Schiege House

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out in Fayette County, a story starts the way so many Texas stories do: with immigrants who crossed an ocean and dug in. Carl Johann Rudolph Schiege, who went by Charles Henry, was born in Prussia in 1815.

He and his wife Caroline, née Schubert, made their way to this patch of Texas and acquired land right here in 1861. They had four children. Only one of those four survived to adulthood.

One. That son carried the full weight of his father's name: Charles Henry, Jr., born in 1858. Now, you have to wonder what that does to a man, knowing he's the only one who made it.

Maybe it made him build. Maybe it made him commit. The marker doesn't say, and I won't pretend.

But what Charles Henry, Jr. did, around 1885, was put up a two-story home right at this site. The same year he built it, he married Emma Frenzel. A new house and a new marriage, all in the same breath.

Then, in 1892, Emma died. Grief has a way of sitting heavy in a two-story house. The following year, 1893, Schiege married Marie Becker.

And together, Charles and Marie Schiege reared ten children. Ten. Whatever sorrow had settled into those walls, life came rushing back in to fill every corner.

Schiege wasn't the kind of man to sit still either. He established a local cigar factory. And if that weren't enough, he served Round Top as justice of the peace, as mayor, as city marshal, and as alderman.

That's about every hat a small Texas town had to offer, and it sounds like he wore them all. Charles and Marie Schiege are buried together in the nearby Florida Chapel Cemetery. One immigrant family's land, one surviving son, one two-story house, and enough life lived inside it to fill a town.

That's the Schiege House.

What the marker says

Prussian immigrants Carl Johann Rudolph (Charles Henry) (b. 1815) and Caroline (Schubert) Schiege acquired land here in 1861. Only one of their four children, Charles Henry, Jr., (1858-1935), survived to adulthood. Charles Henry, Jr., built a 2-story home at this site abut 1885, the year he married Emma Frenzel. Emma died in 1892. In 1893 Schiege married Marie Becker; together they reared ten children. Schiege established a local cigar factory and also served as Round Top justice of the peace, mayor, city marshall, and alderman. Charles and Marie Schiege are buried in nearby Florida Chapel Cemetery. Sesquicentennial of Texas Statehood 1845-1995.