Less than fifty years ago German missionaries, in the territory then known as Damaraland, appealed to the British Government to annex the country. The appeal was rejected. In 1883 a Bremen merchant, F. A. E. Lüderitz, whose name has been given to the settlement at Lüderitz Bay, set up a trading station under the sanction and approval of Bismarck. On the strength of Lüderitz's trifling commercial claims Germany annexed the country. It is said that when Rhodes heard the news he threw the papers signed by the local chiefs into a safe and slammed the iron door, with the remark, "Let them lie there until the country is British." The extent of Germany's trading interest in her new possession may be gathered from the fact that the little steamer employed by Lüderitz was known as "The Bottle Mail," because she imported full bottles of beer for the German trader, and carried back the "empties" as exports!
Germany rejoiced in her new possession, but she had hard work to occupy it. For five or six years the Hottentots fought hard for their independence, and until they were put down there was scarcely any attempt at settlement. In October 1904 the brutal methods of the officials led to a great rising of the Hereros, the bravest of the native peoples. During this revolt the Germans did many of those deeds of shame and horror which afterwards covered their name with infamy in Belgium. It took 19,000 Germans to put down the Hereros, and they were not completely subdued until 1908.
German Camel Corps in German South-West Africa. Photo, Underwood & Underwood.
German South-West Africa is not an inviting land. Much of it is waterless desert, but there are large areas of splendid grass land very suitable for grazing, and upon them the Herero raise huge herds of cattle. Sheep thrive well, and so do goats. Many Boers from Cape Colony have settled in the country, and their flocks and herds have prospered greatly. It was these Boers from Cape Colony who "made" German South-West Africa.
The Germans have done much to foster agriculture, and have opened up the country by good roads, and by railways which in 1913 had a total length of 1,304 miles. They have also bored largely for water. Despite all their efforts, however, the colony did not pay its way until 1912, when diamonds were discovered in the Lüderitz Bay district. Copper was also found and mined, and before the war some 27,500 tons of this metal were exported annually.
When the great struggle began in Europe, the German Empire overseas covered an estimated area of over 1,000,000 square miles, of which nearly 90 per cent. was in Africa, and by far the bulk of the remainder in certain islands of the Pacific Ocean. Of the fourteen islands comprising the Samoan group, which lies 1,600 miles to the north of New Zealand, Germany held eight of the best, and America the remainder. To most people the mention of Samoa recalls Robert Louis Stevenson,[130] the sweet singer and stirring romancer who spent the last years of his life at Vailima, in a deep cleft of the mountains near Apia, in the fertile island of Upolu, the largest island of the Samoan group. Here he wrote several of his books, and worked hard at clearing the rank tropical jungle and at making roads. He died in his island home Dec. 3, 1894, and was buried on the summit of a mountain. Thanks to his descriptions,[131] the Samoans and their beautiful sunny islands are familiar to the readers of English books all the world over.
Apia, near to which Stevenson lived, was the capital of the German islands; it has an excellent harbour. On March 19, 1889, when the harbour was full of shipping, including German and American men-of-war and H.M.S. Calliope, one of the disastrous hurricanes which occasionally sweep over the islands of the Southern Seas began to blow. The only possible way in which these ships could escape wreck was to put to sea and there ride out the storm. All the ships tried to leave the harbour, but the only one that was able to make headway against the fearful wind and sea was the Calliope. All the other ships were wrecked, and many lives were lost. When King George V., then Prince of Wales, visited Wellington, the seat of the New Zealand Government, he passed under an arch of coal with this inscription: "The coal that saved the Calliope."
The German Samoan islands were acquired in 1899. The two largest of them have a united area of 1,000 square miles; the total population of the islands is about 35,000, and the annual trade was reckoned at £120,000. Amongst other Pacific possessions of Germany when the war began were the southern islands of the Solomon group, an archipelago of high wooded mountains, lying to the east of New Guinea. The Bismarck Archipelago, to the west of them, the coral reefs of the Carolines, Pelew, and Marianne (or Ladrone) Islands,[132] and the Marshall Islands still farther north, were also in German hands. On Neu-Pommern, one of the Bismarck group, there was a powerful wireless station.
By far the largest island possession of Germany was a portion of New Guinea. This huge, lizard-shaped island—the second largest island in the world—lies about eighty miles north of Australia, and stands like a stepping-stone between that continent and Asia. The Dutch held the western half, and the remainder was divided between Germany and Britain, the south-east part being ours and the remainder German. The German portion was known as Kaiser Wilhelm Land, and had an area of 70,000 square miles. Most of it is unexplored, but there is no doubt that it is exceedingly rich in wild tropical products, and that it possesses great mineral wealth. The Germans have not made much headway in Kaiser Wilhelm Land or in the "Spice Islands," already mentioned; but they spent much money in developing the country and in fostering trade.