British occupy Neu Langenburg

A British chronology of the war states that on 27 May 1916 British troops occupied Neu Langenburg, today’s Tukuyu in southern Tanzania. It was the administrative centre of the German district of Langenburg, situated on cool mountain slopes at an altitude of about 1,500 metres, at the foot of the Rungwe volcano, some tens of kilometres north of Lake Nyasa. The British official history (Hordern) spreads this event over several days. On the evening of 27 May the advance guard of Lieutenant-Colonel G. M. P. Hawthorn’s column occupied Masoko, a few kilometres from the town, where the German 5th Field Company had been stationed, and found stores of ammunition and food there. According to Hordern, Major R. L. Flindt’s column entered Neu Langenburg itself only on 29 May, without a fight. The last Germans had left the town the previous night, leaving behind food, ammunition and stores.

The town had been founded at the beginning of the 20th century. It took its name from the old Langenburg station on the shore of Lake Nyasa, which the Germans abandoned when the water level rose. From 1901 it was the seat of the district authorities. Neu Langenburg had a post office, a few shops and a heliograph link with other stations of the colony. It also lay at a junction of roads. The most important of them led north-east, to Iringa and on towards the Central Railway.

A pursuit without a battle

Neu Langenburg was the main objective of the first phase of the offensive of Brigadier-General Edward Northey, who set out on 25 May with four columns from Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia. The German garrisons of Ipiana and Igamba had withdrawn without a fight in precisely this direction, and Northey wanted to trap them here. The columns of Hawthorn (the 1st Battalion, King’s African Rifles and a squadron of South African Rifles, about 800 men in all) and Flindt (a squadron of South African Rifles and two companies of King’s African Rifles, about 400 men) were to approach the town from the south-east and south-west. Lieutenant-Colonel E. Rodger’s column was to close the road from the north. The plan failed because Rodger was unable to stop the garrison of the Luwiwa post, which slipped past him on the night of 27–28 May. Flindt pressed on without artillery, because his guns could not get along the difficult track and had to turn back.

The Germans had no intention of defending the town. Everything pointed to their falling back north-east, towards Iringa. Hawthorn was ordered to bar this road to them, and on 31 May he concentrated his column at Mwakaleli, on the track from Neu Langenburg to Iringa. Flindt was sent a dozen or so kilometres north-west, to Rungwe, where he came under Rodger’s command. One of the British officers who took part in this march recalled that the local Nyakyusa (Wankonde) sat quietly in front of their huts and their cattle grazed as if the war did not concern them. In his view they welcomed the arrival of the British as a welcome change of rulers.

A new base

The occupation of Neu Langenburg allowed Northey to move his supplies from distant Karonga to Mwaya, a landing place at the northern end of Lake Nyasa, from which the road through Neu Langenburg led to the columns advancing north. The transfer of the base was completed by 31 May. In his report of 2 June Northey called it “the most interesting part” of these operations. South African engineers then built a road for motor vehicles from Mwaya through Neu Langenburg. Northey made the town, a road junction and the former district capital, his headquarters, and from here prepared the march on Iringa.