German colonial school for agriculture, trade and commerce

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The German Colonial School Wilhelmshof around 1910

The German Colonial School for Agriculture, Trade and Commerce GmbH was founded on May 23, 1898, under the protectorate and chairmanship of Prince Wilhelm zu Wied in his Neuwied Castle in the legal form of a GmbH. In the supervisory board meeting on the same day, Witzenhausen was officially confirmed as the school's location. The German Colonial School (DKS) was closed in 1944 and has been run as the German Institute for Tropical and Sub- Tropical Agriculture (DITSL) since 1957 .

root

Monument to Ernst Albert Fabarius in the inner courtyard of the former Wilhelmitenkloster

The German Colonial School (DKS) had its roots on the one hand in the colonialist-imperialist ideas of the empire . Members of the nobility were among the founders as well as the up-and-coming class of Rhenish industrialists, who saw future opportunities in the development of German colonies . On the other hand, there is a second root in the anti-slavery movement and the mission societies , in particular the Rhenish Mission based in Barmen .

German Colonial School GmbH (1897–1899)

In 1897, Ernst Albert Fabarius wrote the confidential memorandum for the establishment of a colonial school for agriculture, trade and commerce . Under the chairmanship of the factory owner Schlechtendahl from Barmen, the association for the establishment of a German Evangelical Colonial School was established in Cologne . In the same year Ernst Albert Fabarius and Paul Aldinger founded the Evangelical Main Association for German Settlers and Emigrants . His office was set up after the colonial school was founded in Witzenhausen. In 1928 the association moved to Berlin.

On May 23, 1898, under the patronage of Prince zu Wied, the German Colonial School GmbH was founded in Neuwied Castle with a capital of 116,000 marks . After the death of Prince zu Wied in 1907, the President of the German Colonial Society Duke of Mecklenburg took over the patronage. The GmbH was sponsored by private merchants, manufacturers and plantation companies. Ernst Albert Fabarius became the director of the German Colonial School. On July 1, 1898, the GmbH took over the Prussian domain and the Wilhelmitenkloster in Witzenhausen.

German Colonial School Wilhelmshof (1899–1914)

On May 15, 1899, teaching began with 12 boarding school students. In 1905 the extension was completed; now the number of boarding schools has increased from 41 to 90. From 1908 to 1911 the colonial women's school was also located in Witzenhausen.

The German Colonial School Wilhelmshof

Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon 1905 wrote: “The German Colonial School Wilhelmshof near Witzenhausen holds the middle between the mainly scientific Dutch and the mainly practical English institution. First and foremost, it wants to prepare practical economic and plantation officials, planters, farmers, gardeners and cattle breeders for the German colonies and overseas settlement areas in a proficient and versatile manner. It includes the Witzenhausen domain, which has been prepared for this purpose, which, with the leased land and large guarding areas on 285 hectares, enables diverse agriculture and livestock farming. Craft workshops (blacksmiths, carpentry, saddlery, locksmith's shop, carpentry, wheelwright, joinery, masonry) with hydropower from the Gelsterbach flowing through the middle of the homestead, gardening, orchards, vineyards and the surrounding state forests provide educational resources. A natural science institute provides theoretical agricultural lessons. In addition, tobacco and canning factories in Witzenhausen, the forest academy in Münden, the educational institutions in Kassel, in particular the greenhouses, gardens and park of Wilhelmshöhe, and the agricultural institute in Göttingen, together with the university, make every desirable addition to the existing educational resources possible. "

The operation of the German Colonial School was divided into the school department, the department for estate administration and agriculture, the department for gardening and tropical culture and the handicraft department. In addition to twelve full-time teachers, several external teachers also held certain courses as freelance workers. At the school, mainly agricultural and craft subjects were taught in theory and practice. The future tropical farmers were also taught ethnology, cultural history and languages. At first, language lessons were given outside of school. After just a few years, however, language teachers were employed, making it possible to teach English , Spanish , Portuguese , Dutch , French and Swahili . Later, still Malay , West African languages, Russian , Hausa , Berber and Arabic added.

There was a teaching collection to illustrate the lesson. The graduates of the colonial school were asked to send suitable items from overseas to Witzenhausen; they are now in the Witzenhausen Ethnological Museum . After two or three years of training, a diploma from the German Colonial School with the professional title of state-certified colonial farmer could be obtained. By the First World War , around 650 students had passed through the German Colonial School. 500 of them lived abroad, of which 133 in South West Africa, 88 in East Africa and 32 in Cameroon. The German Colonial School stopped operating in 1914 when almost all of the students and lecturers had been drafted into the military. The buildings were now used as a military hospital.

University for Settlement in Germany and Abroad (1919–1944)

Teaching was resumed on January 9, 1919. The German Colonial Lexicon (compiled before 1914, but not published until 1920) describes the training as follows: The training takes place in a distinctly national spirit on the basis of a Christian - moral view of life. The motto of the German Colonial School is: "With God for Germany's honor - at home and above the sea!" Young men from the Reich between the ages of 17 and 27 are accepted in April and October of each year. The course is 2 or 3 years old. The subjects are I. General education, namely cultural studies, natural sciences, other; II. Economic, namely agriculture, animal breeding and veterinary medicine, gardening, forestry, commercial, practical agriculture, gardening and forestry; III. Technical, namely construction, cultural technology, country fairs, crafts; IV. Physical exercises such as gymnastics, riding, fencing. Colonial practice and theory are considered equally and closely related.

The Weimar Republic was marked by efforts to regain German colonies. After the initial success of democratization in schools, political front-building and radicalization later spread. At the time of National Socialism , the German Colonial School was shaken by violent internal party disputes, which prevented urgently needed reforms of the teaching concept. Integration into the party apparatus was initiated, but the planned nationalization was no longer carried out in the wake of the chaos of war. In 1940, Director Köster initiated the transformation of the DKS into a higher technical school. After almost all students and lecturers had been drafted for military service in 1942 and the school buildings had been confiscated by the Wehrmacht treasury to set up a reserve hospital, school operations were finally stopped in 1944. From 1899 to 1943, 2,308 men had been trained at the German Colonial School. Temporary visitors who had only attended individual courses or semesters came to these students. The main emigration destinations of the graduates were Africa and the American continent.

Personalities

Directors and faculty

  • Ernst Albert Fabarius (1899–1927), founding director and lecturer
  • Carl Anton Mense (1900–1914), tropical medicine specialist and explorer, lecturer in tropical health and tropical hygiene
  • Wilhelm Arning (1928–1934), retired medical officer D. Dr., Director and Managing Director
  • Karl W. Koch (1934–1938), SA Sturmhauptführer, director and managing director
  • Reinhold Köster (1938–1944), agricultural councilor, director and managing director
  • Adolf von Duisburg (1920–1938), lecturer in languages, head of the Colonial Studies Institute and the archive of the Colonial School
  • Arthur Golf (1939–1941?), Head of Examinations (presumably external)

Schoolchildren, course participants and graduates

Literature and film

Own magazines

  • The German cultural pioneer. News from the German Colonial School
  • Journal of the Association of Old Men of the German Colonial School for comrades and friends (new edition of the cultural pioneer from December 1949)
  • The tropical farmer (successor)

Literature until 1945

  • Ernst Albert Fabarius : A German Colonial School. Memorandum. Coblenz 1897.
  • Ernst Albert Fabarius : News about the German colonial school Wilhelmshof. Witzenhausen 1899.
  • Ernst Albert Fabarius : Training for colonial service. In: Yearbook on the German colonies. 2 (1909), pp. 135-148.
  • German colonial school. Curriculum and institution plan including course catalog. German Colonial School, Witzenhausen-Wilhelmshof 1912.
  • v. König: German Colonial School Wilhelmshof. In: German Colonial Lexicon. 1920, Volume III, p. 723 f.
  • German Colonial School Witzenhausen (Ed.): Commemorative publication for the 40th anniversary of the German Colonial School Witzenhausen 1898-1938. Duderstadt 1938.
  • Gustav Adolf Kausche: The German Colonial School as the Center of Colonial Studies and Colonial Studies. In: The German cultural pioneer. Vol. 38 (1938) No. 1/2, pp. 7-14.
  • German Colonial School Witzenhausen (Ed.): German Colonial School. Witzenhausen ad Werra. Curriculum and institution plan. Witzenhausen 1939.

Literature from 1945

  • Mechthild Rommel, Hulda Rautenberg: The colonial women's schools from 1908–1945. Comprehensive University of Kassel, Department of International Agriculture in Witzenhausen 1983 ( OpenLibrary )
  • Peter Wolff: Witzenhausen - 85 years in the service of agricultural development in the tropics and subtropics. Witzenhausen 1983.
  • Peter Wolff: Tropical agriculture training centers in Witzenhausen. The development from the German Colonial School in Witzenhausen to the Department of International Agriculture at the University of Kassel. Witzenhausen 1990.
  • Jens Böhlke: On the history of the German colonial school in Witzenhausen - aspects of its creation and work. 1995. (Writings of the Werra Valley Association in Witzenhausen, issue 29)
  • Eckhard Baum: At home and above the sea. From the German Colonial School to the German Institute for Tropical and Subtropical Agriculture in Witzenhausen. Self-published by DITSL, Witzenhausen 1997, ISBN 3-88122-894-2 .
  • Esaïe Djomo: An educational institution for cultural pioneers without a field of activity: The German Colonial School in Witzenhausen an der Werra in the Weimar Republic. In: Sven Halse (Ed.): Words, looks, dreams. Contributions to German colonialism in literature, photography and education. Copenhagen 2007, pp. 165-186.
  • Adelheid Rehbaum: Combination of practice and theory. The German Colonial School and Ernst August Fabarius (1859–1927). In: Hessian homeland. Supplement to the Gießener Allgemeine. No. 25, December 31, 2010, pp. 97-99.
  • Torben Gülstorff: From Wilhelmshof to a foreign country. Insights into the teaching of the own and the foreign at the Witzenhausen colonial school. Approaches to intercultural learning? In: ÖT KONTINENS, az Új‐ és Jelenkori Egyetemes Történeti Tanszék közleményei, No 2010, ELTE . BUDAPEST 2011, p. 395–412 ( academia.edu [PDF; 234 kB ]).

Movie

" The way into the world " - The German Colonial School Witzenhausen 1937 (Production Paul Lieberenz 1937, year of publication and distribution: 1974 at IWF Wissen und Medien gGmbH Göttingen.)

Web links

See also

Colonial women's school in Rendsburg

Individual evidence

  1. ^ For Germany's honor over the sea , in: FAZ , September 24, 2011, p. 68
  2. ↑ Colonial Schools . In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon . 6th edition. Volume 11, Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1907, p.  290 .
  3. ↑ Source: v. König: German Colonial School Wilhelmshof. In: German Colonial Lexicon. 1920, Volume III, p. 723 f.
  4. ^ Dieter E. Kilian: Kai-Uwe von Hassel and his family. Between the Baltic Sea and East Africa. Military-biographical mosaic. Hartmann, Miles-Verlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-937885-63-6 , p. 168.

Coordinates: 51 ° 20 '38.23 "  N , 9 ° 51' 35.27"  E