242 THE UTOPIAN COMMUNISTunique geological formations. With Koch, who was the first presi
dent, came Joseph Venus, who later succeeded to the presidency;
Jakob Ponsar and Cornelius Kopp, tailors; Joseph Kremper, a
farmer; Johann Enders, a locksmith; and Johann Marxer, a shoe
maker. Other members of the original St. Louis group included
Friedrich Meister, who returned to the city after two months to
become a banker; Heinrich Babe, a carpenter; Johann Hofstaeder,
a druggist; Friedrich Koenig, a dentist; and Isaac Nagel or Nage,
a tailor presumably of French extraction. Venus, Enders, and
Kopp were veterans of the New Helvetia colony. Though few
in the group knew much about farming, they began to break the
prairie sod with great enthusiasm and built a log house, twenty feet
by thirty feet, several smaller log houses, a blacksmith shop, and
a brickkiln. Land warrants in the possession of some of the colo
nists proved sufficient to acquire 160 acres; additional land was
bought at $1.25 an acre.
The Koch regime was marked by much dissension and by ugly
charges against the president of the colony which intimated that
he had filled his pockets at the expense of the colonists and was
guilty of plain embezzlement. It is a fact that he had the land
registered at the land office in his own name, but Weitling believed
he was a good administrator, had not violated the law, and simply
had acted to protect the interests of his family.
Whatever the facts, Koch withdrew from the colony in the fall
of 1849 and was paid off with $600. Title passed to Venus and
Mathew Grieshaber. Shortly thereafter the latter disappeared.
Koch retired to Dubuque and became a successful contractor and
politician who got on well with both Whigs and Democrats.^6 The
(^6) At the time of his departure, Koch produced the following poem, which may
deserve preservation:
Wie der Vogel aus dem Bauer,
Wenn ihm seine Flucht gelingt,
Wieder auf den grünen Zweigen
Lustig seine Lieder singt;