ABSTRACT

Early Life Eugene Victor Debs was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, on November 5, 1855. He was the third child of six who survived to adulthood and the first son of Jean Daniel Debs and Marguerite Marie Bettrich Debs. His parents had emigrated in 1849 from Alsace, lived briefly in New York City and Cincinnati, and settled in Terre Haute, opening a grocery store which provided the family with a modest but sustaining income.