German East Africa German East Africa ( ) was a German colony in East Africa , which included what are now : Burundi , : Rwanda and Tanganyika ( the mainland part of present Tanzania ) . Its area was , nearly three times the area of Germany today . The colony came into existence during the 1880s and ended with Imperial Germany ' s defeat in World War I . Afterwards the territory was divided between Britain and Belgium , and was later converted to a mandate of the League of Nations . History . The colony began with Carl Peters , an adventurer who founded the Society for German Colonization and signed treaties with several native chieftains on the mainland opposite Zanzibar . On 3 March 1885 , the German government announced it had granted an imperial charter ( signed by Bismarck on 27 February ) to Peters ' company and intended to establish a protectorate in East Africa . Peters then recruited specialists who began exploring south to the Rufiji River and north to Witu , near Lamu on the coast . When the Sultan of Zanzibar protested , since he claimed to be ruler on the mainland as well , German chancellor Otto von Bismarck sent five warships , which arrived on 7 August and trained their guns on the Sultan ' s palace . The British and Germans agreed to divide the mainland between themselves , and the Sultan had no option but to agree . German rule was quickly established over Bagamoyo , Dar es Salaam , and Kilwa , even sending the caravans of Tom von Prince , Wilhelm Langheld , Emin Pasha , and Charles Stokes to dominate " the Street of Caravans " . The Abushiri Revolt of 1888 was put down ( with British help ) the following year . In 1890 , London and Berlin concluded the Heligoland - Zanzibar Treaty , returning Heligoland ( seized during the Napoleonic wars ) to Germany and deciding on the borders of German East Africa ( the exact boundaries remained unsurveyed until 1910 ) . Between 1891 and 1894 , the Hehe tribe , led by Chief Mkwawa , resisted German expansion . They were defeated as rival tribes supported the Germans . After years of guerrilla warfare , Mkwawa himself was cornered and committed suicide in 1898 . The Maji Maji Rebellion occurred in 1905 and was put down by the governor , Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen . But scandal soon followed , with stories of corruption and brutality , and in 1907 Chancellor Bülow appointed Bernhard Dernburg to reform the colonial administration . It became a model of colonial efficiency and commanded extraordinary loyalty among the natives during the First World War . German colonial administrators relied heavily on native chiefs to keep order and collect taxes . By 1 January 1914 , aside from local police , military garrisons of " Schutztruppe n " ( " protective troops " ) at Dar es Salaam , Moshi , Iringa , and Mahenge comprised 110 German officers ( including 42 medical officers ) , 126 non - commissioned officers , and 2 , 472 native enlisted men ( Askari s ) . Paul von Lettow - Vorbeck ( served in German South - West Africa as well as German Kamerun ) , was an important General in German East Africa during World War I . Economic development . Commerce and growth started in earnest under German direction . Early on it was realized that economic development would depend on reliable transportation . Over were under sisal cultivation – the biggest cash crop . Two million coffee trees were planted and rubber trees grew on , along with large cotton plantations . To bring these agricultural products to market , beginning in 1888 , the Usambara Railway , or Northern Railroad , was built from Tanga to Moshi , Tanzania . The longest line , the Central Railroad covered from Dar es Salaam to Morogoro , Tabora and Kigoma . The final link to the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika had been completed in July 1914 and was cause for a huge and festive celebration in the capital with an agricultural fair and trade exhibition . Harbor facilities were built or improved with electrical cranes , with rail access and warehouses . Wharves were remodeled at Tanga , Bagamoyo and Lindi . In 1912 Dar es Salaam and Tanga received 356 freighters and passenger steamers and over 1 , 000 coastal ships and local trading vessels . By 1914 Dar es Salaam and the surrounding province had a population of 166 , 000 , among them 10 , 490 ( 1 , 050 Europeans , 1 , 000 of them Germans . In all of the east African protectorate were 3 , 579 Germans . In its own right , Dar es Salaam became the showcase city of all of tropical Africa . Gold mining in Tanzania in modern times dates back to the German colonial period , beginning with gold discoveries near Lake Victoria in 1894 . The first gold mine in the colony was the Sekenke Gold Mine , which began operation in 1909 after gold was found there in 1907 . Despite all these efforts , German East Africa never achieved a profit for the German Empire and needed to be subsidized by the Berlin treasury . Education . Germany developed an educational program for Africans that involved elementary , secondary and vocational schools . " Instructor qualifications , curricula , textbooks , teaching materials , all met standards unmatched anywhere in tropical Africa . " In 1924 , ten years after the beginning of the First World War and six years into British rule , the visiting American Phelps - Stokes Commission reported : " In regards to schools , the Germans have accomplished marvels . Some time must elapse before education attains the standard it had reached under the Germans . " One of the influences of this German development of education in their colony is the word " shule " ( from " Schule " in German ) that means school . Since Germans were the first colonialists to establish a solid educational program in East Africa , the word " shule " has been borrowed into the Swahili language , the lingua franca of East Africa . First World War . The story of German East Africa in the First World War is essentially the history of the colony ' s military commander , General Paul Emil von Lettow - Vorbeck . A vibrant officer , he spent the war harrying the forces of the British Empire , tying down with his band of 3 , 500 Europeans and 12 , 000 native " Askaris " and porters , a British / Imperial army 40 , 000 strong , which was at times commanded by the former Second Boer War commander Jan Smuts . One of his greatest victories was at the Battle of Tanga ( 3 – 5 November 1914 ) , where von Lettow - Vorbeck beat a British force more than eight times the size of his own . Lettow - Vorbeck ' s guerilla campaign compelled Britain to commit significant resources to a minor colonial theatre throughout the war and inflicted upwards of 10 , 000 casualties . Eventually weight of numbers , especially after forces coming from the Belgian Congo had attacked from the West ( battle of Tabora ) and dwindling supplies forced Lettow - Vorbeck to abandon the colony . He withdrew into Mozambique , then into Northern Rhodesia where he agreed a ceasefire three days after the end of the war , on receiving news of the armistice between the warring nations ( see Von Lettow - Vorbeck Memorial for details . ) Lettow - Vorbeck was acclaimed after the war as one of Germany ' s heroes , and his Schutztruppe was celebrated as the only colonial German force in the First World War not to have been defeated in open combat ( although they often retreated when outnumbered ) . The Askari colonial troops that had fought in the East African campaign were later given pension payments by the Weimar Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany ( West Germany ) . The German light cruiser SMS " Königsberg " also fought off the coast of East Africa . She was eventually scuttled in the Rufiji delta in July 1915 after running low on coal and spare parts , and was subsequently blockaded and bombarded by the British . The surviving crew stripped out the remaining ship ' s guns and mounted them on trunnions , before joining the land forces , adding considerably to their effectiveness . Another and smaller campaign was conducted on the shores of southern Lake Tanganyika over 1914 – 15 . This involved a makeshift British and Belgian flotilla , and the " Reichsheer " garrison at Bismarckburg ( modern day Kasanga ) . The Treaty of Versailles broke up the colony , giving the north - western area to Belgium as Ruanda - Urundi , the small Kionga Triangle south of the Rovuma River to Portugal to become part of Mozambique , and the remainder to Britain , which named it Tanganyika . Coinage . German East African rupie