Louis W. Miller: German immigrant businessman

Cape Girardeau underwent unprecedented growth and success in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Its location on the Mississippi and the arrival of a railroad were partly responsible, but the town also benefited from German immigration. As a group, Germans were literate, often well-educated and came possessed with an entrepreneurial spirit and technical skills. The stories of many of these immigrants are in public records and surviving letters from Germany. We know less about their impressions of the area and their lives as communicated back to people in Europe.

One notable exception is Ludwig Wilhelm Müller (Louis W. Miller). His letters home have survived, and the ones written to his family concerning the Civil War era appear in "Germans in the Civil War," edited by Walter D. Kamphoefner and Wolfgang Helbich. Miller emigrated at age 24 from Massenheim, Hesse-Darmstadt, in 1853. He began work as a tailor in America and learned English from the pastor of his church.

In July 1860, he married Caroline Essig from Bavaria and leased a "grocery" with his brother-in-law in Jackson. As the Civil War loomed, Miller kept a close watch on the political situation. In one of his letters, he provided a succinct interpretation, "... the Federal states ... didn't want to allow the others to leave the United States and so it came to war." He further stated, "I couldn't stay any longer in my hometown, Jackson ... so on Sept. 12, 1861, I moved ... to Cape Girardeau where it was much safer." During the Civil War, local Germans were strongly pro-Union, and Jackson strongly Confederate, so the Millers followed many Germans who moved to Cape and the protection of the Union Army.

Miller enlisted in Battery F, 2nd Illinois Light Artillery, recruited under the command of Capt. John Wesley Powell. Miller was in the battles of Shiloh, Corinth, Vicksburg and Atlanta before mustering out in December 1864. Thereafter, Louis became active in the Justi Post of the Grand Army of the Republic, a Union veterans' organization, and many attested to his unselfish assistance to many of his old comrades.

Miller started a retail liquor business after the war. It was a great success and by 1870 was already valued at $2,000. He expanded the business several times, serving beer and wine and later oysters and lunches for downtown merchants and shoppers. Miller partnered in a bank and provided financial backing for a brewery. The saloon moved to 109 Independence in 1883, near the former Planter's Mill. The business continued well into the 20th century under the ownership of Miller's son, John L. Miller. (John built a fine home in 1906 at the corner of Spanish and Merriwether streets, which later became the Cape Osteopathic Hospital.)

Louis W. Miller died on April 5, 1892, and lengthy obituaries appeared in the Cape Girardeau Democrat and the German-language Deutscher Volksfreund. Both articles attest to his success in business, willingness to help those in need and community spirit. In this he exemplified many of the immigrant community of Cape Girardeau during that time.