manu/mldr-zoomed-100char-total-queries-documents

chunk_id stringlengths 3 9	chunk stringlengths 1 100
60_7	non-German Anglo names.
60_8	Gillespie County comprises the Fredericksburg, TX Micropolitan Statistical Area.
60_9	History
60_10	Early native inhabitants were the Tonkawa, Comanche, Kiowa, and Lipan Apache peoples. In 1842, the
60_11	Adelsverein organized in Germany to promote emigration to Texas. The Fisher–Miller Land Grant set
60_12	aside three million acres (12,000 km2) to settle 600 families and single men of German, Dutch,
60_13	Swiss, Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian ancestry in Texas.
60_14	Henry Francis Fisher sold his interest in the land grant to the Adelsverein in 1844. Prince Carl of
60_15	Solms-Braunfels secured the title to of the Veramendi grant the next year, including the Comal
60_16	Springs and River, for the Adelsverein. Thousands of German immigrants were stranded at port of
60_17	disembarkation, Indianola, on Matagorda Bay. With no food or shelters, living in holes dug into the
60_18	ground, an estimated 50% die from disease or starvation. The living began to walk to their
60_19	destinations hundreds of miles away. About 200 German colonists, who walked from Indianola, founded
60_20	the town of New Braunfels at the crossing of the San Antonio-Nacodoches Road on the Guadalupe
60_21	River. John O. Meusebach arrived in Galveston. The first wagon train of 120 settlers arrived from
60_22	New Braunfels. Surveyor Hermann Wilke laid out the town. Meusebach named it Fredericksburg, in
60_23	honor of Prince Frederick of Prussia.
60_24	In 1847, the Meusebach–Comanche Treaty was made. About 150 settlers petitioned the Texas
60_25	Legislature to establish a new county, suggested names "Pierdenales" or "Germania". The Vereins
60_26	Kirche became the first public building in Fredericksburg. It served as a nondenominational church,
60_27	school, town hall, and fort. Locals referred to it as “the Coffee Mill Church” for its shape.
60_28	Wilhelm Victor Keidel was the county's first doctor. Mormon leader Lyman Wight founded the
60_29	community of Zodiac.
60_30	The Legislature formed Gillespie County from Bexar and Travis Counties in 1848. They named it after
60_31	Tennessee transplant Capt. Robert Addison Gillespie, a hero of the 1846 Battle of Monterrey in the
60_32	Mexican–American War. Fredericksburg became the county seat.
60_33	Fort Martin Scott was established in 1848 at Barons Creek, a Pedernales tributary.
60_34	An angry mob of soldiers burned down the store-courthouse in 1850, destroying all county records.
60_35	The melee apparently started when County Clerk John M. Hunter, who also owned the store, refused to
60_36	sell whiskey to a soldier. Words were exchanged, and Hunter stabbed the soldier; about 50 soldiers
60_37	stormed and burned the store, destroying all contents. Soldiers prevented townspeople from saving
60_38	the county records.
60_39	John O. Meusebach was elected to the Texas Senate in 1851 to represent Bexar, Comal, and Medina
60_40	Counties, and in 1854, received a special appointment as commissioner from Governor Elisha M. Pease
60_41	to issue land certificates to those immigrants of 1845 and 1846 who had been promised them by the
60_42	Adelsverein. The Texas State Convention of Germans met in San Antonio and adopted a political,
60_43	social, and religious platform, including: Equal pay for equal work, direct election of the
60_44	President of the United States, abolition of capital punishment, "Slavery is an evil, the abolition
60_45	of which is a requirement of democratic principles", free schools – including universities –
60_46	supported by the state, without religious influence, and total separation of church and state.
60_47	In 1852, Bremen seaman Charles Henry Nimitz, grandfather of Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, built the
60_48	Nimitz Hotel in Fredericksburg. In 1870, he added a steamboat-shaped façade.
60_49	Surveyor Jacob Kuechler was commissioned as a captain by Sam Houston to enroll state militia troops
60_50	in Gillespie County. Texas seceded from the Union in 1861, and joined the Confederate States of
60_51	America, and Houston was dismissed from office in March by the Confederacy. Gillespie County voted
60_52	400 -17 against secession from the Union. Unionists from Kerr, Gillespie, and Kendall Counties
60_53	participated in the formation of the Union League, a secret organization to support President
60_54	Abraham Lincoln's policies. Kuechler signed up only German Unionists in his frontier company, and
60_55	was dismissed by Governor Francis R. Lubbock.
60_56	In 1862, 54 Gillespie County men joined the Confederate Army. Eventually, 300 enlisted with the CSA
60_57	to avoid conscription. The Union League formed companies to protect the frontier against Indians
60_58	and their families against local Confederate forces. Conscientious objectors to the military draft
60_59	were primarily among Tejanos and Germans. Confederate authorities imposed martial law on Central
60_60	Texas. The Nueces massacre occurred in Kinney County. Jacob Kuechler served as a guide for 61
60_61	conscientious objectors attempting to flee to Mexico. Scottish-born Confederate irregular James
60_62	Duff and his Duff's Partisan Rangers pursued and overtook them at the Nueces River; 34 were
60_63	killed, some executed after being taken prisoner. Jacob Kuechler survived the battle. The cruelty
60_64	shocked the people of Gillespie County. About 2,000 took to the hills to escape Duff's reign of
60_65	terror.
60_66	The Treue der Union Monument ("Loyalty to the Union") in Comfort was dedicated in 1866 to the
60_67	Texans slain at the Nueces massacre. It is the only monument to the Union other than the National
60_68	Cemeteries on Confederate territory. It is one of only six such sites allowed to fly the United
60_69	States flag at half-mast in perpetuity. Spring Creek Cemetery near Harper in Gillespie County has a
60_70	singular grave with the names Sebird Henderson, Hiram Nelson, Gus Tegener, and Frank Scott. The
60_71	inscription reads “Hanged and thrown in Spring Creek by Col. James Duff’s Confederate Regiment.”
60_72	Kiowa raiders massacred residents of the McDonald farm in the Harper vicinity in 1864. During 1865,
60_73	Gillespie County suffered a war-time crime wave, as 17 individuals were convicted of murder.
60_74	In 1870, Herman Lehmann and his brother Willie were captured by Apaches, but Willie escaped within
60_75	days. Herman Lehmann, escorted by soldiers, was finally returned to his family in 1878.
60_76	In 1881, Gillespie County became the first county in Texas to hold a fair.
60_77	From 1874 to 1875, Andreas Lindig built the county's first lime kiln.
60_78	The original Gillespie County Courthouse was constructed in 1882; it later became the Pioneer
60_79	Memorial Library.
60_80	Chester W. Nimitz, future Commander in Chief, United States Pacific Fleet, was born in 1885 in
60_81	Fredericksburg. His father, Chester B. Nimitz, died before his birth, leaving his seaman
60_82	grandfather as role model.
60_83	John O. Meusebach died at his farm at Loyal Valley in Mason County on May 27, 1897, and was buried
60_84	in the Marschall Meusebach Cemetery at Cherry Spring.
60_85	In 1908, future President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson was born in a small farmhouse on
60_86	the Pedernales River. Johnson became the Vice President of the United States in 1961 and
60_87	subsequently President of the United States. His ranch at Stonewall was known as the Texas
60_88	Whitehouse. Tourism became an important industry. Ranch Road 1 was designated in 1963. On January
60_89	22, 1973, President Johnson died at his Stonewall ranch. He, and later Lady Bird Johnson, were laid
60_90	to rest at the family cemetery on the ranch.
60_91	The Gillespie County Historical Society was formed in 1934, and the Pedernales Electric Cooperative
60_92	was formed to provide rural electrification four years later.
60_93	In 1948, the county began its annual Easter Fire event to commemorate the Meusebach treaty signing.
60_94	Admiral Nimitz died February 20, 1966. The next February, the Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz
60_95	Memorial Naval Museum opened in the old Nimitz Hotel on Main Street in Fredericksburg.
60_96	The Japanese Garden of Peace, a gift from the people of Japan, was dedicated on the 130th
60_97	anniversary of the founding of Fredericksburg at the Nimitz Museum on May 8, 1976. In 1981, the
60_98	state legislature placed the Nimitz Museum under Texas Parks and Wildlife Department as the
60_99	National Museum of the Pacific War.
60_100	The State of Texas opened Enchanted Rock State Natural Area after adding facilities in 1984. That
60_101	same year, it is also added to the National Register of Historic Places,
60_102	The Texas White House officially opened to the public August 27, 2008. In 2009, the George H. W.
60_103	Bush Gallery opened at the Nimitz museum.
60_104	Geography
60_105	According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and (0.3%)
60_106	is water.

60_7

non-German Anglo names.

60_8

Gillespie County comprises the Fredericksburg, TX Micropolitan Statistical Area.

60_9

History

60_10

Early native inhabitants were the Tonkawa, Comanche, Kiowa, and Lipan Apache peoples. In 1842, the

60_11

Adelsverein organized in Germany to promote emigration to Texas. The Fisher–Miller Land Grant set

60_12

aside three million acres (12,000 km2) to settle 600 families and single men of German, Dutch,

60_13

Swiss, Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian ancestry in Texas.

60_14

Henry Francis Fisher sold his interest in the land grant to the Adelsverein in 1844. Prince Carl of

60_15

Solms-Braunfels secured the title to of the Veramendi grant the next year, including the Comal

60_16

Springs and River, for the Adelsverein. Thousands of German immigrants were stranded at port of

60_17

disembarkation, Indianola, on Matagorda Bay. With no food or shelters, living in holes dug into the

60_18

ground, an estimated 50% die from disease or starvation. The living began to walk to their

60_19

destinations hundreds of miles away. About 200 German colonists, who walked from Indianola, founded

60_20

the town of New Braunfels at the crossing of the San Antonio-Nacodoches Road on the Guadalupe

60_21

River. John O. Meusebach arrived in Galveston. The first wagon train of 120 settlers arrived from

60_22

New Braunfels. Surveyor Hermann Wilke laid out the town. Meusebach named it Fredericksburg, in

60_23

honor of Prince Frederick of Prussia.

60_24

In 1847, the Meusebach–Comanche Treaty was made. About 150 settlers petitioned the Texas

60_25

Legislature to establish a new county, suggested names "Pierdenales" or "Germania". The Vereins

60_26

Kirche became the first public building in Fredericksburg. It served as a nondenominational church,

60_27

school, town hall, and fort. Locals referred to it as “the Coffee Mill Church” for its shape.

60_28

Wilhelm Victor Keidel was the county's first doctor. Mormon leader Lyman Wight founded the

60_29

community of Zodiac.

60_30

The Legislature formed Gillespie County from Bexar and Travis Counties in 1848. They named it after

60_31

Tennessee transplant Capt. Robert Addison Gillespie, a hero of the 1846 Battle of Monterrey in the

60_32

Mexican–American War. Fredericksburg became the county seat.

60_33

Fort Martin Scott was established in 1848 at Barons Creek, a Pedernales tributary.

60_34

An angry mob of soldiers burned down the store-courthouse in 1850, destroying all county records.

60_35

The melee apparently started when County Clerk John M. Hunter, who also owned the store, refused to

60_36

sell whiskey to a soldier. Words were exchanged, and Hunter stabbed the soldier; about 50 soldiers

60_37

stormed and burned the store, destroying all contents. Soldiers prevented townspeople from saving

60_38

the county records.

60_39

John O. Meusebach was elected to the Texas Senate in 1851 to represent Bexar, Comal, and Medina

60_40

Counties, and in 1854, received a special appointment as commissioner from Governor Elisha M. Pease

60_41

to issue land certificates to those immigrants of 1845 and 1846 who had been promised them by the

60_42

Adelsverein. The Texas State Convention of Germans met in San Antonio and adopted a political,

60_43

social, and religious platform, including: Equal pay for equal work, direct election of the

60_44

President of the United States, abolition of capital punishment, "Slavery is an evil, the abolition

60_45

of which is a requirement of democratic principles", free schools – including universities –

60_46

supported by the state, without religious influence, and total separation of church and state.

60_47

In 1852, Bremen seaman Charles Henry Nimitz, grandfather of Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, built the

60_48

Nimitz Hotel in Fredericksburg. In 1870, he added a steamboat-shaped façade.

60_49

Surveyor Jacob Kuechler was commissioned as a captain by Sam Houston to enroll state militia troops

60_50

in Gillespie County. Texas seceded from the Union in 1861, and joined the Confederate States of

60_51

America, and Houston was dismissed from office in March by the Confederacy. Gillespie County voted

60_52

400 -17 against secession from the Union. Unionists from Kerr, Gillespie, and Kendall Counties

60_53

participated in the formation of the Union League, a secret organization to support President

60_54

Abraham Lincoln's policies. Kuechler signed up only German Unionists in his frontier company, and

60_55

was dismissed by Governor Francis R. Lubbock.

60_56

In 1862, 54 Gillespie County men joined the Confederate Army. Eventually, 300 enlisted with the CSA

60_57

to avoid conscription. The Union League formed companies to protect the frontier against Indians

60_58

and their families against local Confederate forces. Conscientious objectors to the military draft

60_59

were primarily among Tejanos and Germans. Confederate authorities imposed martial law on Central

60_60

Texas. The Nueces massacre occurred in Kinney County. Jacob Kuechler served as a guide for 61

60_61

conscientious objectors attempting to flee to Mexico. Scottish-born Confederate irregular James

60_62

Duff and his Duff's Partisan Rangers pursued and overtook them at the Nueces River; 34 were

60_63

killed, some executed after being taken prisoner. Jacob Kuechler survived the battle. The cruelty

60_64

shocked the people of Gillespie County. About 2,000 took to the hills to escape Duff's reign of

60_65

terror.

60_66

The Treue der Union Monument ("Loyalty to the Union") in Comfort was dedicated in 1866 to the

60_67

Texans slain at the Nueces massacre. It is the only monument to the Union other than the National

60_68

Cemeteries on Confederate territory. It is one of only six such sites allowed to fly the United

60_69

States flag at half-mast in perpetuity. Spring Creek Cemetery near Harper in Gillespie County has a

60_70

singular grave with the names Sebird Henderson, Hiram Nelson, Gus Tegener, and Frank Scott. The

60_71

inscription reads “Hanged and thrown in Spring Creek by Col. James Duff’s Confederate Regiment.”

60_72

Kiowa raiders massacred residents of the McDonald farm in the Harper vicinity in 1864. During 1865,

60_73

Gillespie County suffered a war-time crime wave, as 17 individuals were convicted of murder.

60_74

In 1870, Herman Lehmann and his brother Willie were captured by Apaches, but Willie escaped within

60_75

days. Herman Lehmann, escorted by soldiers, was finally returned to his family in 1878.

60_76

In 1881, Gillespie County became the first county in Texas to hold a fair.

60_77

From 1874 to 1875, Andreas Lindig built the county's first lime kiln.

60_78

The original Gillespie County Courthouse was constructed in 1882; it later became the Pioneer

60_79

Memorial Library.

60_80

Chester W. Nimitz, future Commander in Chief, United States Pacific Fleet, was born in 1885 in

60_81

Fredericksburg. His father, Chester B. Nimitz, died before his birth, leaving his seaman

60_82

grandfather as role model.

60_83

John O. Meusebach died at his farm at Loyal Valley in Mason County on May 27, 1897, and was buried

60_84

in the Marschall Meusebach Cemetery at Cherry Spring.

60_85

In 1908, future President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson was born in a small farmhouse on

60_86

the Pedernales River. Johnson became the Vice President of the United States in 1961 and

60_87

subsequently President of the United States. His ranch at Stonewall was known as the Texas

60_88

Whitehouse. Tourism became an important industry. Ranch Road 1 was designated in 1963. On January

60_89

22, 1973, President Johnson died at his Stonewall ranch. He, and later Lady Bird Johnson, were laid

60_90

to rest at the family cemetery on the ranch.

60_91

The Gillespie County Historical Society was formed in 1934, and the Pedernales Electric Cooperative

60_92

was formed to provide rural electrification four years later.

60_93

In 1948, the county began its annual Easter Fire event to commemorate the Meusebach treaty signing.

60_94

Admiral Nimitz died February 20, 1966. The next February, the Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz

60_95

Memorial Naval Museum opened in the old Nimitz Hotel on Main Street in Fredericksburg.

60_96

The Japanese Garden of Peace, a gift from the people of Japan, was dedicated on the 130th

60_97

anniversary of the founding of Fredericksburg at the Nimitz Museum on May 8, 1976. In 1981, the

60_98

state legislature placed the Nimitz Museum under Texas Parks and Wildlife Department as the

60_99

National Museum of the Pacific War.

60_100

The State of Texas opened Enchanted Rock State Natural Area after adding facilities in 1984. That

60_101

same year, it is also added to the National Register of Historic Places,

60_102

The Texas White House officially opened to the public August 27, 2008. In 2009, the George H. W.

60_103

Bush Gallery opened at the Nimitz museum.

60_104

Geography

60_105

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and (0.3%)

60_106

is water.