Dahomey uprising
The Dahomey uprising , known at the time as the Dahomey mutiny , was a rebellion by German police soldiers of West African origin in the colony of Cameroon in December 1893. It was put down by the gunboat SMS Hyäne , with a large part of the village of Joßplatte (now part of Douala ) was destroyed. In the German Reich , the rebellion triggered a colonial scandal , as a result of which the former Cameroon police force was disbanded.
causes
To secure the German rule in Cameroon was formally on October 16, 1891 police force Cameroon formed. From the outset, the imperial government had refrained from recruiting police soldiers in the colony itself, since the local population was not politically reliable in the sense of German colonial rule.
In the summer of 1891, Captain Karl von Gravenreuth in the Kingdom of Dahomey had already bought 370 slaves from King Behanzin for the Cameroon governorate . The recruitment of ransomed slaves for the police or military service seemed to the German government administration in Cameroon to be much more cost-effective than the hiring of mercenaries , as they are, for example. B. was practiced for the protection force for German East Africa . The free purchase price was 280 or 320 marks per person. On August 18, 1891, Gravenreuth signed an employment contract with 199 people of both sexes in Weidah ( Ouidah ) , which obliged the undersigned to go to Cameroon and to accept any job as porters, soldiers, farm workers, etc. The contract was concluded for five years, food and clothing were free. The treaty also included the undersigned remaining in Cameroon. Two further contracts were concluded on August 29, 1891 in Weidah with 45 people and on September 1, 1889 in Klein-Popo ( Aného ) with 89 ransomed men and 37 ransomed women. The slaves came from different regions of West Africa and, as far as is known, not from the kingdom of Dahomey itself.
Some of the male freelancers were employed in the Cameroon police force that had just been established . By the end of 1893, two thirds of the so-called Dahomey workers had already perished due to diseases, especially smallpox . In December 1893 the police force consisted of 100 men, 55 of whom were former Dahomey slaves. The remaining police soldiers were West African mercenaries from the Kru and Vai (contemporary Wey ) from Liberia and Sierra Leone and Haussa from Togo .
The simultaneous employment of mercenaries and unpaid ransomed slaves, who served their free purchase sum through their military service, inevitably led to a two-class society in the police force, in which the former slaves felt themselves to be second-degree police soldiers, since they performed the same service as the mercenaries and how they put their lives on expeditions into the hinterland, but were not paid for it. The mercenaries received a monthly wage of 20 or 30 marks, depending on the length of their membership in the police force. In addition, unlike the mercenaries, the Dahomey soldiers were not allowed to plunder on military expeditions. The actual reasons for the uprising, however, were the brutal treatment by German superiors, the use of forced labor and the alleged rape of soldiers' wives by government chancellor Heinrich Leist . The specific reason for the uprising was therefore a punishment of soldiers' wives on December 15, 1893 for refusing to work. The women were beaten by Corporal John Cold with a hippopotamus whip in front of their husbands. At this time, the police force was under the command of Premier Lieutenant ( Oberleutnant ) Walter Haering (1862–?), Who, however, had only started his service on October 1, 1893.
course
On the evening of December 15, 1893, the Dahomey soldiers decided to revolt with the aim of killing Leist and ending German rule in the colony. They took possession of modern carbines , two Maxim machine guns and two quick-loading cannons and plenty of ammunition, and chose the police soldier Mamadu as their leader. He had previously referred to himself as the Dammeheadman ( Dahomey leader ). 47 of 55 Dahomey soldiers and 43 Dahomey women took part in the uprising.
Despite complete superiority in terms of weapons technology and personnel and the surprise effect on their side, the insurgents did not succeed in arresting the German administrative personnel who had holed up in the government building of the Joß-Platte. They declined requests to negotiate. The rebels accidentally shot the assessor Riebow, whom they had mistaken for Leist. The German command personnel were supported by the two government steamers Nachtigal and Soden , which had fast-loading cannons. The besieged were evacuated on December 16, 1893 with dinghies from the steamers and taken to Hickorytown (now also part of Douala).
Furthermore, the rebels could not prevent the telegraphic notification of the gunboat SMS Hyäne , which was stationed at the "West African station" of the Imperial Navy at the time and was currently in the Portuguese colony of São Thomé . As early as December 20, 1893, the hyena arrived under Lieutenant Wilhelm Reincke (1855–1922) in front of the Joß-Platte and took it under fire. Nevertheless, the resistance of the insurgents was not broken, so that finally on December 23rd a landing party of the gunboat together with loyal police soldiers stormed the positions of the rebels and arrested most of them, while some of the insurgents fled into the surrounding jungle. A large number of the refugees were caught in the following weeks; the men were executed and the women used for forced labor.
To secure the colony, the government decided on January 9, 1894 to send a company from the 2nd Sea Battalion from Wilhelmshaven under the leadership of Captain Oltwig von Kamptz to Cameroon. The marines were embarked in Cuxhaven on the express steamer Admiral and arrived in Cameroon on January 28, 1894. The company was used to pursue insurgents on the run, as well as guard and patrol duty, and was withdrawn from the colony at the end of March after the Reich leadership had decided to completely reorganize the police and military in the colony.
Causes of Defeat and Consequences of Insurrection
The defeat of the insurgents was practically inevitable due to their specific social situation and the geographical location of the insurgency area. They had no allies among the mercenaries of the police force or among the local population. They could not move into the hinterland either, since the local population was in contrast to the coastal population and the Dahomey soldiers had been deployed on military expeditions against the population in the hinterland. The rebels could not leave the colony by sea either, as they neither had the technical means nor could they seek exile . The uprising was therefore not a rational strategy to end colonial rule , but arose spontaneously from the specific cause of the mistreatment of the wives of the police soldiers . Although, according to German reports, the rebels operated skillfully militarily, after the arrival of the hyena they found themselves in an untenable position that gave them no leeway, e.g. B. for negotiations.
An investigative commission headed by Legation Councilor Friedrich Wilhelm Rose found that the allegations made against Leist were essentially correct, which led to sharp criticism of German colonial policy , especially from the social democratic , but also from liberal sides . The Leist case turned into a colonial scandal; Leist himself was dismissed from service in 1895, but due to the legal situation at the time, he could only be prosecuted in a disciplinary manner and not under criminal law. Even Governor Eugene of carpenters , who was not present in the colony during the uprising was dismissed because he was blamed for tolerating the conditions.
As a result of the uprising, the old police force was disbanded and converted into the protection force for Cameroon , following the example of the protection force for German East Africa ; in addition, a new Cameroon police force was established. These troops, too, were recruited from West African mercenaries in the next few years, until after 1900 more and more staff from the colonial area were also employed.
The use of the hyena had again demonstrated that the stationaries of the Imperial Navy's foreign stations, usually older gunboats and small cruisers , played an important strategic military role in maintaining colonial rule in the event of an uprising, since the crews of the warships were considered loyal and well trained .
See also
literature
- Adolf Rüger: The uprising of the police soldiers (December 1893) , in: Helmuth Stoecker (ed.): Cameroon under German colonial rule , vol. 1, Berlin 1960, pp. 97–147.
- Chapter: The "Dahome uprising" (mutiny of the police force, 1893) , in: Florian Hoffmann: Occupation and military administration in Cameroon. Establishment and institutionalization of the colonial monopoly of violence , 2 vol., Göttingen 2007 (Phil. Diss.), Vol. 1, pp. 78–83.
- Chapter 9: The uprising of the Dahomeysoldaten , in: Walter Nuhn : Cameroon under the imperial eagle. History of the acquisition and development of the former German protected area of Cameroon. A contribution to German colonial history , 2nd edition Cologne 2000, pp. 137–154.
- Subchapter The subscription and Dahomey uprising in Cameroon , in: Walter Nuhn: colonialism and navy. The role of the Imperial Navy in the founding and securing of the German colonial empire 1884–1914 , Bonn 2002, pp. 163–168. The report of the oldest officer of the West African station on the mutiny of the Schutztruppe and the situation in Cameroon to the commanding admiral in Berlin of January 2, 1894, pp. 294–299, is printed in the appendix as Document No. 19.