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German Samoa
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==History== ===Colonial administration=== [[File:Raising the German flag at Mulinu'u, Samoa 1900 photo AJ Tattersall.jpg|thumb|left|200px|Raising the German flag at [[Mulinuʻu]], 1900 (photo by [[Alfred James Tattersall]])]] [[File:Group Wilhelm Solf, C H Mills, Mata'afa Iosefa - Samoa 1903.jpg|thumb|right|260px|Group with Governor [[Wilhelm Solf]] (wearing peaked cap), New Zealand parliamentarian [[Charles H. Mills]] and paramount chief [[Mata'afa Iosefo]] during a visit by Mills to German Samoa, 1903]] [[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 137-31813, Samoa, Dr. Wilhelm Solf.jpg|thumb|right|260px|Governor Wilhelm Solf at Apia in 1910]] The German colonial period lasted for 14 years and officially began with the raising of the imperial flag on 1 March 1900. [[Wilhelm Solf]] became the first governor. In its political relations with the Samoan people, Solf's government showed similar qualities of intelligence and care as in the economic arena.<ref>Davidson, p. 78</ref> He skillfully grafted Samoan institutions into the new system of colonial government by the acceptance of native customs.<ref>Lewthwaite, in ''Western Samoa'', p. 130</ref> Solf himself learned many of the customs and rituals important to the Samoan people, observing cultural etiquette including the ceremonial drinking of [[kava]].<ref name=nr>{{cite book |url= https://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-RowSamo-t1-front1-d9.html |via=NZETC |title=Samoa Under the Sailing Gods |first=Newton A |last=Rowe |page=11 |publisher=Putnam |year=1930 |access-date=25 February 2010 }}</ref> "German rule brought peace and order for the first time. ... Authority, in the person of the governor, became paternal, fair, and absolute. Berlin was far away; there was no cable or radio."<ref>McKay, ''Samoana'', p. 18</ref> The German administrators inherited a system by which some two hundred leading Samoans held various public offices. Over the years, rivalries for these positions, as well as appointments by colonial officials created tensions that dissident [[fa'amatai|''matai'']] (chiefs) gathered together into a militant movement to eventually march armed on [[Apia]] in 1909. Governor Solf met the Samoans, his resolute personality persuaded them to return home. However, political agitation continued to simmer, several warships arrived and Solf's patience came to an end. He had ten of the leaders, including their wives, children and retainers, in all 72 souls, deported to [[Saipan]] in the German Mariana Islands, in effect terminating the revolt.<ref>McKay, p. 20</ref> Energetic efforts by colonial administrators established the first public school system; a hospital was built and staffed and enlarged as needed.<ref>''Samoanisches Gouvernementsblatt'', Apia, 20 March 1909</ref> Of all colonial possessions of the European powers in the Pacific, German Samoa was by far the best-roaded;<ref>Lewthwaite, p. 153</ref> all roads up until 1942 had been constructed under German direction. The imperial grants from the Berlin treasury which had marked the first eight years of German rule were no longer needed after 1908. Samoa had become a self-supporting colony.<ref>Schultz-Naumann, ''Unter Kaisers Flagge'', p. 163, the only other German protectorate in this category was ''Togoland''</ref> Wilhelm Solf left Samoa in 1910 to be appointed Colonial Secretary at Berlin; he was succeeded as governor by Erich Schultz, the former chief justice in the protectorate. The Germans built the [[Telefunken Railroad (Samoa)|Telefunken Railroad]] from Apia onto the [[Mount Vaea]] for transporting building materials for the 120 m high mast of their [[Telefunken]] wireless station, which was inaugurated as planned on 1 August 1914, just a few days after the beginning of [[World War I]].<ref>{{cite news |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/ESD19140803.2.44.15 |title=THE GERMAN PACIFIC FLEET. |work=Evening Star |date=3 August 1914 |access-date=16 August 2021 |via=Papers Past}}</ref> The German colonial administrator used the former home of writer [[Robert Louis Stevenson]] as a residence; the building is now the [[Robert Louis Stevenson Museum]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Robert Louis Stevenson Museum|url=http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/robert-louis-stevenson-museum|access-date=2021-05-16|website=Atlas Obscura|language=en}}</ref> Germany did not experience similar levels of violent anti-colonial resistance in Samoa as it did in Southwest Africa, Cameroon, or East Africa.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Fitzpatrick |first=Matthew P. |date=2023 |title='Renegade' Resistance and Colonial Rule in German Samoa |journal=The Journal of Pacific History |volume=58 |issue=4 |pages=325–347 |language=en |doi=10.1080/00223344.2023.2212591 |issn=0022-3344|doi-access=free }}</ref> However, there were anti-colonial resistance movements in Samoa, such as the elite-led ''Oloa'' and ''Mau a Pule'' movements, and youth movements against German colonial rule.<ref name=":1" /> ===Occupation=== [[File:Occupation of German-Samoa 1914.jpg|thumb|The [[Union Jack]] being hoisted at a building in Apia, 30 August 1914]] {{Main|Occupation of German Samoa}} Other than native Samoan police, Germany had no armed forces stationed in the islands.<ref name=":1" /> The small gunboat [[SMS Geier|SMS ''Geier'']] and the unarmed survey ship ''Planet'' were assigned to the so-called "Australian Station" (encompassing all German South Seas protectorates, not the [[British dominion]] Australia), but ''Geier'' never reached Samoa.<ref>At the outbreak of World War I, the gunboat was in transit from [[German East Africa]] to [[German New Guinea]] and met the light cruiser [[SMS Emden (1908)|SMS ''Emden'']]. ''Geier'' initially stayed on station in the German Caroline Islands, but the 20-year-old 'orphan' ship had no military value as a naval combatant and was short on coal and provisions. She proceeded in October 1914 to Honolulu in the United States Territory of Hawaii. Shadowed by the Japanese, she was interned. With United States entry into the war in April 1917, ''Geier'' was confiscated, renamed USS ''Schurz'' and operated by the United States Navy until 1918, when she sank after a collision mishap off the North Carolina coast.[http://freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cacunithistories/USS_St_Louis.html] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110722054644/http://freepages.military.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cacunithistories/USS_St_Louis.html|date=2011-07-22}}</ref> British-born [[Herbert Morley (explorer)|Herbert Morley]], who was in business in Samoa in 1914, sent a letter dated 27 July 1914, where he tells of six German warships docking off Samoa. The letter was publicized in the ''[[Keighley News]]'' on 17 November 1914.<ref>{{Cite web|title=This week in WW1. 17th November — 23rd November 1914|url=http://www.wilsdenparishcouncil.gov.uk/wilsden-harecroft-2/this-week-in-ww1-2/164-17th-november-23rd-november-1914|access-date=2021-01-12|website=www.wilsdenparishcouncil.gov.uk|archive-date=2021-01-16|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210116080827/http://www.wilsdenparishcouncil.gov.uk/wilsden-harecroft-2/this-week-in-ww1-2/164-17th-november-23rd-november-1914|url-status=dead}} ''[[Keighley News]]'', 21 November 1914 (Keighley News Archives, accessed via Bradford libraries website).</ref> At the behest of the United Kingdom the colony was invaded unopposed on the morning of 29 August 1914 by troops of the [[Samoa Expeditionary Force]]. Vice Admiral Count [[Maximilian von Spee]] of the [[East Asia Squadron]] gained knowledge of the occupation and hastened to Samoa with the armored cruisers [[SMS Scharnhorst|SMS ''Scharnhorst'']] and [[SMS Gneisenau|SMS ''Gneisenau'']], arriving off Apia on 14 September 1914. He determined however that a landing would only be of temporary advantage in an Allied dominated sea and the cruisers departed.<ref>The ships inflicted some [[Bombardment of Papeete|damage]] at Papeete, Tahiti and then rejoined the squadron en route to South America</ref> New Zealand occupied the German colony through to 1920, then governed the islands until independence in 1962 as a [[League of Nations]] Class C Mandate<ref>date of ratification by the League of Nations was 10 January 1920; Class C mandates were designed for populations considered incapable of self-government</ref> at first and then as a [[United Nations Trust Territories|United Nations Trust Territory]] after 1946.
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