CERTIFYING THE RIGHTS OF THE GERMAN EMIGRATION COMPANY AND THEIR COLONISTS TO LANDS IN TEXAS, in a printed certificate, dated February 28, 1855

Printed broadside, 12 x 8 inches, headed, "Certificate No. [14], The State of Texas, County of Comal," with two manuscript entries completing the text, the certificate number ("14") and the acreage involved ("six hundred and forty"). Signed in type "John O Meusebach / Commissioner," appointed under the provisions of an Act of Legislature entitled 'an act supplemental to an act to secure to the German Emigration Company and their Colonists, the land to which they are entitled . approved 3d of February A.D. 1854.'" Henry Fr. Fisher, authorized agent of the German Emigration Company had appeared before Meusebach in New Braunfels on Feb. 26, 1855, asserting that the company had "introduced previous to the first day of September, 1847, over and above the number of heads of families and single men already proven up before Granville H. Sherwood, commissioner, the additional number of two hundred heads of families and four hundred single men, over the age of seventeen years," and that therefore the company was entitled to an additional 20 certificates of one section of land (i.e., 640 acres of land) as part of the Premium lands secured to them by law. OCLC locates one example (SMU). Some age toning, else very good. John O. Meusebach (1812-1897), born in Dillenburg, Germany, was appointed Commissioner-General of the German Adelsverein in Texas in 1845, succeeding Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels. Between 1845 and 1847, he managed to acquire headrights in the Fisher-Miller land grant and treated with the Comanche, founding three other colonies in addition to the one at New Braunfels. Over 5000 German citizens arrived in Texas as settlers between 1845 and 1847. Despite Meusebach's efforts the colonies and the company struggled with planning and mismanagement problems and the intrigues of land speculators. Meusebach resigned his commission in July 1847, but in 1854 he received an appointment from the Governor of Texas, Elisha Pease, to issue land certificates "to those immigrants of 1845 and 1846 who had been promised them by the Adelsverein," the original name of the German Emigration Company [Handbook of Texas online].…