AHC: Independent, German-speaking, Socialist Upper Midwest

[Rush Tarquin]

Not sure if I got the adjective order in the title right.

I'm rather fond of the 'Deutsche Athen' cultural millieu and the 48ers.

I won't require an independent nation cut out from the Union, because that would be a mighty feat indeed, but the challenge is to create an independent, German-speaking, socialist (interpret that last one as broadly as you like) Upper Midwestern nation. No POD limits, though there's bonus points if the USA also came into existence.

 

[FleetMac]

You'd need to play around with the settlement of the East Coast colonies, but maybe a Pennsylvaanisch/Low German "Trek" from Pennsylvania out west to escape the British (perhaps due to harsher anti-German sentiment?), and them establishing their own territory west of the Mississippi? I think you'd need a different 30 Years' War for that to happen, in order to get that anti-German attitude (although there may be other PODs to use as well).

 

[Baconheimer]

What about if more Germans, Swedes, Norweigens, immigrate there before the Civil War, which is won by the Confederacy, so the Lower Midwest states join the CSA, with California seceding. The Upper Midwest (Michigan, Wisconsin, Northern Illinois, Minnisota, Iowa, and maybe the Dakotas) form their own nation, provided to keeping the Northern Mississippi open. It eventually industrializes, providing product to the CSA, which cannot get it from New England very easily. It is eventually run by Social Democrats, and speaks Low German, Swedish, Norweigen, and English as official languages.

 

[FleetMac]

What about if more Germans, Swedes, Norweigens, immigrate there before the Civil War, which is won by the Confederacy, so the Lower Midwest states join the CSA, with California seceding. The Upper Midwest (Michigan, Wisconsin, Northern Illinois, Minnisota, Iowa, and maybe the Dakotas) form their own nation, provided to keeping the Northern Mississippi open. It eventually industrializes, providing product to the CSA, which cannot get it from New England very easily. It is eventually run by Social Democrats, and speaks Low German, Swedish, Norweigen, and English as official languages.

It seems to me that a nation of that sort of background would, if anything, be even MORE anti-Confederacy than the US, given the attitudes of Germans, Swedes, Norwegians, etc. of that time. Why wouldn't they ignore the South and just deal with the US?

 

[Rush Tarquin]

What about if more Germans, Swedes, Norweigens, immigrate there before the Civil War, which is won by the Confederacy, so the Lower Midwest states join the CSA, with California seceding. The Upper Midwest (Michigan, Wisconsin, Northern Illinois, Minnisota, Iowa, and maybe the Dakotas) form their own nation, provided to keeping the Northern Mississippi open. It eventually industrializes, providing product to the CSA, which cannot get it from New England very easily. It is eventually run by Social Democrats, and speaks Low German, Swedish, Norweigen, and English as official languages.

I'd agree with FleetMacs comment. Maybe a more ambitious and wildly more successful Northwest Conspiracy leads to a copperhead Old Northwest breaking away from the Union and then the German and Scandinavian parts of the Upper Midwest break away from that. But like I said in the OP, ACW PODs seem to difficult to pull off since the Northwest Conspiracy was a bit of a joke OTL and if it were strong enough to breakaway, say with British support from Canada in a concurrent British-American War (another container load of improbabilities), then the Old Northwest state would be able to prevent the German and Scandinavian parts of the Upper Midwest from seceding from them in turn.

 

[Asami]

Perhaps some Holy Roman Hanseatic cities like Lubeck, Hamburg, Bremen, etc. fund colonial expeditions like Courland, and end up colonizing little bits of the American Northeast. When Britain shows up, she throws them out, and they trek west across the Mississippi River, and establish their own loose nation, with the help from the natives.

Everyone forgets about this nation as they blend with the Indians. By the time of the 19th century, Canadians and Americans find a huge Indo-German nation spanning much of the American steppes. Low German and Christianity have become the resident ways, as the Indians they met didn't have a written language, so they adopted German to help with keeping track of things (the joys of meeting merchant colonists), and in exchange, they allowed the Germans to be part of their tribes.

So America finds this Indo-German hybrid state and goes "Oh."

 

[FleetMac]

Perhaps some Holy Roman Hanseatic cities like Lubeck, Hamburg, Bremen, etc. fund colonial expeditions like Courland, and end up colonizing little bits of the American Northeast. When Britain shows up, she throws them out, and they trek west across the Mississippi River, and establish their own loose nation, with the help from the natives.

Everyone forgets about this nation as they blend with the Indians. By the time of the 19th century, Canadians and Americans find a huge Indo-German nation spanning much of the American steppes. Low German and Christianity have become the resident ways, as the Indians they met didn't have a written language, so they adopted German to help with keeping track of things (the joys of meeting merchant colonists), and in exchange, they allowed the Germans to be part of their tribes.

So America finds this Indo-German hybrid state and goes "Oh."

Regardless of plausibility (I honestly don't know how feasible the Courland expedition and such would be by the Hanseatic League), this sounds like such a cool idea. Even better would be how this "New Hansa" or whatever would interact with America as they expand west...something tells me the US will try to go over, under, or (unfortunately) THROUGH these lands.

 

[JimTheB]

It seems to me that a nation of that sort of background would, if anything, be even MORE anti-Confederacy than the US, given the attitudes of Germans, Swedes, Norwegians, etc. of that time. Why wouldn't they ignore the South and just deal with the US?

They'd want to do business with the many German-Texans, I'd have thought.