British take Kilimatinde

On 31 July 1916 the small South African column of Lieutenant-Colonel H. J. Kirkpatrick entered Kilimatinde without a fight. It was a former German military station in the central part of German East Africa. The Germans had left it before the enemy arrived. Kilimatinde lay on a plateau between the escarpments of the Rift Valley, near the Central Railway, which linked Dar es Salaam with Tabora and Lake Tanganyika. According to German studies, the station was founded in 1895 by Tom von Prince to guard the caravan route from the coast to Tabora. He was the same officer who was killed in November 1914 in the Battle of Tanga.

Van Deventer moves from Kondoa Irangi

Since April the 2nd Division of General Jacob van Deventer had been standing at Kondoa Irangi, which its mounted brigade had taken earlier and in May defended against Lettow-Vorbeck’s attack. At the end of June the Germans withdrew from the settlement, but shortages of supplies and transport kept the division in place until mid-July. General Jan Smuts then instructed van Deventer to clear his right flank towards Singida, to send a small column along the road to Saranda and Kilimatinde, and to march with his main force on Dodoma and further east, towards Mpwapwa. The aim was not only to cut the Central Railway but above all to draw closer to Smuts’s main force, which was preparing to march south from the Nguru Mountains.

Kirkpatrick’s column left Kondoa Irangi as early as 15 July. It consisted of the 9th South African Infantry, a squadron of the 4th South African Horse, two mountain guns and a wireless station. According to the British official history (Hordern), it advanced slowly, because the wagons were drawn by oxen, the road in places had first to be prepared, and water was scarce. Serious fighting came only on 27 July at Mponde. There, in bush too dense for an ordinary outflanking movement, a German rifle company held a prepared position across the road. After several hours of fighting the Germans gave way. According to Hordern, Kirkpatrick lost 8 killed and 9 wounded.

To the railway

For two days the column halted at Mponde. Kirkpatrick finally decided to leave the slow wagons behind. During the night of 29–30 July he sent the mounted squadron to cut the railway west of Saranda station, and in the morning he followed with the rest of the force. During the day the infantry covered about 34 kilometres unhindered and reached the line at dusk. Saranda was already empty. On 31 July Kirkpatrick went on to Kilimatinde, which he also found abandoned. The South African official history gives a slightly different chronology and dates the occupation of Saranda to 31 July; the British chronology of the war records the occupation of Kilimatinde under that day.

In the same days van Deventer’s main force reached the railway. On 29 July, according to Hordern, armoured cars and a motorcyclist detachment drove into the abandoned town of Dodoma, where a white flag was flying over the German administration building. The South African history dates the occupation of Dodoma to 31 July. On 30 July the 3rd South African Horse, of the mounted brigade that two days earlier had routed a German rearguard at Nyangalo, reached Kikombo station.

Significance

In the second week of August van Deventer already controlled the Central Railway from Saranda to Kikombo. The German units were falling back east, towards Morogoro, and Lettow-Vorbeck was losing the colony’s main line of communication. Kirkpatrick remained at Kilimatinde until 4 August, after which he left the mounted squadron there and went off to rejoin the division. On 12 August a second column, that of Lieutenant-Colonel A. J. Taylor, which had taken Singida on the way, arrived at Kilimatinde. From then on it covered the railway against the German troops of General Kurt Wahle, who were still standing further west, in the Tabora area.