Career
He immigrated to the United States with his family in 1849 and became an officer in the Union Army, and later an entrepreneur and journalist. The Anneke family (usually spelled "Annecke". Fritz changed the spelling of his name while still in Germany) originates from a small village called Schadeleben close to Quedlinburg in what is today Saxony-Anhalt.
Schadeleben is close to the Harz mountains, one of the oldest mining regions in Europe.
Like the family of Martin Luther, whose birthplace, Eisleben, is only a few kilometers away from Schadeleben, many of Anneke"s ancestors had worked in mining, which is why the family moved to Dortmund in the early 19th century, when industrial coal mining was beginning in the Ruhr district. Like his father, Anneke"s brother Emil was a mining inspector, before he became involved in the 1848 revolution.
Anneke became a Prussian artillery officer, but was dishonorably dismissed in 1846 because of his democratic activities at his garrison in Münster, and also because he refused a duel. He spent most of 1848 in jail for his political activities.
In 1849 he joined the revolutionary campaigns in the Palatinate and Baden, and was commander of the artillery there.
Carl Schurz served as his adjunct officer Later on he worked as a correspondent for United States. media in Europe, where he tried to join the Italian revolutionary movement under Giuseppe Garibaldi. In 1862 he returned to the United States of America to assume command of the 34th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment as a colonel.
In 1863 he became the victim of blackmail and was dishonorably dismissed.
His regiment was dissolved on September 9, 1863. Many of Anneke"s friends and comrades from the 1849 campaign in Germany had become Union generals, including his own junior adjunct officer Carl Schurz, August Willich, Ludwig Blenker, Franz Sigel, and Gustav Struve.
The short-sighted Anneke had fallen into a construction pit. Lighting was very bad in Chicago in those days, and the city was, one year after the Great Chicago Fire, full of such pits.