When he heard about the February revolution in France, Heinzen immediately returned to Europe and took active part in the activity in Germany. He organized an armed incursion of volunteers from France and Switzerland into Baden. After the uprising in Baden was suppressed in 1849, he fled to Switzerland, and then went back to the United States again, via London. In New York City, for a time he edited the "Schellpost", a paper founded by Eichthal. In 1853, he went to Louisville, Kentucky, where he founded the newspaper "Pionier". He put this out for over a quarter of a century, writing most of it himself. German radicalism, of which he was one of the pillars, was the recipient of sharp and bitter satire within its pages.