Leaving Bavaria, 1870s
"But underneath it all I was restless. I felt the urge to expand my wings and to travel to the outside world. I read books on travel far into the…
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From When I Was a Girl in Bavaria, by Bertha Tauber Harper, 1932.
When a girl reached the age of fifteen or sixteen years and had completed the High School course, she was entitled to wear dresses that came down to her ankles, or even lower. To show more of her anatomy than an ankle would have been most improper.
We were “Frauleins” now. People began to accost us with Sie, and no longer with the familiar Du. In Germany there is a vast difference between the pronouns Du and Sie. Du is the familiar, endearing term, used between members of the family, or between intimate friends, while strangers are addressed with the more formal Sie. Kings and other royal personages had to be addressed in the third person only. Great stress had been laid in school on the proper use of the pronoun in the second person, and we had been thoroughly drilled in the correct method of addressing our superiors.
One had to be very particular, also, in addressing envelopes. By no means must we omit to introduce the name of the addressee by “Well-born” or “High-well-born,” according to his rank. Nobility had to be addressed with “His Graciousness” or “Excellency” or “Eminence.” All these formulas we had to practise in school. But I rather think that some of that etiquette has since become obsolete.
Aside from a few private finishing schools and the Conservatory of Music, there was really no institution that could offer an academic education to girls who had graduated from High School. Colleges and universities were not accessible to girls; they were supposed to become Hausfraus in time, and were expected to excel in domestic accomplishments. It was thus the custom, in the well-to-do families, to exchange daughters who had finished their course at school, that they might learn, under the instruction of cooks and butlers with whom they were not acquainted, how to become efficient in the various culinary arts and table functions, even though they never expected to do the manual work themselves.
Since there was little opportunity for office work in those days, a girl would have to learn dressmaking or millinery, or perhaps become a saleslady, unless she chose teaching as a profession. Otherwise she stayed at home and waited for some Prince Charming to woo her.
The girl of the present age would smile to see a young Bavarian daughter of good family chaperoned to a dance, either by the whole family or by some accommodating aunts and uncles, and not allowed to dance with any young man unless he had been formally introduced to all the relatives present. The young man, if approved of, was then permitted to make a formal call upon the daughter, but only in presence of the family. Such a thing as an unchaperoned appointment with a young man was unheard of among the better classes. And a man was not supposed to propose to the lady of his choice without first asking her parents or guardians for her hand.
Nevertheless, the German girl had far more freedom than her French sister, who was not supposed to go out on the street unchaperoned, even in the daytime, and who often had to marry the man of her parents’ choice, even though she had never met him.
I had decided to become a teacher’s apprentice and, in spare hours, to study art with Father. For a year I was under the guidance of a very friendly and capable teacher, who was then teaching the third grade. She quite often left me in full charge of the fifty lively girls, on whom it was not easy to impress the superiority of my sixteen years. But I enjoyed my new responsibilities and I fully intended to join the ranks of the public-school teachers. On Saturdays I coached backward pupils and thus earned my first pocket money, being paid the equivalent of ten cents an hour.
But underneath it all I was restless. I felt the urge to expand my wings and to travel to the outside world. I read books on travel far into the night, when I was supposed to be asleep, or while my girl friends attended the formal balls at the Royal Odeon, which had no lure for me.
One day I met my beloved ex-teacher, Fraulein Rieger, on my way home.
“Bertha,” she said hurriedly, “how would you like to go to France?”
“Oh, it would be wonderful!” I exclaimed most eagerly. “When?”
“One of the best private schools in France, located in Sedan, wants a teacher of German. For her services she will receive free tuition and board. Do you wish to consider it? ”
“Oh, most certainly!” I nearly hugged her for joy over the prospect of going away. I hastened home as fast as my feet could carry me, and burst into the house with the announcement: “Hurrah! I am going to France! ”
“Oh, ho! Not so fast!” my astonished parents said.
“Besides,” Father explained, “there are political clouds hovering over the French horizon now, and I would deem it risky to send my young daughter there at such a time.”
But I was eager to grasp this chance to see the outside world, and I hoped very much that my father might yet change his mind. Meanwhile, I went to the address given to me by Fraulein Rieger, to learn the particulars of the position. They seemed most attractive. Then I saw several of my friends, who promised to prevail on my parents to give their consent.
It was August when the prospect of going to France had been held out to me. It was December before I finally gained the parental consent which I had been seeking for four months. For fear that my parents might yet change their minds, I made hasty preparations for my departure. I would not even wait for the approaching Christmas holidays, lest something might yet prevent my going to the land of my dreams, which beckoned so alluringly on the western horizon.
It was early on a cold December morning in 1869, when the hard snow creaked under one’s feet, when one’s breath nearly froze, and when the gray dawn, or the parting tears, made familiar objects seem indistinct, that the whole family, as well as cousins, friends, and neighbors, surrounded me on the platform of the railroad depot, and awaited the final “Fertig!” of the conductor who stood at the side of the puffing train.
If kodaks had been in use then, no doubt there might still exist an amusing picture of the departing traveler, such as no great-grandmother of the present time would acknowledge. It would show a long, bulging dress of a plaid pattern, made longer by a broad black border, over which would be a long black circular cape, also lengthened by a black angora trimming with long fringe, a little tight-fitting black silk bonnet, tied under the chin with broad black ribbons, and over it a long blue, rather thick veil hanging down to my knees. A large tapestry bag held all my earthly belongings.
Before we parted, Mother cautioned me never to lift my veil while on the train, except when eating. I followed her command to the letter, though I did not understand her reasons, and even managed to nibble my lunch underneath the veil. Finally, she counseled:
“Never do or say a thing which you would not want to write to your mother. And never, under any circumstances, accept a favor from a strange gentleman.”
Throughout all my agitated life in France, these parting words were my guidance in many a dilemma, and helped me through many a critical situation. I thank my mother yet for her good advice.
On my return, after three eventful years in France, nearly all my time was occupied in giving French lessons to young and old, for the study of French had become very much in vogue. I formed many lifelong ties among my pupils of all ages, and together with what little time I had to give to painting and sketching, I spent three very profitable years in my native city.
One summer morning in 1875, my loved ones again bade me good-bye at the Munich Depot. But this time I was a newly-made citizen of the United States of America, and the bride of one of America’s most beloved educators.
Two more of my early girlhood dreams were soon realized. I crossed the ocean, and I saw Niagara Falls, that wonderful spectacle of Nature, whose picture had once aroused my schoolgirl fancy.
Harper, Bertha Tauber. When I Was a Girl in Bavaria. Lothrop, Lee, and Shepard Co., 1932.
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