battle of tanga
DESCRIPTION
Article on a brilliant but obscure battle in German East Africa during WWI.TRANSCRIPT
THEBATTLE OF TANGA
By Bob Cashner
Tanga, 1914
When the term “Sideshow” comes up in the context of World War One,
most think of the amphibious disaster at Gallipoli, the desert raids of T.E.
Lawrence, or perhaps the bitter mountain warfare between Italy and Austria.
However, the often overlooked sideshow in German East Africa deserves
more attention than it gets.
Often divided by internal squabbles through much of the mid 1800’s,
Imperial Germany was quite a late-comer to Imperialism on the continent of
Africa. Other nations such as Great Britain, Portugal, Belgium, and Italy had
already long since “civilized” large portions of Africa into their own
colonies. Using uncertain methods including bribes and coercion, crates of
guns and large amounts of alcohol, a German nationalist named Karl Peters
“secured” from local chieftains the Imperial German colonies of West Africa
(Nambia), the Cameroons, and East Africa, modern day Tanzania.
Of the colonies, German East Africa was the largest and most
important. Parts of it were soon under cultivation for sisal, which produced
hemp for rope-making, coffee, rubber and cotton. The Germans developed
the ports of Dar-Es-Salaam and Tanga, and modern railroads were built
through the bush from the former to Lake Tanganyika and from the latter to
Moshi, near the famous peak of Kilimanjaro. Faced with unbearably heavy
taxes and often used as veritable slave labor, the natives revolted on more
than one occasion, but these rebellions were brutally and bloodily put down
by force, to include the killing of some women and children.
By the time World War One was declared, the Germans were
fortunate indeed to have appointed, in January of 1914, one Colonel Paul
Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck to head the small security forces in East Africa.
The 44-year-old officer was from a military family, the son of a general, and
one of the most experienced combat leaders in the Imperial German Army,
having seen action in the Peking Boxer Rebellion in China as well as in the
Hero and Hottentot Rebellions in German Southwest Africa, where he was
blinded in one eye. He had also observed the Boers in their action against the
British in South Africa, and was good friends with Jan Smuts.
Colonel von Lettow-Vorbeck plunged immediately into his duties as
leader of the Schutztruppe, the tiny “army” that served as a defense force in
East Africa. The German Schutztruppe was the smallest of the Imperial
European defense forces in Africa, with even Portugal fielding more
soldiers. Approximately 2,500 men were divided into independent
companies consisting, usually, of sixteen German officers and Non-
Commissioned Officers and 160 native Askari troops.
German troops serving in East Africa were the cream of the crop,
carefully screened and selected. They drilled the Askaris in Prussian
discipline and marksmanship with modern small arms. In turn, under von
Lettow-Vorbeck, who had almost obsessively studied Africa, the black
troops taught the Europeans their native tactics, camouflage and how to
survive in the bush. Many Askari went on to become senior NCO’s, and
even hade some whites serving under their command, which was unheard in
the day and age.
The Schutztruppe’s armament was a major headache for all
concerned. The vast majority of the Askaris were equipped with the obsolete
black powder 11mm Mauser Jagerbuchse M/71 rifle. Other troops also had
the Model 1888 “Commission Rifle”, which fired the 7.9x57mm Patrone 88
cartridge, while others had the brand-new Model 1989 Mausers. The latter
fired the more powerful high-velocity 7.92mm Patrone S cartridge, which
could not be used in the Commission Rifle due to much higher chamber
pressures.
The smoke from the black powder Jagerbuchse M/71 rifles soon
obscured the battlefield, as in the American Civil War.
Impressively, each company also fielded two Maxim machine guns.
This was at a time when the regular army forces of the British Expeditionary
Force in France and Belgium had only 2 machine guns per battalion!
For mobility, each company also brought along from 250 to 500
bearers or porters to carry supplies. This seemingly archaic method worked
quite well and gave the Schutztruppe much greater mobility than their
British opponents. The porters were immune to most of the African diseases
which affected the Europeans. The British had some motorized supply units,
but roads were few and very poor, and the trucks could not keep up.
Likewise, when they used pack animals such as horses and mules, the
African tsetse fly quickly laid waste to the stock through disease.
Like Stonewall Jackson before him, and Erwin Rommel after, von
Lettow-Vorbeck was passionate about seeing the ground on which he would
fight in person. He conducted extensive personal reconnaissance of the area
immediately upon arrival and throughout the campaign. With horses being
scarce, he often rode a bicycle on his recon trips. Although his small forces
could not meet the enemy in open battle and he planned an extensive guerilla
campaign, when the British threatened the vital port city of Tanga, von
Lettow-Vorbeck was forced to give battle.
As with many generals throughout history, von Lettow-Vorbeck had
to fight his own politicians as well as the enemy. The official governor of
German East Africa, Dr. Schnee, who was regarded with distaste by the
British as well as the German military, had a two-fold plan. First was to
insist that the colony was neutral and, if that failed, to surrender outright.
Even though von Lettow had solid intelligence that a British invasion fleet
was en route, and even after British warships shelled Dar-Es-Salaam, Dr.
Schnee insisted they were still neutral. The good colonel thought otherwise
and prepared accordingly.
Then a British Astrea-class cruiser, the HMS Fox, steamed into Tanga
harbor and a British emissary sought out the town commissioner, Herr
Aurarcher. He told Aurarcher that London would not honor Dr. Schnee’s
“neutrality” and that the city must be surrendered immediately or face
destruction. Aurarcher played for time, saying he must consult with his
superiors, and during the conversation planted in the British emissary’s mind
that the harbor had been sown with anti-ship mines.
After that, Aurarcher didn’t bother to contact Dr. Schnee but instead
promptly notified von Lettow-Vorbeck of the impending invasion. As a
reserve officer in the Schutztruppe, Aurarcher then gathered his 15-man
rifle-armed Askari police force and headed out to join the lone Schutztruppe
company then defending the city.
Granted 24 hours advance notice of the invasion by the emissary’s
visit, von Lettow-Vorbeck rushed what reserves from Kilimanjro down the
railroad to Tanga. He once again personally reconnoitered the area and
deployed his companies. Only about 250 additional Askaris arrived in time
for the beginning of the battle, and von Lettow-Vorbeck’s eventual total
forces came to a maximum of around a thousand men, armed with rifles and
machine guns and devoid of artillery. Facing the Germans was a British-
commanded landing force of some 8,000 men, supported by the big guns of
the Royal Navy.
The handful of available Schutztruppe reinforcements was rushed in to
do battle with the British landing force.
Fortunately for the Germans, the British Expeditionary Force was led
by General Arthur Aitken, an individual reminiscent of the fictional
“Colonel Blimp”. He pompously turned down local information and
assistance from the King’s Own Rifles of British East Africa as well as the
Royal Navy’s offers of fire support from the big guns of the HMS Goliath.
No reconnaissance at all of the landing areas or German defenses, personal
or otherwise, was conducted. Aitken bragged that von Lettow’s “lot of
niggers” would be no match for his force. In his first order of the day, Aitken
was more concerned with spit-and-polish than fighting. “I will not tolerate
the appalling sloppiness of dress allowed during the late war with the
Boers.”
Fearing Aurarcher’s fictitious harbor mines, the BEF landed some
three miles from Tanga, again without any reconnaissance. The troops
slogging ashore found themselves in a palmetto and mangrove swamp
teeming with mosquitoes, leaches and snakes. Once they forded the swamp,
they found themselves facing fifty-foot rock cliffs. This fiasco delayed the
intended attack by another full 24 hours, allowing more German askaris to
rush to the scene.
Many of the British-led troops were Indians, and Aitkin had great
faith in them. However, these were not the justly famous Gurkha and Sikh
warriors who were trained to the standards of the Old Contemptibles. These
were mostly peasant conscripts yanked from their homes, given rudimentary
training, and shoved onto troopships like sardines. For the past three weeks
they had been crammed in the holds of the ships, inactive and seasick. Some
of them were totally unfamiliar with the new Lee-Enfield rifles they had
been issued, while others had fired only 5-10 rounds through their new
weapons.
Schutztruppe Askari riflemen were often better trained than the British
and Indian soldiers they faced.
Despite the atrocious landing area, the troops were ashore by the night
of November 3, 1914. Aitken told them to get a good rest before attacking
on the morning of the 4th. That day, the British and Indians plowed headlong
into von Lettow-Vorbeck’s defenses, again without any intelligence or
reconnaissance. Besides the forbidding terrain they had landed in and had to
cross, the city of Tanga itself, with its solid brick and stone houses and dense
hedgerows, was an ideal defensive position for the Schutztruppe.
The Schutztruppe’s finest company, consisting of the best-trained
marksmen with the most modern rifles, had been placed on the flank of the
British advance. The lines of the British battalions were taken under vicious
and accurate full enfilade fire right off the bat. Other Schutztruppe defenders
to the front poured rifle and machine gun fire into the advancing ranks.
When the Imperial Service Brigade attempted to advance through the
concealment of a ripe cornfield, Askari marksmen perched in trees inflicted
dreadful casualties via head shots among the tassels.
To top it all off, the battlefield area was heavily used by local
beekeepers to raise honey. The hives were tended in hollow logs suspended
from trees in the area. The African honey bee is the most vicious and
aggressive of the bee species. Disturbed and enraged by the noise as well as
stray bullets and shrapnel striking the hives, the bees swarmed over the
advancing Indian infantry and some men received literally hundreds of
stings. This led the British to nickname Tanga “The Battle of the Bees”.
As the day wore on, the fight degenerated into wicked close-range
jungle fighting. The British and Indian troops ran out of drinking water by
noon. Still they fought on in the heat and the bullets and the bees. All units
suffered heavy casualties. Some Indian units began to break under the
pressure.
In late afternoon, von Lettow-Vorbeck’s reinforcements, consisting
only of two companies, arrived via rail and were immediately thrown into a
counter-attack against the British flank and rear. The Entendre units began
fall apart, and then to break and run. By nightfall, the BEF had been forced
back into the landing boats and was retreating to the troopships.
Despite eight-to-one odds, the short battle had cost the British and
Indians 360 dead, 400 wounded and 1,800 men missing or captured. Colonel
von Lettow-Vorbeck’s forces reported losses of 15 Germans and 54 Askaris.
In addition, the German forces captured a vast array of British supplies,
including 500 rifles, 16 machine guns, over a half a million rounds of
ammunition, telephones, wire, tents, medical supplies, and other military
gear. The booty enabled von Lettow-Vorbeck to raise and equip another
three companies of men for his tiny army.
The defeated British Expeditionary Force went limping back
Mombassa in British East Africa (BEA). To add insult to injury, the local
port authorities would not let the task force dock and unload until they paid
the 5% port tax. They were dissuaded at gunpoint. Soon, a satirical
anonymous poem about the battle began to circulate through British East
Africa.
Steaming Down to Tanga
Steaming down to TangaOver the briny main,
See our major generalAnd his brilliant train.
Three brigade commandersColonels, staff galore.Majors count for little,Captains they ignore.
Armoured trains and sleepers,Guns of different bores,
Telephones and mess plates,Hospitals and stores.Medicos in thousands
Anxious to avoidWork outside the units
Where they are employed.
Earnestly they studyEach Little Book
Which, compiled in Simla,Tells them where to look.Local knowledge needed;
Native scouts of use.For so quaint a notionThere is small excuse.
See them shortly landingAt the chosen spot.
Find the local climateJust a trifle hot.
Foes unsympatheticMaxims on them train;Careful first to signalRange to ascertain.
Ping, ping go the bullets;Crash, explode the shells.Major General's worried
Thinks it just as wellNot to move too rashlyWhile he's in the dark.
What's the strength opposingOrders to reembark?
Back to old MombassaSteams Force B again,
Are the generals ruffled?Not the slightest grain.
Martial regulationsInform us day by day
They may have foozled Tanga
But they've taken BEA.