural and
economic orientation was principally German. In the 19th century it
held the status of a Free City for some
time, before becoming part of Prussia in 1814. Caspar Rottenburg, from the city
of Cologne on the Rhine, had moved to Danzig in 1665 and, by 1706, the family
was established as wine merchants in the person of Johann Theodor Rottenburg,
who became a citizen there in that year.
Through
two more generations, those of Franz Gottfried Rottenburg, who acquired the
noble hereditary 'von' from the then-reigning Polish king, and Paul Julius von
Rottenburg, the family prospered, branching out into maritime trade with the
acquisition of shipping. Paul Julius's son, Franz Napoleon von Rottenburg, who
would be Franz Johannes' father, was born a Roman Catholic in 1802. In 1842,
Franz Napoleon married Ida Charlotte le Goullon in Konigsburg, East Prussia.
Ida Charlotte, seventeen years younger, was of
French descent and from the principality of Weimar. Beginning with
Jeanette in 1843 the couple had three daughters and four sons. Franz Johannes
the second child, was born in 1845 and Lollo, the youngest, in 1858. Franz
Napoleon is described in a family memoir written by Lollo as "a very
lively, even nervous, man, brilliant in conversation and a great lover of
festivities." Ida Charlotte, well-educated, speaking French and familiar
with English and Italian, was, in contrast, romantic and quiet, caring little
for social displays. Subject to depression, she is described by Lollo (in an
unpublished family memoir) as
"self-tormenting." Despite her occasional misery, she cared deeply
for her children and the marriage was a happy one. Franz Napoleon's
father-in-law was a member of what Lollo describes as a "free religious
community" founded by a radical Catholic priest, Ronge, which Franz Napoleon
controversially joined. As a consequence, the contemporary Prussian king,
disapproving of his subject's religious choice, refused to honor Franz
Napoleon's nobility.
In
1866, tragedy struck the family. While Ida Charlotte was caring for Jeanette,
who had just given birth to her second child, she received news that Lollo,
then eight, had fallen ill, whereupon she hastened home. In her absence, a
nurse, looking after Jeanette, injured herself in a fall from a chaise longue on which she had climbed
to lower a blind. Shocked by this incident, Jeanette, suffering from puerperal
fever, an inflammation associated with childbirth, died after a few days.
Obsessed with guilt at the death of her daughter, Ida Charlotte sank into a
severe depression. Hospitalized in a Swiss mental hospital, she died in the
same year. Less than a year later, Franz Napoleon, overcome with grief,
followed her.
Into
the parental gap stepped a sister of Ida Charlotte, Therese, and her husband,
Louis Leisler, who constituted a childless, happily married couple living in
Glasgow, Scotland, where Louis was in business. The intervention proved
beneficial for the children, particularly the younger ones, and the Leislers
helped to pay for the completion of Franz's schooling.
Franz
was educated at the universities of Göttingen, Heidelberg, where he was known
as a distinguished swordsman, and Berlin. During his student days, Franz met
Herbert von Bismarck, Otto von Bismarck's son, with whom he would have a
lifelong friendship. Studying law, Franz became an assessor in 1872. Meanwhile, in 1870, during the
Franco-Prussian war, as a volunteer in the ambulance corps tending the sick and
wounded at the siege of Metz, he suffered a bout of typhoid fever, as would his
future father-in-law, William Walter a year or so later across the ocean, being
subject to similar enervating lifetime health consequences. Traveling to France
and England in 1872, Franz commenced a four year period, in which he continued
his law studies including politics and constitutional history, beginning an
uncompleted work, "The Idea of the State: French Theories of the State up
to the Year 1789." In 1876, while in London, he met and married Marian
Hutton, daughter of Charles Hutton, one of Her Majesty's Lieutenants for the
City of London. Noted for her beauty, intellectual capacity and kindness, she
would, with Franz, have two children: Otto, 1885, and Elizabeth, 1888.
Following his marriage, Franz returned to Berlin, where circumstances obliged
him to work in his uncle's accounting firm. A brief treatise of his, "An
Ideal State," coming to the attention of Chancellor Bismarck through his
son Herbert, so impressed the Prince that he persuaded Franz to come into his
service. Loyal and hardworking, Franz became his private secretary, speech writer
and aide. In 1881, he was appointed chief of the Imperial Chancellery, a
position corresponding to that of chief of staff in the German Army. In
addition to numerous decorations including the Order of the Iron Cross, in
1887, he was awarded the noble hereditary German 'von' by the Emperor. In
support of Bismarck's social policy and motivated by sympathy for the
sufferings of workers in face of the depredations of corporate interests, he
played a significant role in passage of the aged and infirm workmen's insurance
law of 1888, conceived and managed through Parliament by a colleague, the
Secretary of State for the Interior, Karl von Boetticher. In 1889, Marian died
in England of pneumonia, following diabetic-related complications.
In
the wake of Bismarck's resignation in 1890, Franz's services highly valued as a
means of providing continuity in government, he was appointed Under-Secretary
to von Boetticher. It was while he was thus employed that he met Marian Phelps,
whom he married in 1893.
Photographs
of Franz reveal a man of medium height and build, tending to overweight. His
eyes are keen and his preoccupied expression is one of shrewdness and high
intellect. In the presence of his children by his first wife, Marian Hutton,
his distant expression is softened by a touch of kindness, while, in another
with his son alone, he presents mock fisticuffs, in his eyes a glint of humor,
in the boy's attitude pleasure at the father's attention. The lower part of his
face is all but hidden by a dark, bushy mustache that flares aggressively,
lending him an intimidating aspect; his eyebrows resemble those of a tawny owl.
A pronounced crop hangs beneath his chin. Always a hard worker, his employment
under Bismarck consumed most of his energy, and, in his chief's retirement, he
would remain as industrious as ever.
Later,
when Franz's marriage to Marian Phelps failed, he described it as the greatest
mistake of his life, claiming he had undertaken it for the sake of his
children. His sister Lollo, however, distrusted that a woman as young and
wealthy as she would want him as earnestly as initially expressed - Franz was,
after all, forty-eight, a widower with two children; Marian, twenty-three years
younger. Lollo believed that he had succumbed to her attentions out of personal
vanity. In speaking publicly of their marriage, Marian placed considerable
emphasis on her belief that American "proficiency" mated with German
intellect would produce an "important" individual. This led a
perceptive friend of Lollo, Fran Meister, to give her opinion that the bride's
basis for the marriage was pursuit of an offspring born from natural selection:
if there was romance, it was all on Franz's side.
Though
it seems most likely that, in marrying Franz, Marian's foremost object was to
fulfill her father's wishes for a German marriage, it is worth mentioning the
science of Eugenics which, having been coined by the English scientist Francis
Galton in 1883, was rapidly gaining acceptance and acquiring a wider audience.
Galton
believed in a moral philosophy devoted to the improvement of humanity through
the encouragement of procreation involving the ablest and healthiest members of
society. His ideal, free of prohibitions, presented a positive attitude;
however, a negative stance, involving identification and control of those
considered unfit, developed in the United States, Germany, and Scandinavia. The
idea of segregating people considered unfit to reproduce is an ancient one. The
Old Testament describes the Amalekites - an apparently depraved group that God
condemned to death - and, in the early 18th century, a degeneracy
theory developed, embracing environmental concerns that might damage heredity.
This led, for example, to enforced vasectomies on prisoners at a
Jeffersonville, Indiana, prison, beginning in 1899, producing, in 1907, an
Indiana law mandating the compulsory sterilization of "degenerates."
In 1877, the sociologist Richard Dugdale published an influential study, The Jukes, based on an Ulster County,
New York, family of paupers and petty criminals, claiming environmental factors
as responsible. In the 1880s, August Weismann's germ plasm theory, claiming
that reproductive tissue was unaffected by body tissue, challenged such
theories and was absorbed by degeneracy theorists who favored negative
eugenics.
While
there is no evidence that Marian had any scientific training, it may reasonably
be supposed that such ideas of selection were encouraged in her class and may
have provided her with an intellectual justification for the marriage.
On
July 30, 1895, little more than a year following the death of her father,
Marian gave birth to Frances at the American embassy. The location remains
unexplained; perhaps familiar surroundings and an American doctor were
preferred. One significant problem was immediately apparent: the newborn was a
girl. There can be no doubt that the desired outcome for an
"important" offspring to bear the family name involved the production
of a male.
In
1896, his health failing from overwork, Franz resigned from the government and
was appointed Curator (director) of the prestigious Bonn University. In
response, the family moved from Berlin to Bonn, a quieter city where Marian
missed the social whirl of the capital.
The
following spring, Marian achieved her father's goal, giving birth to a boy,
Phelps, on May 4.
A
photograph taken not long after the birth of her son, shows Marian in a
jubilant mood. Wearing a heavy, fussy dark dress, she is already tending to
plumpness and bears the look of one completely confident in her role as the
bearer of the family's expectations. The infant she holds aloft, Phelps, scowls
furiously, presenting in the instant a decidedly reluctant heir. To her left,
in a dark dress with light relief about the neck and shoulders, stands an older
woman of haughty mien with piercing eyes who may be Ellen, her mother, while,
further to the left, is a shorter unidentified woman of kinder appearance, also
dressed darkly. To Marian's right stands a woman who, by her demeanor and dark
uniform-like dress, may be a nanny or nurse; her right hand holds that of
Frances who, wearing a light-colored frock, smiles anxiously at the camera.
Frances' hair is cut in a bang, bringing to mind William Walter's hairstyle. In
the forefront of the group stands Elizabeth, Franz's nine-year-old daughter by
Marian Hutton. She wears a light-colored pinafore over a dark blouse and smiles
enthusiastically, her eyes glowing with pleasure.
In
1899, Franz made his only trip to America, to receive a doctorate from Yale,
staying with his in-laws in New Jersey. Demonstrating his scholarly abilities,
mistakenly believing that the proceedings would be conducted in English, he
prepared his acceptance speech, only to discover at the last minute that Latin
would be spoken. Unfazed, he effected a spontaneous translation. The children,
however, were less impressed with their visitor, filling his shoes with water
as they rested outside his bedroom door awaiting the servants' attentions (The
children most likely included those of William Walter’s two sons, John Jay II
and Sheffield). His marriage, too, was about to be treated with equal
disdain.
Lollo's
memoir describes how, following the birth of Phelps, Marian's interest in the
marriage steadily declined, until, one day, taking both her children, she
sailed back to America without Franz, never to engage in the marriage again. A
separate biographical source gives the date as 1899. While evidence exists that
she renounced her interest in his estate, no divorce papers have ever come to
light. Though there is no substantiation of any threat on Franz's part, it is
said that she returned home and placed guards about the house, fearing her
husband would attempt to gain custody of their children. In 1910, they would be
naturalized American. Franz's children, Otto and Elizabeth, were once again
motherless, the latter keenly missing Marian. Shocked by this development,
their father withdrew into his work.
Continuing
his duties at Bonn, Franz founded a magazine with Baron von Berlepsch, Soxiale Praxis, devoted to labor issues,
while encouraging scientific research and academic teaching. His support for
labor against exploitation by capital interests, expressed in fund-raising for
striking German miners, incurred corporate wrath, resulting in a government
censure in 1905. In 1907, while still at the university, he suffered a heart
attack and died. Though a manuscript on which he had been working mysteriously
disappeared after his death and a rumor circulated in the family that he had
been murdered, there is no evidence for this.
Franz's
funeral was attended by Prince August Wilhelm of Prussia, Princess Adolf of
Trotha, and numerous government representatives, and there were telegrams of
sympathy from the Emperor and Prince Bulow. From William Walter's family there
was no acknowledgement: Franz's destined role was long since concluded.