French take Edea
- Category:
- Military operations
- Front:
- Africa
- Date:
- 26 October 1914
- Author:
- Natalia
- Tags:
- Kamerun, German colonies, France, Great Britain
On the morning of 26 October 1914 Allied troops occupied Edea, a town on the Sanaga river in German Kamerun. It lay on the railway running from Duala into the interior of the colony, and near it the railway crossed the Sanaga.
After the capture of Duala and the taking of Yabassi, General Charles Dobell, commander of the Anglo-French expedition, turned against Edea. He planned an attack from three directions. The main French column of Colonel Mayer, made up of Senegalese tirailleurs, set out around 20 October along the railway from the bridge at Japoma. A second column went by the Nyong river to Dehane and from there marched north. The third, the British river flotilla of Commander L. W. Braithwaite, was sent up the Sanaga. Dobell later wrote that getting the vessels up this difficult river was a remarkable feat.
The French advancing along the railway met strong resistance on the way. The Germans, however, decided not to defend the town itself and withdrew towards Jaunde. On the morning of 26 October the Allies entered Edea without a fight. Soon they pushed on along the railway to Kopongo.
Edea became an Allied outpost, defended by Mayer’s French troops. The Germans wanted to recover it. On 5 January 1915 they attacked Kopongo and Edea itself simultaneously, but were repulsed. According to Dobell’s report, they left on the battlefield 23 European dead and about 190 African soldiers killed and wounded, with very slight French losses.
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Related events
(04)The same battle, people or subject.
- 27 September 1914 · AfricaAllies capture DualaOn 27 September 1914 British and French troops took Duala, the main port of German Kamerun. The Germans withdrew inland and fought on there until 1916.
- 25 August 1914 · AfricaSkirmish at Tepe. The French enter Kamerun from ChadOn 25 August 1914 the British drove the Germans from the post at Tepe on the Benue, and French troops from Chad attacked the German fort at Kousséri.
- 23 August 1914 · AfricaGeneral Dobell to command the Kamerun expeditionOn 23 August 1914 General Charles Dobell was appointed commander of the Allied land forces against German Kamerun.
- 14 October 1914 · AfricaBritish capture YabassiOn 14 October 1914 British troops took the German post of Yabassi on the Wouri river in Kamerun. A first attack a week earlier had failed.