Maji Maji Rebellion
Encyclopedia
The Maji Maji Rebellion, sometimes called the Maji Maji War, was a violent African resistance to colonial rule in the German colony of Tanganyika
, an uprising by several African indigenous communities in German East Africa
against the German rule in response to a German policy designed to force African peoples to grow cotton
for export, lasting from 1905 to 1907.
) and in the Pacific.
In Africa, colonies were established in Togo
, Kamerun (the German Cameroon
s), German South West Africa and what later was known as German East Africa
. German East Africa had been acquired largely through the efforts of the German Colonization Society, founded by Karl Peters. Just as in German South West Africa, where genocide was used to exterminate the indigenous population, similarly, by 1898 Karl Peters used extreme violence in accord with his racist views ("...the wild murdering by Karl Peters ...", "the more gifted of the adventurers, gamblers, criminals, etc. ... were walking incarnations of resentment like the German Karl Peters... who openly admitted that he was 'fed up with being counted among the pariahs and wanted to belong to a master race'." "[The] African colonial possessions became the most fertile soil for the flowering of what was later to become the Nazi elite.") to murder large segments of the population. This earned Peters, who was now the Tanganyika colonial governor, the name "Milkono wa Damu," meaning "Man with Blood on His Hands." Throughout this period of German occupation the African population was also subjected to high taxation and a system of forced labor, whereby they were required to grow cotton and build roads for their European occupiers.
Germany began levying head taxes in 1898, and relied heavily on slave labor to build roads and accomplish various other tasks. In 1902, Peters also ordered villages to grow cotton as a cash crop (for export). Each village was charged with producing a quota of cotton. The Headmen of the village were left in charge of overseeing the production, which set them against the rest of the population.
In 1905, a drought threatened the region. This, combined with opposition to the government's agricultural and labor policies, led to open rebellion against the Germans in July, 1905.
The indigenous population opposed the Germans, used their religious views (magic) as a unifying force in the rebellion against the culturally foreign German colonizers. A spirit medium named Kinjikitile Ngwale
claimed to be possessed by a snake spirit called Hongo. Ngwale began calling himself "Bokero" and developed a belief that the indigenous peoples had been chosen to eliminate the Germans. German anthropologists recorded that Ngwale gave his followers war medicine that would turn German bullets into water. This "war medicine" was in fact water (maji in Swahili
) mixed with castor oil
and millet
seeds. Empowered with this new liquid, Bokero's followers began what would become known as the Maji Maji Rebellion.
s, spear
s, and arrows
, sometimes poisoned. However, they were numerous and believed that they could not be harmed because the German's bullets would turn to water. They marched from their villages wearing millet
stalks around their foreheads. Initially they attacked small outposts and damaged cotton plants. On July 31, 1905, Matumbi tribesmen marched on Samanga and destroyed the cotton crop as well as a trading post. Kinjikitile was arrested and hanged for treason. Before his execution, he declared that he had spread the medicine of the rebellion throughout the region. On August 14, 1905, Ngindo tribesmen attacked a small party of missionaries on a safari; all five, including Bishop Spiss (the Roman Catholic Bishop of Dar es Salaam
) were speared to death.
Throughout August, the rebels moved from the Matumbi Hills in the southern part of what is now Tanzania
and attacked German garrisons throughout the colony. The attack on Ifakara, on August 16, destroyed the small German garrison and opened the way to the key fortification at Mahenge
. Though the southern garrison was quite small (there were but 458 European and 588 local soldiers in the entire area), their fortifications and modern weapons gave them an advantage. At Mahenge, several thousand Maji Maji warriors (led by another spirit medium, not Bokero) marched on the German cantonment, which was defended by Lieutenant von Hassel with sixty African soldiers, a few hundred loyal tribesmen, and two machine gun
s. The two attacking tribes disagreed on when to attack and were unable to co-ordinate. The first attack was met with gunfire from 1000 meters, and after the tribesmen had stood firm for about a quarter hour they broke and retreated. After the first attack, a second column of 1,200 men advanced from the east. Some of these attackers were able to get within three paces of the firing line before they were killed.
While this was the apex of the uprising, the Ngoni people
decided to join in the revolt with a force of 5,000. The Muslim Gwangara Ngoni were relatively recent arrivals in the region, descendants of a remnant of the Ndwandwe confederation defeated by the Zulu in 1818 (other Ngoni states were formed in Malawi, Zambia, and north-central Tanzania). German troops, armed with machine guns, departed from Mahenge to the Ngoni camp, which they attacked on October 21. The Ngoni soldiers retreated, throwing away their bottles of war medicine and crying, "The maji is a lie!" Upon the outbreak of the fighting, Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen
, governor of East Africa, had requested reinforcements from the German government. Kaiser Wilhelm immediately ordered two cruisers with their Marine complements to the troubled colony. Reinforcements also arrived from as far away as New Guinea. When 1,000 regular soldiers from Germany arrived in October, Götzen felt he could go on the offensive and restore order in the south.
Three columns moved into the rebellious South. They destroyed villages, crops, and other food sources used by the rebels. They made effective use of their firepower to break up any attacks the rebels might launch. A successful ambush of a German column crossing the Rufiji River
by the Bena kept the rebellion alive in the southwest, but the Germans were not to be denied for long. By April 1906, the southwest had been pacified. However, elsewhere the fighting was bitter. A column under Lt. Gustav von Blumenthal
(1879–1913, buried at Lindi
) consisting of himself, one other European and 46 Askaris fell under continuous attack as it marched in early May, 1906, from Songea
to Mahenge. The Germans decided to concentrate at Kitanda, where Major Johannes, Lt. von Blumenthal and Lt. von Lindeiner-Wildau
eventually gathered. Lt. von Blumenthal was then sent along the Luwegu River, partly by boat. The southeast campaign degenerated into a nasty guerrilla war that brought with it a devastating famine.
The famine following the Maji Maji Rebellion was partly planned. Von Götzen was willing to pardon the common soldiers as long as they gave up their weapons, leaders and witch doctors. However, he also needed to flush out the remaining rebels and famine was the chosen weapon. In 1905 one of the leaders of German troops in the colony, Captain Wangenheim, wrote to von Götzen, "Only hunger and want can bring about a final submission. Military actions alone will remain more or less a drop in the ocean."
After the Maji Maji fighters undertook guerrilla tactics as the Germans were using machine guns and cannons to systematiclly destroy villages and wells, including removal of livestock, and burning of fields and food stores. This forced the Maji Maji to surrender. The resulting famine caused an estimated 100,000-300,000 deaths. Not until August, 1907, were the last embers of rebellion extinguished. In its wake, the Maji-Maji rebellion left 15 Europeans and 389 African soldiers and between 200,000 and 300,000 insurgents dead. It also broke the spirit of the people to resist and the colony remained calm, thanks also to a change of governors which brought a more enlightened regime, until the outbreak of World War I. Lions in the area developed a taste for human flesh in the wake of the slaughter and the Songea region is still plagued by man-eaters.
. Tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people died or were displaced from their homes. In the wake of the war, the imperial government instituted administrative reforms so that, by the outbreak of the First World War, Tanganyika could be said to be among the better-administered European colonies in Africa. The rebellion became a focal point in the history of the region. Later Tanzanian nationalists used it as an example of the first stirrings of Tanzanian nationalism, a unifying experience that brought together all the different peoples of Tanzania under one leader in an attempt to establish a nation free from foreign domination.
Later historians have challenged this view, claiming that the rebellion cannot be seen as a unified movement, but rather a series of revolts conducted for a wide range of reasons, including religion. The Muslim Ngoni chiefs were offered Christian baptism before execution. Many people in the area itself saw the revolt as one part of a longer series of wars continuing since long before the arrival of Germans in the region. They cite the alliance of some groups with the Germans in order to further their own agendas at the time. Today, the area in Tanzania
where the Maji Maji war took place is one of the largest wildlife reserves in Africa. Kinjikitile "Bokero" Ngwale is revered as a hero by the people of Tanzania.
Tanganyika
Tanganyika , later formally the Republic of Tanganyika, was a sovereign state in East Africa from 1961 to 1964. It was situated between the Indian Ocean and the African Great Lakes of Lake Victoria, Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika...
, an uprising by several African indigenous communities in German East Africa
German East Africa
German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....
against the German rule in response to a German policy designed to force African peoples to grow cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....
for export, lasting from 1905 to 1907.
Background
Starting circa 1884, Germany entered into a program of imperialism whereby colonies were established both in Africa (often referred to as the Scramble for AfricaScramble for Africa
The Scramble for Africa, also known as the Race for Africa or Partition of Africa was a process of invasion, occupation, colonization and annexation of African territory by European powers during the New Imperialism period, between 1881 and World War I in 1914...
) and in the Pacific.
In Africa, colonies were established in Togo
Togo
Togo, officially the Togolese Republic , is a country in West Africa bordered by Ghana to the west, Benin to the east and Burkina Faso to the north. It extends south to the Gulf of Guinea, on which the capital Lomé is located. Togo covers an area of approximately with a population of approximately...
, Kamerun (the German Cameroon
Cameroon
Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon , is a country in west Central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo to the south. Cameroon's coastline lies on the...
s), German South West Africa and what later was known as German East Africa
German East Africa
German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....
. German East Africa had been acquired largely through the efforts of the German Colonization Society, founded by Karl Peters. Just as in German South West Africa, where genocide was used to exterminate the indigenous population, similarly, by 1898 Karl Peters used extreme violence in accord with his racist views ("...the wild murdering by Karl Peters ...", "the more gifted of the adventurers, gamblers, criminals, etc. ... were walking incarnations of resentment like the German Karl Peters... who openly admitted that he was 'fed up with being counted among the pariahs and wanted to belong to a master race'." "[The] African colonial possessions became the most fertile soil for the flowering of what was later to become the Nazi elite.") to murder large segments of the population. This earned Peters, who was now the Tanganyika colonial governor, the name "Milkono wa Damu," meaning "Man with Blood on His Hands." Throughout this period of German occupation the African population was also subjected to high taxation and a system of forced labor, whereby they were required to grow cotton and build roads for their European occupiers.
Germany began levying head taxes in 1898, and relied heavily on slave labor to build roads and accomplish various other tasks. In 1902, Peters also ordered villages to grow cotton as a cash crop (for export). Each village was charged with producing a quota of cotton. The Headmen of the village were left in charge of overseeing the production, which set them against the rest of the population.
In 1905, a drought threatened the region. This, combined with opposition to the government's agricultural and labor policies, led to open rebellion against the Germans in July, 1905.
The indigenous population opposed the Germans, used their religious views (magic) as a unifying force in the rebellion against the culturally foreign German colonizers. A spirit medium named Kinjikitile Ngwale
Kinjikitile Ngwale
Kinjikitile "Bokero" Ngwale was a Tanzanian medium and a leader of the 1905–1907 Maji Maji Rebellion against colonial rule in German East Africa.-Biography:...
claimed to be possessed by a snake spirit called Hongo. Ngwale began calling himself "Bokero" and developed a belief that the indigenous peoples had been chosen to eliminate the Germans. German anthropologists recorded that Ngwale gave his followers war medicine that would turn German bullets into water. This "war medicine" was in fact water (maji in Swahili
Swahili language
Swahili or Kiswahili is a Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups that inhabit several large stretches of the Mozambique Channel coastline from northern Kenya to northern Mozambique, including the Comoro Islands. It is also spoken by ethnic minority groups in Somalia...
) mixed with castor oil
Castor oil
Castor oil is a vegetable oil obtained from the castor bean . Castor oil is a colorless to very pale yellow liquid with mild or no odor or taste. Its boiling point is and its density is 961 kg/m3...
and millet
Millet
The millets are a group of small-seeded species of cereal crops or grains, widely grown around the world for food and fodder. They do not form a taxonomic group, but rather a functional or agronomic one. Their essential similarities are that they are small-seeded grasses grown in difficult...
seeds. Empowered with this new liquid, Bokero's followers began what would become known as the Maji Maji Rebellion.
The Uprising
The followers of Bokero's movement were poorly armed with cap gunCap gun
A cap gun is a toy gun that creates a loud sound simulating a gunshot and a puff of smoke when the trigger is pulled. Cap guns were originally made of cast iron, but after World War II were made of zinc alloy, and most newer models are made of plastic....
s, spear
Spear
A spear is a pole weapon consisting of a shaft, usually of wood, with a pointed head.The head may be simply the sharpened end of the shaft itself, as is the case with bamboo spears, or it may be made of a more durable material fastened to the shaft, such as flint, obsidian, iron, steel or...
s, and arrows
Arrows
Arrows Grand Prix International was a British Formula One team active from to . For a period of time, it was also known as Footwork.-Origins :...
, sometimes poisoned. However, they were numerous and believed that they could not be harmed because the German's bullets would turn to water. They marched from their villages wearing millet
Millet
The millets are a group of small-seeded species of cereal crops or grains, widely grown around the world for food and fodder. They do not form a taxonomic group, but rather a functional or agronomic one. Their essential similarities are that they are small-seeded grasses grown in difficult...
stalks around their foreheads. Initially they attacked small outposts and damaged cotton plants. On July 31, 1905, Matumbi tribesmen marched on Samanga and destroyed the cotton crop as well as a trading post. Kinjikitile was arrested and hanged for treason. Before his execution, he declared that he had spread the medicine of the rebellion throughout the region. On August 14, 1905, Ngindo tribesmen attacked a small party of missionaries on a safari; all five, including Bishop Spiss (the Roman Catholic Bishop of Dar es Salaam
Dar es Salaam
Dar es Salaam , formerly Mzizima, is the largest city in Tanzania. It is also the country's richest city and a regionally important economic centre. Dar es Salaam is actually an administrative province within Tanzania, and consists of three local government areas or administrative districts: ...
) were speared to death.
Throughout August, the rebels moved from the Matumbi Hills in the southern part of what is now Tanzania
Tanzania
The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...
and attacked German garrisons throughout the colony. The attack on Ifakara, on August 16, destroyed the small German garrison and opened the way to the key fortification at Mahenge
Mahenge
Mahenge is a limestone plateau area in the Ulanga District, Morogoro Region, Tanzania, Africa. There is a town there of the same name. It is about south east of Singida, in the miombo woodland bio-region....
. Though the southern garrison was quite small (there were but 458 European and 588 local soldiers in the entire area), their fortifications and modern weapons gave them an advantage. At Mahenge, several thousand Maji Maji warriors (led by another spirit medium, not Bokero) marched on the German cantonment, which was defended by Lieutenant von Hassel with sixty African soldiers, a few hundred loyal tribesmen, and two machine gun
Machine gun
A machine gun is a fully automatic mounted or portable firearm, usually designed to fire rounds in quick succession from an ammunition belt or large-capacity magazine, typically at a rate of several hundred rounds per minute....
s. The two attacking tribes disagreed on when to attack and were unable to co-ordinate. The first attack was met with gunfire from 1000 meters, and after the tribesmen had stood firm for about a quarter hour they broke and retreated. After the first attack, a second column of 1,200 men advanced from the east. Some of these attackers were able to get within three paces of the firing line before they were killed.
While this was the apex of the uprising, the Ngoni people
Ngoni people
The Ngoni people are an ethnic group living in Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia, in east-central Africa. The Ngoni trace their origins to the Zulu people of kwaZulu-Natal in South Africa...
decided to join in the revolt with a force of 5,000. The Muslim Gwangara Ngoni were relatively recent arrivals in the region, descendants of a remnant of the Ndwandwe confederation defeated by the Zulu in 1818 (other Ngoni states were formed in Malawi, Zambia, and north-central Tanzania). German troops, armed with machine guns, departed from Mahenge to the Ngoni camp, which they attacked on October 21. The Ngoni soldiers retreated, throwing away their bottles of war medicine and crying, "The maji is a lie!" Upon the outbreak of the fighting, Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen
Gustav Adolf von Götzen
Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen was a German explorer and Governor of German East Africa. He was the second European to set foot in Rwanda, after Dr Oscar Baumann, and later presided over the bloody quashing of the Maji Maji Rebellion in what is now Tanzania.- Early life :Götzen studied law at the...
, governor of East Africa, had requested reinforcements from the German government. Kaiser Wilhelm immediately ordered two cruisers with their Marine complements to the troubled colony. Reinforcements also arrived from as far away as New Guinea. When 1,000 regular soldiers from Germany arrived in October, Götzen felt he could go on the offensive and restore order in the south.
Three columns moved into the rebellious South. They destroyed villages, crops, and other food sources used by the rebels. They made effective use of their firepower to break up any attacks the rebels might launch. A successful ambush of a German column crossing the Rufiji River
Rufiji River
The Rufiji River lies entirely within the African nation of Tanzania. The river is formed by the convergence of the Kilombero and Luwegu rivers. It is approximately 600 km long, with its source in southwestern Tanzania and its mouth on the Indian Ocean at a point between Mafia Island called Mafia...
by the Bena kept the rebellion alive in the southwest, but the Germans were not to be denied for long. By April 1906, the southwest had been pacified. However, elsewhere the fighting was bitter. A column under Lt. Gustav von Blumenthal
Von Blumenthal
The von Blumenthal family are German nobility from Brandenburg-Prussia. Other, unrelated, families of this name exist in Switzerland and formerly in Russia, and many unrelated families called "Blumenthal" without "von" are to be found worldwide.The family was already noble from earliest times ,...
(1879–1913, buried at Lindi
Lindi
Lindi is a coastal town located at the far end of the Lindi Bay, on the Indian Ocean in southeastern Tanzania. The town is 450 kilometers south of Dar es Salaam and 105 kilometers north of Mtwara, the southernmost coastal town in Tanzania, and gives its name to the surrounding Lindi Region, one...
) consisting of himself, one other European and 46 Askaris fell under continuous attack as it marched in early May, 1906, from Songea
Songea
Songea is the capital of the Ruvuma Region in southeastern Tanzania. It is located along the A19 road. The city has a population of approximately 130,000, and is the seat of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Songea. Between 1905 and 1907 the city was a centre of African resistance during the Maji...
to Mahenge. The Germans decided to concentrate at Kitanda, where Major Johannes, Lt. von Blumenthal and Lt. von Lindeiner-Wildau
Friedrich Wilhelm von Lindeiner-Wildau
Oberst Friedrich Wilhelm Gustav von Lindeiner-Wildau was a German Staff Officer during World War I best known today as the Kommandant of Stalag Luft III during World War II, the setting for the movie The Great Escape....
eventually gathered. Lt. von Blumenthal was then sent along the Luwegu River, partly by boat. The southeast campaign degenerated into a nasty guerrilla war that brought with it a devastating famine.
The famine following the Maji Maji Rebellion was partly planned. Von Götzen was willing to pardon the common soldiers as long as they gave up their weapons, leaders and witch doctors. However, he also needed to flush out the remaining rebels and famine was the chosen weapon. In 1905 one of the leaders of German troops in the colony, Captain Wangenheim, wrote to von Götzen, "Only hunger and want can bring about a final submission. Military actions alone will remain more or less a drop in the ocean."
After the Maji Maji fighters undertook guerrilla tactics as the Germans were using machine guns and cannons to systematiclly destroy villages and wells, including removal of livestock, and burning of fields and food stores. This forced the Maji Maji to surrender. The resulting famine caused an estimated 100,000-300,000 deaths. Not until August, 1907, were the last embers of rebellion extinguished. In its wake, the Maji-Maji rebellion left 15 Europeans and 389 African soldiers and between 200,000 and 300,000 insurgents dead. It also broke the spirit of the people to resist and the colony remained calm, thanks also to a change of governors which brought a more enlightened regime, until the outbreak of World War I. Lions in the area developed a taste for human flesh in the wake of the slaughter and the Songea region is still plagued by man-eaters.
Aftermath and interpretation
The Wahehe Rebellion of 1891-1898 is viewed by historians as a precursor of the Maji Maji uprising. The suppression of the Maji Maji people changed the history of southern TanzaniaTanzania
The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...
. Tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people died or were displaced from their homes. In the wake of the war, the imperial government instituted administrative reforms so that, by the outbreak of the First World War, Tanganyika could be said to be among the better-administered European colonies in Africa. The rebellion became a focal point in the history of the region. Later Tanzanian nationalists used it as an example of the first stirrings of Tanzanian nationalism, a unifying experience that brought together all the different peoples of Tanzania under one leader in an attempt to establish a nation free from foreign domination.
Later historians have challenged this view, claiming that the rebellion cannot be seen as a unified movement, but rather a series of revolts conducted for a wide range of reasons, including religion. The Muslim Ngoni chiefs were offered Christian baptism before execution. Many people in the area itself saw the revolt as one part of a longer series of wars continuing since long before the arrival of Germans in the region. They cite the alliance of some groups with the Germans in order to further their own agendas at the time. Today, the area in Tanzania
Tanzania
The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...
where the Maji Maji war took place is one of the largest wildlife reserves in Africa. Kinjikitile "Bokero" Ngwale is revered as a hero by the people of Tanzania.