History of the Inventor: After the German Reich had abandoned an active colonial policy in the first years of its existence due to foreign policy considerations, this changed in 1884. The colonies Deutsch-Südwestafrika, Togo, Cameroon, Deutsch-Neuguinea, Deutsch-Ostafrika and Samoa, formally referred to as "protectorates", emerged. The governorates of these protectorates established in the following period were first under the control of the Colonial Department in the A u s w ä r t i g e s A m t and finally of the resulting R e i c h s k o l o n i a l a m t . The Kiautschou leasehold in China, acquired in 1898, was subject to the R e i c h s m a r i n e a m t . From the very beginning it was necessary to be able to assert and protect the interests of the empire in the colonies by military force. In the initial phase, this task was performed by ships and landing commands of the Imperial Navy. In the German South Sea colonies this remained so until the end. In the African colonies there was a development of their own. In 1889, a troupe of German volunteers with a contract under an active officer (Captain Curt von François) was formed in D e u t s c h - S ü d w e s t a f r i k a , which was initially only to perform police duties. In 1889, in D e u t s c h - O s t a f r i k a, the Reich Commissioner Captain Herrmann Wissmann set up a troop of recruited Africans to suppress the "Arab Uprising" that broke out in 1888. With the law of 22 March 1891 the "Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Ostafrika" was finally formed from volunteers of the army and navy as well as recruited volunteers, followed by the "Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Südwestafrika" and the "Schutztruppe für Kamerun" with the law of 9 June 1895. A protection force for Togo was planned at times, but was not formed, just as there were no protection forces for German New Guinea or Samoa. Only police troops were formed there. In the respective protectorates the governor held the highest military power, the commander of the protection troop was subordinated to him. The protection troops were responsible for maintaining security and public order. At times the individual protection troops were exclusively occupied with the suppression of insurrections of the indigenous population. To this end, some considerable personnel reinforcements were recruited from Germany. The Schutztruppen were first led by the Reichsmarineamt. With the "Gesetz betreffend die Kaiserlichen Schutztruppen in den Afrikanischen Schutzgebieten und die Wehrpflicht daselbst" of 18 July 1896, the Schutztruppen were subordinated to the Reich Chancellor, administered by the Colonial Department in the Foreign Office. In the Colonial Department, the Department M - Military Administration (Command or High Command of the Protection Forces) was responsible. The Prussian War Ministry (Army Department) took over the organizational support. Command affairs were handled by the Director of the Colonial Department, with Division M as his military staff. With the establishment of the R e i c h s k o l o n i a l a m t by the Most High Decree of 17 May 1907, the command of the Schutztruppen was placed under its control, now as a military command staff with responsible command power. Like the Navy, the Schutztruppen were under the supreme command of the Emperor. Its members were volunteers of the army (or armies of Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony and Württemberg) and the navy, who retired from the respective army or navy for the time of their service in the Schutztruppen and then returned there again. The male German population in the protectorates was subject to compulsory military service. The conscripts in the Schutztruppen were able to meet these demands. In 1913 the Schutztruppe included the following personnel: - Command of the Schutztruppe in Berlin: 80 men - Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Ostafrika: 2758 men (266 Germans, 2492 natives) - Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Südwestafrika: 1970 Mann (German) - Schutztruppe für Kamerun: 1471 Mann (171 German, 1300 indigenous) During the Herero Uprising, the Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Südwestafrika's personnel strength in 1907 was approx. 15,000 men. The outbreak of the First World War hit the German colonies unprepared. Defensive measures against other colonial powers had never been seriously considered, the Imperial Government had assumed that in the event of a European conflict the colonies could be kept out of the fighting according to the agreements in the Congo Act of 1885, despite warning voices from the colonies themselves. On 1 August 1914, therefore, only a state of emergency was declared in the protectorates. It was not until mid-August 1914 that mobilization began in the protectorates, but the armed units there (Schutztruppen, police troops, naval units present) were ultimately without a chance compared with the opponents who were far superior in terms of numbers and materials. The following were lost, partly after fierce fighting, partly without a fight: - on 27 August 1914 Togo - on 7 September 1914 Samoa - on 17 September 1914 Deutsch-Neuguinea - on 9 July 1915 Deutsch-Südwestafrika - in February 1916 Cameroon The Kiautschou leasehold area under the control of the Navy had capitulated after heavy fighting on 7 November 1914. It was only in D e u t s c h - O s t a f r i k a that the Schutztruppe was able to hold its ground to the end and thus bind considerable enemy forces. Their commander, Major General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, only laid down his weapons on 25 November 1918 on order from Berlin. Processing note: The stock RW 51 was originally created as stock for the "imperial protection troops and other German land forces overseas" and comprised 29 units. In 2010, the documents of the East Asian Expeditionary Corps were extracted and, together with the corresponding new additions, formed the newly created holdings RW 61. Since then, the holdings of RW 51 have consisted exclusively of documents of the Imperial Protection Forces and were subsequently fundamentally revised and developed further. Some new additions were added. Description of the holdings: The collection contains the documents of the Imperial Schutztruppen for D e u t s c h - S ü d w e s t a f r i k a , D e u t s c h - O s t a f r i k a and Cameroon, as well as the command of the Schutztruppen, as far as they are available in the military archives. Characterization of content: The inventory contains only a few real fact files. It consists above all of a compilation of commandos of the Schutztruppe für Deutsch-Ostafrika from 1907 to 1914, as well as a file of the same commandos with reports of subordinated units and offices from 1916. In addition there are documents on organization and supply in Deutsch-Ostafrika and Deutsch-Südwestafrika and in particular some hand-drawn maps. Only two documents have survived on Cameroon. State of development: The inventory RW 51 was originally created as an inventory for the "imperial protection troops and other German land forces overseas" and comprised 29 units. In 2010, the documents of the East Asian Expeditionary Corps were extracted and, together with the corresponding new additions, formed the newly created holdings RW 61. Since then, the holdings of RW 51 have consisted exclusively of documents of the Imperial Protection Forces and were subsequently fundamentally revised and developed further. Some new additions were added. Pre-archival order: The tradition of the Schutztruppen In the Bundearchiv military archive is purely fragmentary. The Schutztruppen archive in the Heeresarchiv was destroyed during the air raid on Potsdam in April 1945. This applies to the personnel files of the Schutztruppen and to the records in the archives of the Schutztruppen in the colonies themselves. The tradition of the command of the Schutztruppen is essentially in the R 1001 R e i c h s k o l o n i a l a m t . The documents of the protection troops remaining in Africa after the First World War are now in the national archives of Tanzania (Dar es Salaam), Namibia (Windhoek) and Cameroon (Duala). In addition, the Belgian Imperial Archives in Brussels contain documents of the Rwandan Schutztruppen. Films on the documents in Windhoek and Dar es Salaam can be found in the Federal Archives in Berlin. Replacement records of the Schutztruppen and their deployments can be found above all in the documents of the Imperial Navy, which as a rule acted in a supportive capacity or, during uprisings, also issued landing commands. In addition, reference should be made to the tradition of the contingents of protection troops in the respective state archives provided by Bavaria, Saxony and Württemberg. Scope, explanation: 30 AU Citation method: BArch, RW 51/...
Preliminary remark: Since the end of the 19th century, military command and administrative authorities have increasingly issued general memos, training instructions, budget overviews, equipment descriptions, maneuver reports, combat experience, overviews of foreign armies, etc. to subordinate departments and units. These publications were intended to provide rapid and reliable information and were generally to be handled "only for official business", "confidential", "only in the hands of officers", "secret", "top secret" and others. Admittedly, such restrictions could change according to external political circumstances - e.g. rankings were only published in peace - so that it is not possible to clearly distinguish them from announcements in official journals or other publications. Even the regulations - Bestand M 635/1 - do not strictly differentiate these printed matters, as both their subject matter and the legal obligation were assessed differently. In general, it can be assumed that communications produced and distributed via private companies had less confidential content than those originating from the Reichsdruckerei; writings without an indication of the publisher were usually classified as secret. The documents were usually kept with the relevant files, some of them also under special lock and key, and arrived with them in the archive. The Reichsarchiv branch or the Heeresarchiv Stuttgart has removed the largely printed, at least duplicated material from the previous environment and kept it further when larger file excretions were pending, such as in the case of the fortress Ulm. In the same way, printed matter found in private estates, despite their official and mostly confidential character, was taken from there. Under changing aspects and changing editors - government inspector Alfons Beiermeister, Army Archives Council Captain of the Reserve Franz Knoch, Army Archives employee August Martin and others - the individual items thus produced were classified in the library, under the regulations, under the memorandums, later stock M 730, and under the pamphlets, later stock J 150, each of which also contained other written material. Small-format printed booklets were preferably sent to the pamphlets, while copies in folio format were sent to the memoirs or, if they were "historical" summaries, to the "Kriegsarchiv" (M 1/11) holdings. Double copies could be found in all the collections mentioned as well as in the library. Pieces assigned to the archive since about 1920 seem to have been set up as hand copies, if this proved to be useful. Foreign printed materials were only occasionally sent in via the representatives of the Chief of Army Archives, among others. As a result of the war, the indexing and classification faltered from about 1941 onwards, so that the corresponding repertories remained unfinished or were only completed after the Second World War - according to M 730 - with the insertion of individual addenda. as part of a job creation measure, the temporary employee Anneliese Fink compiled the regulations and other printed matter(1), which were only partially recorded in various lists and not signed, for the memorandums (M 730) this was done by the student temporary employee Anne Weber. With the temporary cooperation of the aspiring inspectors Elstner and Wüst as well as Häfele, Kronberger and Schön, library material was then sorted out, the regulations and the other printed matter were distributed among the new holdings M 635/1 and M 635/2, and the library and the pamphlets (J 150) in particular were checked for corresponding material on the basis of the catalogues and repertories: Now that 64 from the library, 275 from the original compilation of the regulations, among others, 275 from the memorandums (M 730), 363 from the pamphlets (J 150), 88 from the "Kriegsarchiv" (M 1/11), 21 and 52 pieces from other mostly collection holdings have been taken over and about 30 have been handed over to the military library or put back into the associated files according to their provenance, and 88 duplicates have been discarded, the holdings now comprise 863 volumes, booklets and individual sheets in 13 metres of shelving.Not included in the new holdings - already due to the necessarily different storage - were the maps and plans which were almost exclusively produced for official use and which make up the own holdings M 640 "Military Maps" and M 652 "Plan Collection". Furthermore, as already indicated, the general official gazettes and individual publications are missing here, for example the official general staff works on past acts of war, troop newspapers and war illustrations, "Tornisterschriften", training letters, etc. The same applies to wall attacks by military authorities, which form the basis of inventory J 151 "Collection of Wall Attacks", as well as pure film and pictorial material published by military authorities, a small part of which can be found in the inventories of the "Image Collections" (M 700 ff.). While writings originating from the military side were incorporated here regardless of their content, elaborations by civilian bodies - Foreign Office, Prussian Ministries of the Interior and Justice, R e i c h s k o l o n i a l a m t , R e i c h s k o l o n i a m t , R e i c h s a l a m t a n i n e , etc. - are included if they address decidedly military or military-policy matters. It would not have been possible to rank them according to the publishers because, as mentioned above, they are often not given. Since the alphabetical order of the geographical and subject matters in the holdings of the memorandums (M 730) and the pamphlets (J 150) occasionally overlaps and thus seems less suitable, and since no comprehensive classification scheme has been preserved from the time of the Württemberg army administration, it made sense to base the new holdings on the "Einheitsaktenplan für den Bereich der Heeresleitung und des Ministeramts" of 1931(2). This was all the more true as it, or its predecessors, was formed in the interwar period and also contains documents from this epoch to a large extent. Further general elaborations are to be expected, mainly in the case of the file holdings of the War Ministry and the General Command; to record them and to insert them here in addition, however, would have required a disproportionately high effort, so that a corresponding quite desirable compilation of later time must remain reserved.The spelling applied in the find book is based on today's rules. Changing spelling for individual ... After more frequent use, positions were standardized, i.e. Generalgouvernement instead of General-Gouvernement, Army Department instead of Army Department, News Formation instead of News Formation.The individual title recordings are based on the following model, which was also used for the holdings M 635/1: Title of the typefacePlace and date of writing; possible place of print/publishing, printshop/publisher, year of printingEditors Supplements; handwritten notesEarlier archive and library signaturesRemarksStuttgart, June 1986 Dr. Cordes1) Accordingly, no earlier archive signatures are given for the title recordings of the pieces from this inventory2) issued as regulations and listed as no. 2 under the scheduled army printing regulations since 1938 (M 635/2 Bd.