268 THE UTOPIAN COMMUNIST
trator. Spring floods washed away the dam and the mill wall on the
Volga, and the workers refused to rebuild them unless cash wages
were guaranteed. Weitling's devoted friend, J. Krieg, announced
that he was through with communism and demanded his money.
Brandenberger offered to complete the mill project for $6,000
and reported that he was forced to sell some of the colony's mov
able property to pay the seceders and provide them with travel
funds and that he had been in "Dubjoch" (Dubuque) to instruct
the attorney to drop the suit against Weitling.
By this time nearly all available funds of the Arbeiterbund had
been sunk in the hapless venture. Weitling told his friends that he
would rather carry a sack of meat to a pack of wolves than a bag
of money to the colonists. He begged the tiny remnant of the
faithful to continue to have faith in his courage. His attorney in
Dubuque advised him to insist upon a chancery suit rather than a
jury trial, assured him that his conduct had been perfectly legal,
and approved the power of attorney which he had obtained from
most of the Gemeinde.
Accepting this advice as a complete vindication, Weitling's
spirits rose immediately. He was ready to forget the colony and
begin all over again with more practical objectives. "We are not
guilty of the losses which many will suffer," he insisted. "Forget
that we once had brothers in Communia." He pleaded for a new
propaganda purified by the fires of bitter experience, reminded
his friends that virtue and things of the spirit outweigh all material
things, and told them that Hannibal lost many a soldier before his
army finally conquered Rome. His only practical proposal how
ever was a plan to have all property of the Bund recorded here
after in the name of "Wilhelm Weitling, trustee of the Working-
men's League," so that purified in soul and spirit the Arbeiterbund
could move forward "into a new and more beautiful Canaan."
Die Republik der Arbeiter for June, 1854, published several
letters from Communia in which settlers presented their claims
and accused Weitling of defrauding the working class. Weiss,
the storekeeper for the colony, advocated a public sale or a parti-
barré
(Barré)
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