Frauenthal, Max

American soldier; born at Marienthal, Rheinpfalz, Bavaria, in 1836; emigrated to America in 1851; lived for a time in Texas and Louisiana, finally settling in Brookhaven, Miss. On the outbreak of the Civil war he, with several coreligionists, enlisted at Summit, Miss., in a company subsequently known as "Company A, Sixteenth Regiment, Mississippi Volunteers." Frauenthal accompanied Gen. Stonewall Jackson through the valley of Virginia, and served till the end of the war, escaping with slight wounds. In the presence of several officers, General Ewell among the number, Frauenthal was highly complimented by his colonel. "If I had ten thousand men like Frauenthal," said the colonel, "I would drive the Yankees into the Potomac before night." Frauenthal particularly distinguished himself at the "Bloody Acute Angle" in the battle of Spottsylvania Court House (May 12, 1864). In a letter to the "Galveston Daily News," Colonel A. T. Watts, now judge at Dallas, Texas (who was a private in the same company as Frauenthal), contributes an account of the "grand, terrific, sustained fighting in the Angle of Livid Hell and Darksome Death." After describing in detail the formation of the "Acute Angle," Judge Watts concludes: "Frauenthal, a little Jew, had the heart of a lion. For several hours he stood at the immediate point of contact (the apex of the angle), amid the most terrific hail of lead, and coolly and deliberately loaded and fired without cringing."

Frauenthal is now (1903) living in Conway, Ark., and is commander of the Conway Camp of United Confederate Veterans.

Bibliography:

  * H. Cohen, A Modern Maccabean, in Publications Am. Jew. Hist. Soc. No. 6, 1897;
  * Galveston Daily News, July 15, 1893.



A. H. C.