Paul Follen

Paul Follenius (May 5, 1799 – October 3, 1844) was a German-American attorney and farmer, who had founded the Gießener Auswanderungsgesellschaft (Gießen Emigration Society). Early life He was born at Gießen, in Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany, to Christoph Follenius (1759-1833) and Rosine Follenius (1766–1799). His father was a counselor-at-law and judge. He was the brother of August Ludwig Follen and Charles Follen, and the uncle of the biologist Carl Vogt. During his studies at the University of Gießen he became friends with Friedrich Muench and in 1825 married Muench's sister Maria. Gottfried Duden Philanthropist Gottfried Duden, a German attorney, settled on the north side of the Missouri River along Lake Creek in 1824. He was investigating the possibilities of settlement in the area by his countrymen. In 1827 he returned to Germany, which he felt was overpopulated. There he published Bericht über eine Reise nach den westlichen Staaten Nordamerika's ("Report of a Journey to the Western states of North America") in 1829. Friedrick Münch The description of the free life in the US, by Duden, motivated the Protestant minister Friedrich Münch and Follenius to found the Gießener Auswanderungsgesellschaft in 1832. Both had participated in the outlawed republican and democratic movements in Germany in the wake of the French July Revolution of 1832. As there was no immediate hope for success, they intended to establish a "new and free Germany in the great North American Republic" to serve as model for a future German republic.