My Reminiscences of East Africa

by Paul Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck

In May, 1917, Captain von Lieberman, who, with the 11th and 17th Companies, was occupying an entrenched position at Ngaula, a day’s march south of Kilwa on the Kilwa-Livale road, was attacked by eight companies with two guns. Lieutenant Buechsel, with his 17th Company, made such a heavy flank attack that he completely routed, one after the other, several of the enemy’s Askari companies, who took to their heels, followed by the 40th Indian Pathan Regiment. The enemy left about seventy dead on the field, and, as the English related afterwards, it was only by chance that we did not find his guns, which had stuck fast in a river.

On the whole it seemed to us that the enemy’s forces were once more getting exhausted. Unless he brought over very considerable reinforcements it was obvious that the forces available would before long be worn out and his operations end in failure. It was already apparent that they were involving a great strain. It had been ascertained that a battery from the Indian interior had been brought to Kilwa and that a large number of new Askari companies were being raised.

More dangerous than the enemy seemed to me the material position of our men. The cargo of wheat from the relief ship was coming to an end, and I thought it questionable whether bread could be baked from Mtama flour alone, without the addition of wheat flour. At that time I still regarded bread as an indispensable necessity for the nourishment of Europeans, and therefore I made experiments personally in baking bread without wheat flour. Unfortunately the results were unsatisfactory. Afterwards, under the stress of necessity, we all produced excellent bread without wheat. The methods differed widely. Later we made bread not only with mtama, but also with muhogo, sweet potatoes, maize, in short, with nearly every kind of meal, and with mixtures of all sorts of combinations, and later still improved the quality by the addition of boiled rice.

The necessary kit also required attention. A shortage of boots was in sight. My experiments showed me that a European can go barefoot where there are tolerable paths, but never through the bush. Sandals, which anyone can make, given an odd bit of leather, proved helpful, but did not take the place of boots. To be ready for any emergency, I had some lessons in boot-making, and succeeded, with supervision, in producing an object that at a push could be taken for a left boot, though it was intended to be a right. It is very convenient for a European who knows the simplest rudiments of this craft to be able to kill an antelope and make a boot, or at any rate repair one, from his skin a few days later, without the help of any of the tools of civilization. A nail must serve as an awl, a tent-pole as a last, and the thread he can cut from the tough leather of a small antelope. As a matter of fact, however, we were never driven to these extremities, as we were always able to obtain the necessary kit and equipment from captured stores, and many captured saddles were cut up to make soles and heels for boots.

Every European was becoming more and more like a South-African “Trekker” and was his own workman. Naturally, not always in person, but within the small independent household, consisting of his black cook and his black servant, which followed him about. Many had even provided themselves with a few hens which they took about with them, and the noise of these betrayed the position of German camps even as far as the native settlements. An order issued in one force that the crowing of cocks before 9 a.m. was forbidden brought no relief.

The important question of salt was very simply solved by the troops at Kilwa, by the evaporation of sea-water. In order to secure the supply, which was beginning to run short, against the loss of the coast, salt-yielding plants were collected and the salt obtained from their ashes by lixiviation. We got this idea from the natives of the district, who supplied themselves with salt in this way. The salt thus obtained was not bad, but was never required to any extent, as we were always able to meet our requirements from the captured stores. The large numbers of elephants in this district furnished us with fat; sugar was replaced by the excellent wild honey which was found in large quantities. The troops had made an important step forward as regards supplies of grain. They found out how to ripen it artificially, and in this way provided against want.

It should be noted here particularly that the Medical Corps, in spite of the difficult and constantly changing circumstances of life in the field, had succeeded in satisfactorily solving the important questions of quinine and material for bandages. It has already been mentioned that in the north quinine tablets of better quality than the English had been added to the stock of Peruvian bark. After the evacuation of the northern area a large consignment of Peruvian bark had been sent to Kilossa. Through the efforts of the Deputy Staff Medical Officer, Staff-Surgeon Teute, a part of this was transported further south. It was of course impossible without the necessary apparatus to manufacture tablets, but liquid quinine was produced by boiling Peruvian bark. This had an infernal taste and was drunk unwillingly but with beneficial results by the patients, among whom it was known as “Lettow-Schnaps.”

The other difficulty was the supply of bandages. To supplement the stock of linen, which was beginning to give out, not only was clothing of all kinds disinfected and used for this purpose, and then after being boiled used again, but quite a good bandage-material was made from bark. This idea, too, we got from the methods of the natives, who for a long time had made clothing and sacks from Myombo bark. The medical service had done everything humanly possible to keep the troops alive and well. The great resource of this service and the necessary husbanding of the primitive material available deserve special recognition, as this service had always been accustomed under the special conditions of a tropical climate, and rightly so, to be very free with their stocks. The Staff Medical Officer, Staff-Surgeon Stolowsky, and later his successor, Staff-Surgeon Teute, showed exemplary devotion, energy and foresight.

The surgery was on an equally high level. The hospitals which, during the early part of the campaign, had been accommodated for the most part in solid buildings, and had worked the whole year round without moving their quarters, had now to turn themselves into movable columns, which might at any moment be called upon to pack up, with patients and baggage, and keep up with the march in various directions of the troops. All not absolutely indispensable material had to be eliminated, so that the preparations for a surgical operation had always to be more or less improvised. The operating-theatre was as a rule a newly-erected grass hut. In spite of all this, Staff-Surgeon Müller, Dr. Thierfelder, of the Imperial Medical Service, and others successfully performed even serious operations, including several for appendicitis.

As has already been mentioned, the confidence even of the enemy in the German medical service was fully justified. The successful and devoted activity of these men went far to strengthen the mutual confidence between white and black. In such ways as this the strong bond was formed which united the different elements of our force.