The story of three brothers, Bernhard Heinrich, Johann Ludwig, and Carsten August Bequest (German immigrants to Charleston, South Carolina), takes place after the Civil War ended. The stage is set by showing how the brothers' relatively late arrival in Charleston was the logical outcome and culmination of developments that had begun much earlier in the century. By the time the Bequest brothers appear on the scene, the German ethnic community had already set down deep roots and was proceeding to become more Charlestonian than German. The brothers' stories are representative of the journeys...