German or Dutch?

Stop painting all Americans with the same brush, dude. It is so narrow-minded of you. Yes, I dare say there are plenty that have never travelled through Europe but there are plenty that have, and they tend to be very broad-minded and outgoing. Whatever are you talking about when you say that all Americans “get to hear and all you want to hear, is stuff about world war II and thats it”? You really are making yourself sound like an Englishman bigot with sweeping generalisations like that.

So let me ask you, Englishman, how DO you tell the difference between a German and a Dutchman? Having travelled extensively throughout Europe myself many times and camped at many campsites that tend to be quite full of Germans AND Dutch, I can tell the two people apart in many ways. Hence the phrase: “not-too-subtle differences” in my first post. But I’d like to hear from you how it is done, particularly if you are a Missouri farmer in the early 1860s who has never left his own county (never mind country) and you are talking to a second generation immigrant (as I think Jake was) who has an accent identical to your own. I suppose you can generalise about looks: Dutch tend to be taller and blonder, but you do get tall, blonde Germans so this won’t work all the time. If I cannot see a caravan or look at their car licence plates therefore, it may take me a while to tell two groups apart…I’m pretty sure that the Roedel’s didn’t have German OR Dutch plates, but I’m not too sure about the caravan, though….

Bearing in mind that most Europeans speak English with a strong accent (occasionally with a strong Englishman`s or American accent) I have yet to meet the person who can speak to anybody from Continental Europe, in English, and work out what country that person hails from simply by listening to his/her voice. But of course you’ll know all about this, having a German girlfried AND a wife with lots of Dutch friends (but what I really want to know is, does your wife know your German girlfried, Englishman, or are you getting yourself confused, as your German girlfried is actually one of your wife's Dutch friends?). And your German friends that you “only love to kick ther ass** if they beat you up in soccer”. Let’s not forget about them too…or the fact that no Englishman actually plays soccer…or the fact that although England regularly gets BEATEN by Germany playing football they seldom get BEATEN UP by them on the pitch...or the fact that no Englishman would actually write "kick ther ass** ", or "dude" (or "c'mon" for that matter), or ` as an apostrophe, or....!

By the way, why don't you ask your many German friends if they mind being called "Dutch", then you could answer your own sort-of question which you raised.

And as for that last sort-of question you asked at the end, the answer is, of course it’s all the same: us guys think that we’ll make such a person as you’re describing one of the biggest paid stars in Hollywood…just look at what happened to Mel Gibson (although I don’t recall if he ever played the part of a Canadian) and Russel Crowe, (although he is from New Zealand - though no-one can actually tell the difference ;-) ).

And by the way, it’s not “Canadian, huh?”, it’s “Canadian, eh?”

Keep it real, mijn vriend van Engelsman/mein Engländerfreund!

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Dutch, in American use, meant a German = taken from the German word "Deutsch".

How many people of Netherlands nationality fought in the ACW ? Not too many.

On the other hand, German immigrants were plentiful and together with the Irish, formed the largest foerign contingents in the Union and Confederate armies.

Various German regiments were raised on both sides. The Union had various German units from New York and Wisconsin for a start, Missouri Germans also favoured the North and formed regiments too. The South had regiments of German background, including a Louisiana Jager regiment from New Orleans who wore brown short jackets and mouse-grey pants and kepis.

German regiments weren't always highly regarded by American observers and their commanders were a mixed bag too. Fritz Sigel of New York, a political general, was probably the most famous of the German commanders. Talking of Union German units, one Union American observer said that he had no time for the "Dutch" troops of the Union Army.

Some of the most famous German Union regiments were the 40th New York Infantry (Mozart Regiment), the 41st NY Infantry(De Kalb/Jager Regt), 45th NY Infantry (5th German Rifles), 52nd NY Infantry (German Rangers - Sigel Infantry), 54th NY Infantry.

One of General Lee's most trusted aides was a huge Prussian officer called Heros Von Borke, who wielded his enormous Prussian cavalry sabre during the battle of Brandy Station in June 1863, just before Gettysburg.


"S h i t happens in mysterious ways, its wonders to perform"

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What else but 'the deutch' should they consider themselves. Deutch (originally deutsch, dunno if you spelled it wrong or the word underwent some transformation over the centuries) is how the Germans call themselves.
deutsch = german, Deutschland = Germany.
People of dutch descent probably would call themselves 'Nederlanders'.

I don't know about you but the OP (being dutch) should know that Dutch derives from Deutsch. They even sing it in their won national anthem William of Nassau, scion Of a German and ancient line,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Het_Wilhelmus#Interpretation
"Duytsch"
The word "Duytschen" in the first stanza as a reference to William's roots, whose modern Dutch equivalent, "Duits", exclusively means "German", could refer to William's ancestral house (Nassau) as well as to the lands of the Holy Roman Empire at large, including the Netherlands; scholars have pointed out that a sharp distinction between Duits ("German") and Diets ("Dutch"), which are dialectical variants of the same word, is unlikely to have existed in 16th-century usage.[15]

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"It's called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe in it".

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Jake Roedel's comrades are well aware of his german origins, so by calling him dutchie, they don't assume he is from the Netherlands (guess most of them aint even aware such a country exists). Just fits their tongues better than 'deutschie' would.

Why are you all making stuff up in your heads instead of actually researching this. The term Dutchie was used for Germans because the Dutch language is nearly identical to Old Low German, they were using linguistic groupings instead of nationalities, which was common then e.g. German speakings living in, say, Galicia weren't called Rutherians, or Polish, or Ukrainians, or even Austrians, which they properly were, but German based on the language they spoke.

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These Union song lyrics of the day show that Dutch was what they were called.
Harriet Beecher Stowe uses the word German in her book though. I don't think there was any confusion or prejudice attached to using the word Dutch.

Col Mulligan's brigade
They were never yet afraid,
Fought at Lexington five days without complaining;
Fed the rebels shell and shot
Till they out of water got
Then surrendered up their happy land of Canaan

There's the "Dutch Comany"
Who are fighting for the free
When in battle every nerve they are straining
When it comes to run away
They will tell you "nix furstay!"
They re an honor to our happy land of Canaan

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Yes, exactly, linguistically they are German, regardless of the later concept of nationality that grouped them differently. It seems really strange that the OP if he really is Dutch wouldn't know this, is their educational system intentionally that deficient in their own history?

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