Battle at Rugaro

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Battle at Rugaro
Part of: Hehe War
Monument in Rugaro (now Lugalo)
Monument in Rugaro (now Lugalo)
date 17th August 1891
place Lugalo
output Victory of the Hehe
Parties to the conflict

No flag.svg Hehe Bena
No flag.svg

German EmpireThe German Imperium German Empire

Commander

Mpangile

Emil von Zelewski †

Troop strength
2,000-3,000 Hehe warriors 14 Europeans, 320 Askari , up to 200 porters
losses

250-1,000 Hehe warriors

10 Europeans, 250–291 Askari, approx. 100 carriers

The battle at Rugaro on August 17, 1891 was a battle between the Hehe people (also Wahehe ) and the protection force for German East Africa . Despite having few firearms, the outnumbered Hehe warriors triumphed. For the Schutztruppe it was one of the most costly defeats in its history. The battle marks a climax in the Hehe War .

prehistory

In 1890, the German Empire and Great Britain drew the borders of German East Africa in the so-called " Helgoland-Sansibar Treaty " . The colony passed from private administration by the German-East African Society to direct Reich administration. Due to the coastal uprising of 1888 , the colonial penetration inland was still in its infancy. After the suppression of the uprising, military expeditions began in the interior to control the caravan routes, to consolidate German rule and to break any resistance from local leaders.

Commander

The 5th ( Sudanese ) Company , the 6th Company and the 7th ( Zulu ) Company of the Schutztruppe for German East Africa under the command of Captain Emil von Zelewski were involved in the battle . His appearance towards the coastal inhabitants is considered to be the trigger for the previous coastal uprising. Among other things, he is said to have desecrated a mosque in Pangani by entering it in boots and with dogs, which caused a scandal in the Muslim coastal town . Von Zelewski also led the inland expeditions in an uncompromising manner. On July 30, 1891, he noted something like: "A fortified settlement shot at with 20 shells and 850 maxi cartridges".

The Hehe warriors were led by Mpangile , the brother of Chief Mkwawa . The Hehe claimed an extensive area of ​​power in the highlands of Iringa , which diminished the influence of the Germans, as well as the German-friendly neighboring peoples.

Marching route

Von Zelewski was initially in the hinterland of Kilwa to contain the unrest in the Mahenge . From there he moved over the Rufiji to Usagara to attack the Hehe. Rochus Schmidt , at the same time an officer in the East African protection force, later wrote that Zelewski would have better returned with the force to Bagamoyo by ship in order to penetrate into the Hehe area from there. Had he taken this route, the Wagogo and Maasai would have been won as allies on the caravan route to Mpwapwa .

course

Place of the battle of Rugaro a good 15 years after the event (recorded by Kurt von Schleinitz )

About twelve kilometers from the fortified town of Iringa , the marching column was attacked simultaneously by Hehe warriors along its entire length. The Hehe had watched the column and took cover at a convenient place next to the foreseeable route. In the further course, the way was blocked by warriors from the Bena people. It had been agreed that on the command of their commander a shot should be fired as a sign of attack. An unforeseen incident led to a premature attack, which in turn was supposed to save the rearguard of the German column. While most of the column was already directly below the hidden hehe, a German officer shot birds. The Hehe took this as a signal and attacked. Since the fight took place in densely overgrown terrain and von Zelewski had waived an advance command, the troops were completely surprised. The Askari could only fire a few shots from their rifles before the Hehe broke into the column armed with butt spears. The protection force was defeated in direct close combat. After only 10-15 minutes, the fight was over. The Hehe captured around 300 rifles as well as artillery pieces and machine guns, which subsequently made them a dangerous enemy of the Germans.

The rearguard under Lieutenant von Tettenborn had not yet fallen into the trap and was gathering on a nearby hill. Hehe warriors who stormed after could be repulsed. With the survivors, Tettenborn managed to march back towards Dar es Salaam . Four Germans, about 64 Askari and about 74 porters survived the battle. Your loss rate was therefore unusually high. But the losses of the Hehe are also said to have amounted to several hundred men.

Von Zelewski was also among the dead.

consequences

It took the Schutztruppe three years to recover from the defeat at Rugaro. It was not until October 1894 that a large-scale “ punitive expedition ” began under Friedrich von Schele . Subsequently, the governorate of German East Africa embroiled itself in a protracted guerrilla war with Mkwawa, which opposed the Germans until his suicide in July 1898.

With the storming of Kwirengas on October 30, 1894, among other things, booty weapons from the battle at Rugaro were recaptured.

Protection Force officer Tom von Prince later reported that he passed the site of the Rugaro battle in 1894. He also saw numerous human remains from the Zelewski expedition. Among them was a skull , impaled on a stick by the side of the road, which he identified as the head of Zelewskis on the basis of seals and the characteristics of the bridge of the nose . Prince had the bones of the fallen members of the Schutztruppe buried and had a burial mound built nearby. The skull was supposed to be brought by Zelewski's bereaved relatives, but was lost on the march.

The Germans later built a memorial at the site of the battle. In the Great German Colonial Atlas from 1901 to 1915, published by the Colonial Department of the Foreign Office, the monument is marked as the “Zelewski Monument” a little east of Iringa. It still exists and is located directly on the national Tanzam Highway (T1) coming from Morogoro a few kilometers before Iringa.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c B. Arnold: The Battle of Rugaro 1891 (Tanzania, Iringa). In: P. Heine, Uvd Heyden (ed.): Studies on the history of German colonialism in Africa. Pfaffenweiler: Centaurus 1995, p. 100.
  2. ↑ B. Köfler, W. Sauer: Failure in Usambara . ( Memento of the original from May 1, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Wiener Geschichtsblätter 53 (1998/1) 1–25, Vienna 1998. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sadocc.at
  3. ^ BG Längin: The German colonies . 2005: p. 173.
  4. ↑ G. Knopp: The world empire of the Germans . Munich: Piper, 2011, p. 240.
  5. ↑ T. Morlang: You wanted it that way. In: Die Zeit , No. 32/1998.
  6. ↑ G. Knopp: The world empire of the Germans . Munich: Piper, 2011, p. 251.
  7. ^ R. Schmidt: Germany's colonies . Vol. 1, Berlin: Verlag des Verein der Buchfreunde Schall & Grund, 1898, p. 246f.
  8. ↑ "lugalo" on Mkwawa.com , insight March 2017
  9. ↑ Battle of Lugalo: African Tribesmen Wipe Out German Force on burnpit.us, blog from the American Legion, insight March 2017
  10. ^ R. Schmidt: Germany's colonies . P. 258.
  11. ^ T. v. Prince, quoted in G. Knopp: Das Weltreich der Deutschen . Munich: Piper, 2011, p. 254
  12. ↑ Herbert V. Patera: The white Lord without fear - The life of the Schutztruppenhauptmanns Tom von Prince . Deutscher Verlag, Berlin 1939, p. 167f.

Coordinates: 7 ° 44 ′ 18.2 ″  S , 35 ° 52 ′ 36.9 ″  E

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