When we talk about colonial empires, our minds instantly jump to Great Britain, Spain, Portugal
France, or the Netherlands. Most times we don't really talk about the German colonial empire
because, spoiler alert, it didn't last very long. There is not much to the history of its demise
Germany lost World War I and because of the peace treaty that followed, Germany lost every single
one of its overseas colonies, being reduced to its European dimension, which even itself
was smaller than before. But for a decent amount of time, Germany was an important player in the
European powers' scramble for Africa. They also stretched their rule to the East Indies and the
Indian and Pacific Oceans, as well as the shores of China. There was even an attempt to colonize a
region of South America, known as Little Venice, which I'll get to in a minute, not to mention
the various plans that the Germans had to expand their empire. So in this video, I'm going to briefly go over the history of the German colonial empire
The German Empire unified in 1871 under Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, and it is the colonies of
German Empire itself, which we'll mainly be focusing on in this video
But before we get to those, I want to mention a few others that existed as well
These were short-lived attempts of colonization by individual German states which had occurred
in preceding centuries before the unification. And there were essentially four main pre-unification German colonies
The first was Little Venice, then the Hanau Indies, Bavaria's colonies and Brandenburgian
slash Prussian colonies. Little Venice was actually the first German colonial project
However, it was a private business initiative. Emperor Charles V ruled German territories as well as the Spanish Empire and he was deeply
in debt to the Welser family of Augsburg. of repaying them in money, the Velsers accepted a grant of land on the coast of present-day
Venezuela in 1528, which they called Little Venice. I have no idea why. A small number
of German settlers were sent to the colony, but most of them died. Something else that
didn't help is that, apparently, the governors devoted most of their time and expeditions
into the interior to search for El Dorado, the mythical Golden City. In 1556, the Spanish
crown revoked the Welsers' privilege and resumed control of the territory. The Welsers were treated
as heroes in much of the 19th century German fiction and regarded as an inspiration for German
colonial projects later on in history. Then the Hanau Indies, which consisted of a lease contract
between the Dutch East Indies and the county of Hanau in the Dutch Guyanas, also in South America
and this happened in 1669. However, Hannau didn't have enough resources or people
to make the colonization of this region successful. A similar situation happened with the Duchy of Cowerland
a German-led state which leased part of Tobago eventually failing as well
Bavaria's efforts at colonizing weren't very good either. A Bavarian ruler, Ferdinand Maria
was interested in a project to colonize New Amsterdam, currently New York
but after the Netherlands ceded the territory to Britain, the idea was abandoned in 1675
The most significant pre-unification example of German colonialism lies with Brandenburg and Prussia
who in fact took the lead when it came to unifying the German states in Europe
In 1646, Frederick William, the Duke of Prussia, attempted to persuade the Holy Roman Emperor
to create a new East India Company to aid in German states' plans of colonization
But the emperor refused, not wanting to disturb the interest of other European powers
In 1651, they made another effort, agreeing to purchase Danish possessions in India
but they never raised enough money to do so. Finally, they were able to make some advances and began trading people and resources in Africa
through the Brandenburger African Company. after establishing the colony of the Brandenburger Gold Coast from 1682 to 1721 in modern Ghana which flew this really cool white flag with a black eagle eventually being renamed to Prussian Gold Coast
But after a while, this was annexed by the Dutch. They also leased a port from the Danish and the Caribbean to be able to trade there in
the island of St. Thomas. But from there onwards, their attempts of expansion were unsuccessful as they just couldn't
find any other islands to rule over. They tried buying some in the Caribbean, sharing others, but all of the deals fell through for
various reasons. The French also began attacking the Brandenburg African Company and because of that it became
insolvent in 1735. Also, the heir of Frederick William, King Frederick William I of Prussia, didn't really care
for colonization and wanted to focus his resources on the Prussian army instead
And so, Prussian and German early efforts of colonization were put to an end
But like I mentioned, as Germany began to unite, first under the German Confederation
and then as a rebranded and more centralized German Empire, the efforts of colonization returned
It made sense, their ambitions of European expansion had been essentially fulfilled
so now they needed to establish their role as a main European power
by doing what neighboring nations were doing as well, venturing out into the seas and establishing colonies
whose resources could be used to become richer and stronger. The German confederation had a really odd colony
because it wasn't in Africa or America, it was in Ukraine. A group of settlers founded the estate of Ascania Nova in present-day Ukraine
as a colony leased to a German count. But after it went bankrupt, they sold it to a Russian noble
Now, let's get back to the actual overseas colonies. It's interesting because the first big movement of Germans to a colony
happened before they had any of their own, and to a destination that did not belong to them
In 1808, King João VI of Portugal encouraged European settlers to move to Brazil
especially to the south, and the same continued even after Brazil's independence
aiming to attract European migrants. Around 6,000 Germans therefore moved to Rio Grande do Sul
an area which even today has significant German heritage. A similar situation happened in Chile to where many Germans also migrated
Another example was the migration to Pennsylvania in the 1600s when Germantown was founded
as many Germans fled from the Thirty Years' War in Europe. 65,000 Germans landed in Philadelphia alone up to 1775
More than 950,000 Germans immigrated to the U.S. in general in the 1850s and 1.4 in the 1880s
But this early form of colonization by the German Confederation consisted only of private migration by German settlers, the establishment of small settlements that were not under state control of Germany, and the creation of trade companies, which as a general rule weren't very successful
but some were and laid the groundwork for future actual German colonies
like trade outposts in Africa, Samoa, and New Guinea. This was around 1860 and was in part conducted by the Hanseatic Republics of Hamburg and Bremen
These were known as Privat Kolonisatoren, independent colonizers. It seemed that up to this point, there wasn't really a desire to territorially expand
and permanently settle these places as direct German possessions by the German state itself
in part because of their internal priorities. Another possible reason for this was that German colonial policy was more focused on
commerce rather than missionary activities of converting indigenous people to Christianism, like we saw with Portugal or Spain, but also because they didn't want to aggravate Britain
since they knew their royal fleet was tremendously powerful. In fact, some say a defining factor for the actual beginning of German colonization was the establishment and construction of the German Imperial Fleet, which began as early as 1867, allowing them to enforce their colonial aspirations
But it all changed in 1871 with German unification. Now that it was united, Germany was stronger with a common foreign policy and had a fleet to call its own
But they still needed to play catch up against the rest of Europe and find their own place in the sun Many Germans also saw the acquisition of colonies as the true confirmation of being a single nation and therefore saw overseas expansion as a requirement for the success of the unification
of Germany under one flag. And so the German colonial empire got its official start in around 1884 bearing this
flag, the German Imperial tricolor. Black, white, and red horizontal stripes, but in the center, a white circle, filled with the German
coat of arms, the Imperial Eagle. Acquiring a number of territories in Africa, mostly places
in which private colonizers had previously gotten leases to establish settlements and trade
or had just arrived and did so in agreement with the locals. But the way Germany officialized its
direct state rule over the lands was through the partition of Africa, in which, through the 1884
Conference of Berlin, known as the Scramble for Africa. European powers divided the African continent
among themselves. The results were the ones we see on this map. Most of Africa went to the British
and the French, some to Belgium, Portugal and Italy, and a tiny bit to Spain. And Germany was
also granted a significant portion of the land. German East Africa, present-day Burundi, Rwanda
and Tanzania, Germany Southwest Africa, present-day Namibia, German Cameroon, which is today Cameroon
Gabon, Congo, the Central African Republic, and Togoland, which is present-day Togo and parts of
Ghana. The territory of Cameroon was expanded in 1911 when France ceded part of the French Congo to
them to solve the Agadir crisis, in which France and Germany were rivaling over the control of
Morocco. This almost doubled the German colony size from 465,000 square kilometers to 760,000
Although many in Germany said it was empty territory without much potential
and the German colonial secretary eventually resigned over the issue. A fun fact is that Bismarck despised colonization and thought it was in part a waste of time
At one point he apparently stated Southwest Africa was such a burden
that he wanted to give it away to the British. The fact is the Germans did face a lot of issues in Africa
one of which being several rebellions from the local native populations against their rule
leading to a pushback by the Germans and terrible consequences through evil actions to the indigenous
people. The Germans also became more active in the Pacific, annexing a few islands that would be
called German New Guinea, part of present-day New Guinea and several nearby island groups. However
some were directly bought from other nations. The Caroline Islands, Palau, Mariana and the Marshall
Islands were bought off Spain and also leasing a few coastal territories in China like Chiachubei
in Tsingtao. A fun fact is that the second biggest Chinese beer today, Tsingtao beer, was founded by German
settlers in 1903. And so they began establishing real colonies in these areas
However, even being somewhat converted to colonialism by 1884, Otto von Bismarck still
preferred a model of chartered companies exploring and managing the colonies rather than establishing
full-on colonial governments which would be more expensive. of this were the German New Guinea Company, bearing this lion flag, but it transitioned
to an imperial governor ruling system in 1899. The German East Africa Company was another
example and this one lasted until 1920, bearing an interesting flag as well as stylized representation
of the constellation of the Southern Cross. Each of the actual German colonies themselves
merely flew the Imperial Standard. However, they did have specific coats of arms, and we currently have proposed flags for each
of them which take the Imperial tricolor and add the local shield to the center, replacing
the national one, leaving us with some really cool flags as we can see here
But it is doubtful if these were ever actually used at the time
And at the expense of local indigenous people and natural resources, the German colonies
were growing and thriving. At its peak, they ruled over 2.6 million square kilometers, excluding
Imperial Germany in Europe, with around 12.5 million inhabitants. But the number of native
Germans in these places was extremely small. The German colonial population consisted of
only 19 Germans in Africa and the Pacific colonies in 1913 The other millions were indigenous people The Germans made considerable profits and they built impressive settlements With schools and hospitals they were building these things to last
In today's Kpalime city in Togo, water is still led into the city from nearby waterfalls
through the pipe system installed by the Germans before World War I
The thing is, maybe these things did last, but not to serve the Germans
because by 1914, World War I begun, and Britain and its allies took a strong position against
German colonies immediately, with battles taking place there as they did in Europe
although perhaps not in the same dimension or intensity. In the Pacific, Britain's ally Japan
declared war on Germany and quickly seized several of Germany's island colonies, the Mariana
Caroline, and Marshall Islands, with virtually no resistance. However, the Germans did resist
quite well in Africa, especially in the East. German General Paul von Lettov-Worbeck led their
forces which were greatly outnumbered by the British and was able to achieve important victories
in the area, a style of guerrilla warfare which forced the British to dedicate a lot of manpower
and resources to a reasonably small theater in the war. And this was the strategy, put up such
a resistance that they would be forced to move some forces from the Western European Front
thus making the main theater of war more favorable to the Central Powers. Eventually
they were pushed back and retreated into Portuguese Mozambique and North Rhodesia
but still resisting. In fact, it is said Letov Vorbeck was the last German general to surrender
to the Entente, only receiving word of the armistice three days after it happened in Europe
and remaining somewhat undefeated. After the war ended in 1918, Germany's overseas
empire was dismantled. The Treaty of Versailles in Article 22 defined that
German colonies were transformed into League of Nations mandates and divided between Belgium, the United Kingdom, France and Japan with the determination
not to see any of them returned to Germany. In Africa, the United Kingdom and
France divided German Cameroon and Togoland, Belgium gained Rwanda-Urundi, the United Kingdom obtained by far the greatest landmass of German East Africa
thus gaining the missing link in the chain of British possessions stretching from South Africa
to Egypt, and Portugal received the Kionga Triangle, a sliver of German East Africa
In the Pacific, Japan gained Germany's islands north of the equator and Kiatsu in China
German Samoa was assigned to New Zealand. German New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, and Nauru went to Australia as mandates
indirectly under the control of the British as well. After that, calls for recovering the empire
were few and unsuccessful. There was a brief claim of part of Antarctica in 1939, new Swabia
but it never came to be. A limited empire, which took a long time to get started
was reasonably successful, but however, did not last very long. The plans they had of expanding
their colonies to Somalia, the Congo, Mozambique, and other parts of Africa were instead replaced
by the complete loss of their territories overseas. And Germany was once again confined to its continental limits of Europe
in anticipation of the fate of its neighboring European powers, who saw the collapse of their own colonial empires a few decades later
So, that was a brief overview at the history of the German colonial empire
starting from the very early attempts at German colonies by specific German states
which like we saw, ended up failing for a number of reasons, but paved the way to the reasonable
size German Empire in Africa and Asia, which came to an end with the peace treaty that followed
the end of World War I. Remember to leave a comment if you'd like me to do this for any
other colonial empires, going briefly over their history, how they began, grew, and ultimately ended
Always remembering that as interesting as these historical videos are, and as romanticized as
colonial empires may seem to be for Europeans, we must always remember that they were built
on the backs of oppressed native populations. Their success is not due to some European
superiority, but instead the exploration in an inhumane manner of other innocent people
Thanks so much for watching this video. Subscribe if you want to catch future ones
and I will see you next time for more general knowledge