Everybody has a dream to immigrate to germany.The challenges faced by German immigrants to the United States in the 19th century are well documented, but relatively little information is available about the related sacrifices made by family and friends who didn't make the journey and remained behind.
Fortunately, letters written to one German immigrant, a man named Wilhelm F. Kempe who settled in Texas in 1854, offer real-life insights into how German immigration to America disrupted the traditional role of young people in what had been a largely place-bound population in Europe.
Clearly, as illustrated in the letters written to Kempe, the emigration of tens of thousands of bright and industrious young people took a serious toll, involving everything from emotional to workforce issues.
Kempe's widowed father, forced to raise two other pre-teen children while also working the family farm, remained heartbroken for decades at Kempe's emigration from his German homeland to America.
Seen through this sample of family life in Germany, emigration often meant that sons and daughter wouldn't be available to carry on family farms and businesses, or help parents deal with old age and illness. Instead, parents had to cope as they could or depend on considerably fewer numbers of able young people to meet their substantial and growing needs.
Emigration was also tough emotionally for the people who remained in Germany. Parents and grandparents lost their children and grandchildren to a distant land, often with little hope of seeing them ever again. Many of those left behind continued to hope for many years that the emigrants would give up on attempts to establish a new home across the ocean.
Notably, the great majority of German immigrants to America came to stay, never returning to Europe. Instead, they overcame tremendous challenges to build a new life and contribute their knowledge, culture, and work ethic to the American melting pot.
