Love Finds You in Amana Iowa

by Melanie Dobson

  The elders had given Friedrich the choice to come to Amana three years ago or wait for her. He’d chosen to come to the new Kolonie. Not because he didn’t love her, he said, but because he thought waiting together in Ebenezer until he was twenty-four would be torture. But now he was two years older than the age required to marry, and she hoped they were both mature enough to rationally think through their decisions instead of act upon their emotions.

  Even though his letters weren’t as frequent as they used to be, every time Friedrich wrote he said he was faithful to his promise to her, that he waited for her. Her heart remained true to him as well. Never once did she even consider marrying one of the other men who remained behind in Ebenezer. For more than a decade, she’d believed that she and Friedrich were meant to be together.

  Still, she had changed over the past three years, and he must have changed as well. And the moment she saw him, she believed she would know if she would become his wife.

  Lifting her skirt, she climbed into the back of the wagon, beside Karoline. The younger woman was sleeping on the comforter, breathing softly. There wasn’t much room among the stacked crates and trunks and barrels, but Amalie tucked her knees close to her chest and leaned her head back against a trunk. Until they left Ebenezer, she hadn’t realized how important the seemingly simplest comforts were to her. A bed. A bathtub. A clean place to wash her clothes.

  Mr. Faust shouted, and the wagon lurched forward.

  Turning, she reached into the chest and pulled out a small, handcarved box Friedrich crafted for her before he left New York. It was made of dark walnut wood and polished until it almost glowed. She opened it slowly and looked at the rose petals inside, from the flowers Friedrich had given to her to remind her of his love for her while they were apart.

  She sniffed the rose petals, hoping for even the slightest scent to remind her of his love, but they’d long since lost their aroma. Closing the lid, she clutched the box in her lap. It was a very small sacrifice to leave the comforts of Ebenezer for their journey west. It would all be worth it when they arrived in Amana.

  Her eyes drooped, and she tried to open them again, but they wouldn’t obey her. The wagon hit a hole, and everything around her and Karoline shook, but the clanging didn’t awaken her friend. Amalie reached behind her, placed her precious box back into the trunk, and rested beside Karoline.

  When the wagon stopped again, Amalie rubbed her eyes and squinted outside at the fading sunlight. A river reflected a brilliant scarlet color from the setting sun, and she pulled herself to her feet to begin supper before the darkness engulfed them. Karoline was still asleep, but maybe Niklas or one of the other men could help her prepare the meal tonight. Even with two of them working hard, it would take a good hour to finish the biscuits and the stew for twenty-five of them, but if they were as hungry as she was, they would complete it as quickly as they could.

  She stood on her toes, trying not to wake Karoline as she lifted a pan off its hook. Then she took a burlap bag filled with potatoes off the heap of supplies. She’d wanted to conserve them, but they were almost to Lisbon now. The boiled potatoes would help fill their bellies tonight along with the stew.

  She started to climb over Karoline, and then she stopped. Karoline was quiet. Too quiet.

  Amalie dropped the potatoes on the floor and knelt down by her friend, dropping her cheek to her chest.

  “Karoline,” she said, quietly at first. Her voice trembled when she said her name again. “Karoline!”

  When she shook her, Karoline didn’t respond.

  “Niklas!” she screamed as she ripped open the canvas. “John!”

  Seconds later both men were at her side.

  Watch against thyself, my soul, see thou do not stifle

  Grace that should thy thoughts control, nor with mercy trifle.

  Johann B. Freistein

  Chapter Four

  Friedrich wiped the cloth napkin over his mouth and paused before he took another bite of the tender roast pork and red cabbage. Forks clanged against the ceramic plates as forty men and women ate the roast and vegetables prepared by Henriette Koch and her assistants. No one spoke except to ask for the salt or to pass the basket of rolls. Conversation was reserved for time away from work and meals and their daily services in prayer and worship.

  He lifted another bite to his mouth, but then he set his fork down, pushing away his plate of food. How could he eat when men like Joseph were getting beaten tonight? When they were being starved? He spent his days harvesting food for animals while there were men who were fighting and dying for what was right.

  Loyalty means you fight...

  Colonel O’Neill’s words played over and over again in his mind, and he couldn’t seem to rid himself of the burden of guilt that entangled him. By not participating in this war, was he being disloyal to the government God had placed over him? Was he a coward?

  Sophia Paul stopped at his table with two pitchers of milk in her hands. Lifting Friedrich’s glass, she slowly filled it. Friedrich didn’t look at her, but he could feel her presence as she lingered beside him, filling the glasses of the men on each side.

  When he glanced over at her, Sophia giggled, and he refocused his eyes on Matthias, across the table. One of Matthias’s eyebrows rose, and Friedrich’s eyes narrowed at the grin on his friend’s face. Matthias’s smile grew even bigger, and Friedrich wished he could reach across the table and wipe the smirk off his face.

  Matthias knew Friedrich was planning to marry Amalie Wiese, and no matter how many times Sophia refilled his glass or brought him and the men in the fields baked goods for their lunch, he wouldn’t change his mind.

  Sophia moved to the women’s table and placed one of her pitchers on it. Friedrich noticed she neglected to fill any of their glasses.

  The man sitting next to Friedrich elbowed him and whispered, “Won’t be long before Amalie’s making supper for you.”

  Friedrich nodded. Amalie’s cooking was renowned across the community. When her baas was ill in Ebenezer, Amalie developed a reputation as someone who demanded those under her to work hard, but all of their hard work paid off during meal times. Most of the brothers hoped they would be selected to eat in her new dining room, but as Amalie’s husband, Friedrich would be guaranteed a place at one of the tables.

  Amalie wasn’t silly like Sophia or some of the other young women who giggled around the men. She was serious and determined and dedicated to their community. There was no finer single woman among the Inspirationists than Amalie, and she was going to be his wife.

  But tonight, instead of excitement about her arrival and their subsequent marriage, an eerie sense of dread settled over Friedrich’s heart. In weeks, he would become one of the married men the colonel talked about, and in a year’s time, he could be a father as well.

  He wanted to marry Amalie, and he especially wanted to have children, two or maybe even three. But how could he live with himself, knowing he didn’t fight for his brother? His children would never respect him, not if he didn’t respect himself. And how could he, if he knew people were suffering in their country, and he covered his ears and his eyes to their pain?

  Maybe the timing wasn’t right to marry Amalie or begin a family. Maybe he should fight first and then return to her.

  When he looked up again, Matthias was watching him, but this time Matthias didn’t mock him with his smile. Instead he nodded at Friedrich’s half-eaten plate.

  “Are you ill?” his friend whispered.

  He shrugged his shoulders. He couldn’t whisper back all that had happened this afternoon or the thoughts raging in his head. Lifting his fork again, he pushed the remaining cabbage and potatoes around his plate. The thought of taking even one more bite made his stomach roll so instead of eating, he guzzled down his glass of milk and then slid off the bench before Brother Schaube closed the meal with prayer.

  The dining room door slammed behind him, echoing through the silence, but he didn’t care. How could any of
them fill their bellies in silence when so many of their countrymen were dying? It seemed wrong now, so much peace here when a war raged in their country.

  He marched forward on the narrow pathway that wove through the houses and gardens in Amana. He had to get away from the others, to a place where he could clear his mind.

  Ahead was the stone residence where they met each night for prayer. Beside it was a grove of plum trees, lined in neat rows in a procession out to the cornfield. In the midst of the quiet trees was a wooden bench, and he sat down on it, resting his chin in his hands.

  There was no fighting in their community. No battles among their people. Amana and the surrounding villages were about as close as one could come to experiencing a bit of heaven on this earth. The community members worshipped God together. Ate together. Encouraged and consoled one another.

  Would God have him leave this peaceful world and the people who had loved him since he was born to go out to a place where people hated one another? Where a man wounded and sometimes killed his brother?

  He pulled the envelope from his pocket and opened it. The letter was brief, but it was exactly what Colonel O’Neill had said. The government was mustering him to fight for the state of Iowa, for their union. And they wanted him to report for duty on Monday.

  He flicked his fingernail against the paper. He hadn’t started this war, but something continued to stir inside him, something that urged him to fight.

  Since he was a boy, he’d been the one to fight for the underdog. He’d even fought for Amalie when they were in school, stopping the boys who teased her when she excelled above all of them in their studies. He’d never tried to fight for his own good, only for the good of those around him, but he’d suffered the consequences for the fight that swelled within him, suffered under the switch of their schoolmaster and his father’s paddle.

  His father often said that Friedrich reminded him of Otto Vinzenz, Friedrich’s grandfather. His grandfather had fought against Napoleon Bonaparte’s army fifty years ago and was one of many who defeated the tyrant in the Battle of Waterloo. A war hero. His father rarely talked about Otto Vinzenz, but Friedrich used to pepper his mother with questions about him when he was a child.

  When his parents joined the Community of True Inspiration and moved to the United States, God had placed a new government over them, and now the same government that had provided freedom for them from oppression in German called him to duty to fight against the oppression of slaves.

  Their leader, Christian Metz, spoke often of the war and sometimes about slavery. He didn’t think slavery was right, but he and the other elders believed that this evil would one day be eliminated by God, like other evils in their society.

  Friedrich shook his head. What if God ordained this war to eliminate slavery? He wouldn’t join the infantry if he lived in the Confederacy, but the Union was fighting for freedom. How could he turn his back on men like Joseph who had been sold and beaten because of their skin color?

  Matthias sat down beside him. “You never leave food on your plate, Friedrich.”

  “I wasn’t hungry.”

  Matthias leaned back, crossing one leg over the other. “I never thought I’d hear those words come out of your mouth.”

  Friedrich didn’t respond.

  “Is it Amalie?” Matthias asked.

  “Partly.”

  “Have you changed your mind?”

  He shook his head. “Neither my mind nor my heart have changed.”

  “She’ll make a good wife for you.”

  “You don’t even like Amalie.”

  “That’s not true,” Matthias protested.

  “You said she’s too impertinent for me.”

  “When she was sixteen!”

  Friedrich managed a smile. “So you’ve changed your opinion.”

  “People change over the years—”

  “It doesn’t matter anyway,” Friedrich interrupted. “Amalie isn’t the problem.”

  “So there is a problem—”

  Two sisters walked by them, and Friedrich waited to speak. More than a thousand Inspirationists had arrived from New York now, which made privacy in Amana almost impossible. Each member had their own room in which to sleep, but they worked and worshipped together. And sometimes they talked about each other like they were a giant family as well.

  The two women slipped into the stone house, and Friedrich glanced back down the path. No one else was coming toward them. “Two men visited us today in the fields.”

  “Vagabonds?”

  He shook his head. “Soldiers.”

  Matthias frowned. “What were they doing here?”

  “Recruiting.”

  “Metz said none of our men would be going to war.”

  “The man was a colonel,” Friedrich said. “And he played a powerful argument.”

  “It doesn’t matter how powerful an argument. It matters what is right.” Matthias’s voice was strong, determined, but Friedrich barely heard his words.

  “There was a colored man with the colonel,” Friedrich said. “He was beaten by his owner in Georgia.”

  “Slavery is a terrible, terrible evil.”

  “An evil that should be stopped.”

  “This isn’t our war,” Matthias said.

  “Why not?” he probed. “This is our country. I can’t understand why this isn’t our war as well.”

  “Slavery is wrong,” Matthias agreed. “But instead of brothers battling each other, the slaves should flee to safety, like our people did when we left Germany.”

  “There is no place for the slaves to flee.”

  “They can run north. To freedom.”

  Friedrich fidgeted on his seat. “But what if they can’t run?”

  “The colonel is playing with your emotions, Friedrich, so you’ll follow him instead of following what God has ordained for our community.”

  His thoughts raced. “What is God’s plan for us?”

  Matthias was quiet for a moment. They’d both heard the same words, the inspired testimonies from their Werkzeuge—the men and women God used to communicate to their society. Brother Metz had begged the leaders in Washington to cast themselves down in the dust of humility so that peace would be preserved, instead of stirring up brothers to war against each other. His words went unheeded.

  “We need to pray for peace,” Matthias said.

  Friedrich shook his head. “It’s too late for peace.”

  “It’s never too late—”

  “The Confederate Army just killed four thousand men in Pennsylvania.”

  “Four thousand—” Matthias’s voice faded away as he looked across the street, toward grapevines that had entwined itself around the trellis. Brother Schaube walked by them with his wife and son. He tipped his hat, but Matthias didn’t seem to notice.

  Seconds passed, the number of casualties walled between them. Matthias’s eyes stayed on the grapevines, his voice low. “How many Confederates did the Union soldiers kill?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “It is happening just as Brother Metz said it would. Instead of seeking peace, the brothers are fighting themselves. Killing each other.”

  “For their fellow man.”

  “Ach,” Matthias snapped. “For the pride in their Union.”

  The bell tolled from the tower, announcing their evening prayers, but Friedrich didn’t stand up. He held Matthias’s letter out to him.

  “They want us to fight.”

  “We are not to fight,” Matthias said as he stood. “We are to pray.”

  Friedrich remained on the bench, still holding the letter out to Matthias. “We’re supposed to report to the enlistment office in Marengo on Monday.”

  Matthias sighed as he took the envelope, but he didn’t open it up. “They cannot make us fight, my friend. The Bruderrath will hire substitutes for us and we will continue to build our Kolonie, where God has called us.”

  As the chiming faded away, Friedrich stood up and followed
Matthias to the stone house. His friend opened the door for a woman whose shoulders and head were covered with her shawl, and then the two of them entered the large sitting room. The woman walked to the left, and both men sat on a pine bench on the right.

  Brother Schaube led them in prayer for their country and for the men and women traveling west to them tonight. Friedrich dropped his head in his hands and prayed like he’d never prayed before.

  Should this night prove the last for me in this dark vale of tears,

  Then lead me, Lord, in heaven to Thee and my elect compeers.

  Dr. Johann Herzog

  Chapter Five

  Amalie wouldn’t release Karoline’s limp hand. Niklas brought cold water from the river, wiping it across Karoline’s forehead, but all Amalie could do was cling to her friend’s fingers. She felt so powerless. Her friend was breathing, barely, but there was nothing Amalie could do. Karoline wouldn’t wake up, no matter how cold the water.

  The sliver of the crescent moon was out tonight, its light spilling over the coolness of the evening and across the wagons in their campsite. Karoline was unconscious in the night air, stretched across the canvas Niklas had spread to protect her from the ground.

  Amalie tucked a quilt tight around her friend’s shoulders, and Karoline moaned, tossing her head as Niklas dipped the washcloth back into the pail and dampened her forehead again.

  It was her fault Karoline wouldn’t waken. She shouldn’t have given Karoline the cannabis nor should she have let her sleep. And she should have insisted that Mr. Faust ride toward Lisbon immediately when they realized Karoline was injured instead of waiting for the cumbersome wagon train to plod toward the river.

  “Sister Amalie,” Brother John whispered. “The men need to eat something for supper.”

  She looked up at him, dazed. “Supper?”

  “Nothing fancy,” he insisted. “Just something to get us by for the night.”