otjimbingwe

Otjimbingwe

The earliest settlers we could trace to the area of today's Karibib district were missionary Johannes Rath and his family, who arrived in Otjimbingwe on 11 July 1849.

Six years later, in 1855, rich copper deposits were found in the Khomas highlands, and the Walwich Bay Mining Company was founded in Cape Town, with its offices in Otjimbingwe, to exploit the deposits at the Matchless Mine, which then were transported with ox-wagons from Otjimbingwe to Walvis Bay. By 1860, the copper deposits were yielding too little for further mining activities, and subsequently the mine closed down and sold its buildings in Otjimbingwe to Charles Andersson for a whopping 1500 pounds.

In the meantime, the Rhenish Missionary Society extended its activities until an offical white settlement in Otjimbingwe was announced in 1864. The buildings of the Walwich Bay Mining Company, later owned by Charles Anderson were used to set up a smith for building ox-wagons and tools, as well as store-rooms and a butcher. One of the first settlers to take residence in Otjimbingwe in 1864 was Mr Johann Carl Eduard Hälbich, who arrived with missionary Carl Hugo Hahn on 9 January 1863 in Walvis Bay.

The first settlement efforts were pretty much a failure. Trading has become a much more important aspect than anything else, so even the Rhenish mission decided to call into being the "Rheinische Missionsgesellschaft" to cater for the economic needs of Otjimbingwe and environs. To such an extent Mr Hälbich was asked to act on behalf of this Missionsgesellschaft and thus converted from settler to business man. However, the Missionsgesellschaft was yet another failure, and was liquidated a few years later, after which Mr Hälbich took over the storage facilities in Otjimbingwe and started trading on his own account.

From the failures in their economic endeavours, the Rhenish mission learnt to stick to their missionary principles, and with the financial aid of princess Augusta von Lippe to the sum of 3500 Reichstaler and other sources, the Augustineum was built in Otjimbingwe, where Herero converts were educated as from 1866, to help the missionaries with their work.

The following years saw an eager increase in trading activity into Damaraland. In 1876, Palgrave was sent to Damaraland by the English government in South Africa to try and convince the Herero to subject themselves to the English rather than the Germans. As a direct result of this visit by Palgrave was the annexion of Walvis Bay by Great Britain in 1878. Five years later, a German trader of the name FAE Lüderitz became interested in South West Africa, with the subsequent annexion of the coastal strip in 1884.

In April 1885, Germany sent the first Commissioner, Dr Heinrich Göring, to Namibia - together with secretary Nel and the first police officer von Goldammer he arrived in Otjimbingwe in August 1885. Under Goering, Otjimbingwe became the capital of the country. The Augustineum was bought by the German government to make space for offices.

In 1887, gold was found at Anawood by the well-known trader Robert Lewis (although it was suspected, that the gold finds were fictitious in order to get the government in the Cape to step up annexation to counterbalance German activities). Through such agitation measures against Germany, Göring thought it wise to temporarily relocate to Walvis Bay in November 1888. As a result of political activity, the first 21 German soldiers arrived in Walvis Bay in July 1889 under the command of Captain Curt von François and immediately relocated to Otjimbingwe to re-instate German command. On arrival, von François was of the opinion, that Otjimbingwe couldn't be fortified sufficiently, and thus moved on 8 August 1889 to Tsaobis, where he built the well-known garrison Wilhelmsfeste. In 1890, eventually, military headquarters were moved to Windhoek, while the civil administration was relocated to Windhoek in 1892.

Only during the first Witbooi-uprise in 1894 did Otjimbingwe gain importance once again, when a Lt. Schwabe was stationed here to safeguard the Swakopmund-Windhoek link against the warriors of Hendrik Witbooi.

After the submission of Witbooi, the Schutzgebiet of Otjimbingwe, Swakopmund and Omaruru were divided into three districts, while these three districts remained under central control and formed a county called Otjimbingwe. Due to the rapid growth of Swakopmund, it was split off from the county Otjimbingwe and formed its own county in 1896. The census of 1897 showed 359 settlers in the entire Otjimbingwe county (thus excluding Swakopmund), of which 209 lived in Omaruru and 150 in Otjimbingwe. Due to the increased importance of Omaruru, the regional administration was moved from Otjimbingwe to Omaruru in September 1899.

(we would like to thank Mr Jochen Kutzner, National Archives of Namibia, for his valuable input)