Preface

A number of people have been involved in bringing this volume to fruition. I would like to thank first and foremost Marianne Klemm of for her support for this unique edition of Karl Hanssen’s memoirs of his time in German under New Zealand occupation and his incarceration and internment in New Zealand. Marianne Klemm, Karl Hanssen’s granddaughter, made available Karl Hanssen’s memoirs to us along with his photograph collection, and gener- ously contributed to the printing costs of this edition. I would also like to thank the Research Committee of the School of Cultures, Languages, and Linguistics for their support in contributing to the printing costs of this edition. The transcrip- tion and translation of Hanssen’s memoirs were undertaken by Faculty of Arts Summer Scholars Elizabeth Eltze and Judit Tunde McPherson in the summer of 2012–2013 and were revised by Dr James Braund in 2015. The Historical and Political Background section is based on Bronwyn Chapman’s M.A. thesis sub- mitted to the University of in March 2015 entitled “The Background to Karl Hanssen’s Great War Memoirs, 1915–1916”, which I have abridged and edited for the purposes of this edition.

Professor James N. Bade Director, Research Centre for Germanic Connections with New Zealand and the Pacific University of Auckland December 2015

The Historical and Political Background to Karl Hanssen’s Memoirs

Bronwyn Chapman 1. Introductory Remarks1 At the end of October 1915, as the First World War raged on the battlefields of Europe, Karl Hanssen, manager of the Deutsche Handels- und Plantagengesells- chaft (DHPG), a large copra production company, was on his way from Samoa to New Zealand aboard the SS Talune. Along with fourteen other Samoan Ger- mans, he spent the fifteen-day journey in anticipation and uncertainty over what would greet him at his destination. Hanssen had visited New Zealand before on business trips, as a guest of the Union Steam Ship Company, but this time would be very different. Instead of being welcomed by business representatives, he expected to be taken immediately into military detention to serve a six-month sentence imposed by a military court in Samoa for bypassing censorship regula- tions. After the expiry of this sentence, he would be held indefinitely as a prisoner of war, until the termination of hostilities, which it was then hoped would not be far away. Little did Hanssen know that would be another three years before the war rag- ing in Europe would come to its bloody close, and even longer before German prisoners would be allowed to return to their homeland. Nor would he spend the next six months in military detention. Instead he would be held alongside crimi- nals in the New Zealand state prison system, administered by the Department of Justice, with two months of his sentence to be served in the country’s most noto- rious high-security prison, Mt Eden. Meanwhile, in Samoa, the copra business he hoped to return to after the war would be placed in liquidation and lose its stock to Australasian companies.2 He would also never again see the islands that had been his home for over twenty years, and would instead watch from afar as New Zealand was given a mandate to govern Samoa under a civil administration.

1 This background section is based on Bronwyn Chapman’s M.A. thesis for the Uni- versity of Auckland entitled “The Background to Karl Hanssen’s Great War Memoirs, 1915–1916”, abridged and edited by James Bade. 2 Hermann Hiery, The Neglected War: the German South Pacific and the Influence of World War One, Honolulu, University of Hawai’i Press 1995, pp. 154–6. 10 Bronwyn Chapman

War had reached German Samoa in , with the arrival of a New Zealand military force, tasked with seizing the colony in the name of Great Brit- ain and her Allies. Hanssen meticulously recorded the subsequent military occu- pation in his personal diary, which was published in 2011 as Volume 8 of the Germanica Pacifica series.3 This diary, which has proved to be such a valuable contribution to the literature exploring New Zealand’s military occupation of Samoa, was – ironically – responsible for Hanssen’s four-year imprisonment at the hands of the New Zealand authorities. Hanssen had regularly been smuggling correspondence to , and it was the discovery of his diary secreted on a ship en route to Amsterdam that led to his arrest and conviction for bypassing censorship in 1915. The publication of this diary also led to the granddaughter of Karl Hanssen, Marianne Klemm, contacting the Research Centre for German Connections with New Zealand and the Pacific with a manuscript, written by her grandfather, in which he records his experiences of his imprisonment in New Zealand. This document, Karl Hanssen’s Kriegserlebnisse, is truly unique, in that it provides a German prisoner’s perspective of life in New Zealand state prisons during the First World War. Although Hanssen was by no means the only Ger- man to be incarcerated in the New Zealand prison system during this period, his appears to be the only surviving account to record these experiences in any detail.4 This section of the edition will draw on Hanssen’s memoirs to explore the historical and political background to the events surrounding his imprisonment. The first part will focus on Hanssen’s description of the military occupation of Samoa, looking at the effects that the change in administration had on the day- to-day life of the islands’ German settlers, as well as the devastating impact on German business. It will also examine native Samoan attitudes towards both the New Zealand administration and the deposed German colonial government.

3 Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, August 1914–May 1915: A German Perspective on New Zealand’s Military Occupation of German Samoa, edited by James N. Bade with the assistance of James Braund, Alexandra Jespersen, and Nicola Pienaar (Germanica Pacifica, vol. 8), Frankfurt a. M., Peter Lang 2011. Henceforth referred to as Karl Hans- sen’s Samoan War Diaries. 4 Felix von Luckner includes a brief account of his stay in Mt Eden prison in January 1918 in his autobiography Seeteufel. This is discussed by James N. Bade in Von Luckner: A Reassessment: Count Felix von Luckner in New Zealand and the South Pacific, 1917–1919 and 1938 (Germanica Pacifica, Vol. 3) Frankfurt, Peter Lang 2004, pp. 95–99, and in Sea Devil: Count von Luckner in New Zealand and the Pacific, , Steele Roberts 2006, pp. 75f. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 11

The second part will concentrate on Hanssen’s experiences as a military pris- oner in New Zealand, both in the state prison system and in military-run intern- ment camps, and attempt to answer questions about whether his treatment at the hands of the New Zealand authorities was fair, or in fact legal. The third part will explore the background to Hanssen’s comments on New Zealand responses to the First World War.

2. Samoa under New Zealand Military Occupation Samoa was colonised relatively late compared to its Pacific neighbours. In 1900, after decades of rivalry between three colonial powers, the islands were parti- tioned between Germany and the , with Britain withdrawing her claim in return for German claims in Tonga and elsewhere, a solution that caused some disquiet and consternation in New Zealand. For some time New Zealand had been harbouring its own colonial aspirations towards Samoa and elsewhere in the Pacific. Some early premiers, such as George Grey, Robert Stout and Julius Vogel, had hoped that a Samoan colony could be a strong economic asset, help to secure the nation’s defences, and be part of a potential New Zealand South Pacific .1 In November 1899, at the news of the tripartite agree- ment, the New Zealand Herald ran an editorial which captured the public mood: We confess that that was a somewhat bitter pill for us to swallow. Ever since New Zealand became a colony we have had frequent intercourse with the islands of the Pacific, and es- pecially with Samoa. Long before the complications had arisen which have compelled the present settlement, the settlers of New Zealand urged that England should take possession of Samoa. We looked forward to the time when New Zealand would be at the head of an island confederation, of which Samoa would be an important part.2 No wonder then that New Zealand, at the outbreak of the First World War, was so eager to fulfil Britain’s request to seize and occupy German Samoa for the Allies. By sending troops to capture the islands, New Zealand could achieve a dual goal. Having been granted the “consolation prize” of colonies in the and Niue after the disappointment of the 1899 settlement, New Zealand could now secure what would be the jewel in its burgeoning Pacific empire, while also taking the opportunity to prove its loyalty and capability to mother Britain.

1 Ministry for Culture and Heritage, “Capture of German Samoa”, NZ History, http:// www.nzhistory.net.nz/war/capture-of-samoa/background, accessed 3 September 2015. See also Angus Ross, New Zealand Aspirations in the Pacific in the Nineteenth Century, Oxford, Clarendon Press 1964. 2 Editorial, New Zealand Herald, 24 November 1899. 12 Bronwyn Chapman

However, despite the years spent hoping for such an opportunity, the 1400-strong Advance Party of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) that sailed for Samoa on 15 August was poorly prepared to administer a colony. The initial seizure of government buildings and property was relatively successful, as no resistance was offered by the resident , but the day-to-day running of island affairs proved more difficult. The who took over the roles of German officials lacked relevant experience. The troops themselves were also young and inexperienced, and the military administrator, Colonel Robert Logan, a former sheep farmer, had no field experience or knowledge of native affairs.3 Together they bumbled their way through five years of military administration before being replaced by a civil administration in 1920, making more than a few mistakes and misjudgements along the way. The change in administration caused a great deal of upheaval for many of Samoa’s residents, particularly the German settlers. The observations in Karl Hanssen’s war diaries and memoirs provide a distinctive and authentic perspective of the effects of the occupation on the German community and the variety of atti- tudes that existed towards the occupiers. His accounts sit comfortably alongside those of other Samoan Germans, including the diaries of settler Frieda Zieschank, novelist Erich Scheurmann, and planter Ernst Demandt.4 New Zealand’s military occupation of Samoa has been examined at some length elsewhere, in particular in the “Background” section of Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, which is largely based on research by Alexandra Jespersen.5 Here we will focus on a few points more specific to Hanssen’s memoirs.

3. Effects of the Occupation on the German community News that Britain had declared war on Germany reached Samoa in the early hours of the morning on 5 August, by a dispatch from the German Colonial Office. Realising immediately the likelihood of an attempt to seize the islands, prominent members of the German community, led by the colonial Governor,

3 Doug Munro, “Logan, Robert”, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, http://www.teara. govt.nz/en/biographies/3l12/logan-robert, accessed 3 September 2015. 4 Zieschank and Scheurmann’s diaries were published after the war as Ein Jahrzehnt in Samoa (Haberland, Leipzig 1918) and Erinnerungen aus der Besetzungszeit (Bing, Korbach 1935). Demandt’s diary is unpublished and held at the Bundesarchiv Koblenz. 5 “The Background to Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries 1914–15”, in: Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, edited by Bade, Braund, Jespersen, Pienaar, op. cit., pp. 1–35. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 13

Dr Erich Schultz, met to decide what their course of action should be if such a situation were indeed to develop. Given the paltry armaments at hand and the presence of a sizeable English settler population in Samoa, it was clear that any attempt at armed resistance would most likely be futile, possibly even disas- trous, and it was decided that no such resistance should be offered.6 Critically, however, this was not understood by those present at the meeting to mean that the Germans would surrender to enemy forces, rather that they would quietly allow the islands to be occupied for the duration of the war, and re-establish the German administration when hostilities ceased.7 When suspicions proved to be correct and a 1,400-strong New Zealand military force landed in several weeks later, this understanding led to one of the first major conflicts between the occupying force and the German community. After officially declaring German Samoa to be under military occupation, Logan turned his attention to how he would govern the islands’ more than 40,000 residents. Having been given no specific instructions for the day-to-day administration of the islands, Logan initially observed the German systems and officials at work. Finding everything to be highly effective and running smoothly, he asked the German officials to continue in their roles. This request caused some heated discussion within the German community. On 1 September, Hanssen writes that he admonished magistrate Richard Williams for breaking a promise to Schultz to only work under the German flag, to which Williams replied that he and the other officials had not been given a choice in the mat- ter.8 Tense negotiations followed between Logan and the officials, but when it became clear that the two parties had fundamentally opposing views of the situ- ation, all officials resigned. As the New Zealanders believed they had legitimately conquered German Samoa, Logan had considered it only appropriate to insist that rulings would no longer take place under the name of the Kaiser, but under the name of the law, and, most problematically, that the German officials would act as “servants of the British Government”.9 This ran totally contrary to the Germans’ understanding of themselves as custodians of the German regime during a temporary occupation, and could only be refused. The result of such a significant miscommunication was that ten of the higher ranked officials were abruptly sent to New Zealand for internment as prisoners of war – a measure which no doubt caused considerable pain and bitterness for some members of

6 Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, p. 38. 7 Ibid., p. 27. 8 Ibid., p. 45. 9 Ibid., p. 47. 14 Bronwyn Chapman the German community, as many wives and children found themselves sepa- rated indefinitely from their husbands and fathers. This lack of tact came to characterise much of Logan’s subsequent interac- tion with the German settlers. Hanssen writes in his memoirs that, primarily in the earlier stages of the war, Logan made life incredibly difficult for Germans in Samoa by oppressive administrative orders, frustrating requisitions of private property, and general harassment. A great deal of good will from the German settlers was lost over the introduction of a series of exceedingly heavy-handed and restrictive regulations applying only to Germans, which will be discussed in more detail below. Of particular relevance to Hanssen, though, were the new administration’s attacks on German commerce. Officially German businesses were allowed to continue operating unimpeded, as long as they only conducted business with Allied or neutral countries. However Hanssen reports that business was constantly hampered by the administration’s demands to requisition DHPG property. In the month of September 1914 alone, his diary records five instances of equipment and resources, including horses and carriages, mules, lighters and coal, being requisitioned by the New Zealand military, often without advance warning or proper receipts, and in some cases without even seeking permission. On one occasion, sixteen mules were taken from a single plantation, significantly impacting on productivity. After submitting a formal protest, the DHPG was told that they could take nine mules back, but only in exchange for more horses from another plantation.10 In the case of the coal, the military argued that it was gov- ernment property and required no receipt. In October Hanssen met with Logan, who was very apologetic about the disruptions, but issues, especially surround- ing the repurposing of coal, persisted. In February 1916, Hanssen estimates that between twenty and fifty tons of coal had been removed from DHPG property, for which Logan refused to take any responsibility, having the audacity to instead suggest that it had been stolen by native .11 After Hanssen was arrested and the DHPG placed under forced administration in late 1915, and when the business was liquidated completely in 1916, nobody could have reasonably claimed that business was proceeding uninterrupted. Another way Logan intruded upon German business, unmentioned by Hans- sen, but discussed in detail by historians such as Michael Field and Hermann Hiery, was his expulsion of Chinese indentured labourers. German companies in Samoa had been recruiting part of their labour force from China since 1903.

10 Ibid., p. 51. 11 Ibid., p. 109. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 15

These labourers were often treated very badly by German planters, with reports of physical abuse and forced labour, but numbers grew significantly during the German administration and Chinese labourers became an important part of the Samoan economy. At the time Logan arrived in Samoa, the islands were home to 2,184 indentured Chinese labourers, and it soon became clear that he was hostile towards this population. Ostensibly Logan was concerned about preserv- ing the racial purity of the native Samoans, some of whom were in common law marriages with Chinese workers, but he also seemed to have an intense personal dislike for Chinese, likely influenced by the anti-Chinese prejudice rampant in New Zealand.12 Over the course of his administration Logan followed an aggres- sive policy of repatriation of Chinese labourers, without replacement, which saw the Chinese-Samoan population drop from 2,184 to 832 by 1918.13 Without the Chinese, and with Samoans unwilling to work on the plantations, German planters were left only with imported Melanesian labourers, leaving the plan- tations overgrown and reduced in profitability. Field reports that the planters petitioned Logan for permission to bring in a new draft of overseas workers, but were refused, and consequently found themselves facing bankruptcy.14 Another aspect of the New Zealand takeover of Samoa, which has received much attention, is the conduct of the soldiers of the NZEF Advance Party. By all accounts, even those from a New Zealand perspective, these troops disgraced themselves from the moment they stepped off the boat. In an oft-quoted article in Truth, Colonel Logan is reported to have told the troops, before their return to New Zealand: Some of you … have played the game, but these, I may say, are in a very small minority, and to those of you who have not played the game I would give you my advice. It is this: That when you get back to New Zealand you will do your level best to stay there. The man who cannot take the good with the bad cannot do anything at all for his country or Empire and is not worthy of the name of a soldier.15 These troops’ behaviour had fallen well below the expectations, not only of Logan, but also of the majority of the Samoan settler community. They had been consist- ently unruly, rude, indolent, often drunk and aggressive towards other Samoan residents and, on occasion, physically violent. Officers openly admitted they were

12 Hiery, op. cit., p. 167. 13 Michael Field, Mau: Samoa’s Struggle for Freedom, Auckland, Polynesian Press 1991, p. 31. 14 Ibid., p. 33. 15 “Back from Samoa”, New Zealand Truth, 27 March 1915. 16 Bronwyn Chapman unable to control the troops’ behaviour. Interestingly, Hanssen’s accounts of the occupation feature criticisms of the troops’ day-to-day behaviour less prominently than other first-hand accounts, the memoirs not referring to their conduct at all. This probably reflects the predomination of business concerns over any annoy- ance caused by misbehaving troops, but other German diarists devote consider- able space to expressing their disapproval of the New Zealand soldiers’ behaviour. Frieda Zieschank was particularly critical, depicting the troops as a gang of ridicu- lous and puerile pretenders, referring to them as “armed boy scouts” and a “picnic party” (“bewaffnete Wandervögel” and “Picknickgesellschaft”).16 It is important to distinguish between the initial Advance Party soldiers and the later arrivals who gradually replaced them from early 1915. The main point of contrast between these two groups was that initial arrivals were primarily very young volunteers, most barely out of their teens, while the more docile, better behaved replacement forces were generally considerably older reserve sol- diers. With the youth of the Advance Party came naivety and ignorance. Leon- Leary, a member of the initial force who recorded his experiences in the book New Zealanders in Samoa, writes that the majority of the soldiers did not even know where Samoa was located, let alone what its strategic significance might be, meaning that they were poorly prepared for what awaited them.17 This was not helped by the fact that the whole force was equally poorly informed on what conditions to expect in Samoa, leading to such awkward misjudgements as the soldiers being issued with heavy clothing totally unsuitable for a tropical climate. Another specific issue with the Advance Force was that the men had left New Zealand under the impression that they were headed for all the glory and excitement of active combat in Europe, and when they found themselves in Samoa, where not so much as a minor skirmish was to be had, they were bitterly disappointed. The only work to be done was garrison duty, and when relentless boredom soon set in, the troops attempted to break it by drinking excessively and generally making a nuisance of themselves around the town. In the case of the Advance Party, youth also brought a particularly zealous jingoism that often led to offensive and antagonistic anti-German behaviour. The troops seemed to enjoy harassing Germans in the streets and espousing pro-British propaganda, and some regularly went out in search of “Huns” to physically assault.18

16 The “Wandervögel” were a German boys’ youth movement in a similar vein to the Boy Scouts. Frieda Zieschank, Ein Jahrzehnt in Samoa (1906–1916), Leipzig, Haberland 1918, pp. 126 and 127. 17 Leonard Leary, New Zealanders in Samoa, London, W. Heinemann 1918, p. 54. 18 Leary, op. cit., 97. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 17

With boredom and tension in the New Zealand camp rapidly building throughout 1914, things finally came to a head in December, with the infamous Christmas Eve riots. At some point in the evening, about two hundred soldiers left camp, without permission, to go for a drink at a hotel in Apia. Upon being refused service, they took matters into their own hands and ransacked the bar, looting as much alcohol as they could carry. Fuelled by drink, their actions esca- lated quickly, as they moved on to further hotels and the German-owned Krause & Preusse store, in search of more alcohol, smashing and damaging property in the process. These events were recounted in much critical detail by both Ger- man and New Zealand observers, even mentioned in some New Zealand news- papers, such as the Poverty Bay Herald, where the whole affair was described as “disgraceful”.19 As for Hanssen, this was one event that did prompt some fairly extreme criticism in his diary, where he labels the troops “scoundrels” (“Schurken”),20 attacks the New Zealand military’s failure to censure them for the incident, and advocates the death penalty as an appropriate punishment for the offending soldiers.21 Above all, what his entry of the 25 December makes clear is that the troops’ conduct had made Samoa suddenly seem a very dangerous place for a German. Not only had the riots caused economic damage to Germans and others who had their property destroyed or stolen, the incident also proved that the New Zealanders could not control their own men. “We have no protection and no guarantees“, wrote Hanssen. “What might still be in store for us?”22 In the knowledge that there was little standing between them and further attacks by New Zealand soldiers, Samoa’s German residents simply had to live with fear and anxiety in the early stages of the occupation.

4. Samoan Perspectives on the Colonial Administrations Samoa’s German population surprised nobody with their negative reaction to New Zealand’s presence on their colonial turf, but comprising only five hundred of the islands’ total population of over 40,000, their stance was only part of the puzzle.23 Of more importance to the New Zealand administration were the views

19 “News from Samoa”, Poverty Bay Herald, 4 February 1915. 20 Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, p. 194. 21 See Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, p. 23. 22 Ibid., pp. 87f. and194f. 23 Statistics taken from Ministry for Culture and Heritage, “Capture of German Samoa”, http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/war/capture-of-samoa/administration, p. 4, accessed 3 September 2015. 18 Bronwyn Chapman of the 38,000 native Samoans they were now tasked with governing. The Samo- ans’ attitude to the political upheaval was critical to the new administration, given New Zealand’s own colonial designs on the islands, but was also of great interest to Hanssen, who dedicates a sizeable section of his memoirs to observations on the matter. His information is derived from two month-long malaga (journeys) through the districts and villages of both ‘ and Savai’i in July and Sep- tember 1915. Ostensibly business trips, he also took the malaga for the purpose of establishing the native Samoans’ allegiances and bolstering support for the now exiled Dr Schultz. Hanssen’s impressions before departing were that the chiefs were generally favourable to the Germans, while their “dislike of the New Zealanders and the Administrator”, as he puts it in his Memoirs, was very clear. Eight weeks of extensive travelling with enthusiastic and friendly receptions at every village confirmed this and Hanssen concluded that the will of the majority was to see German governance restored. He is discerning enough, though, to real- ise that this probably does not equate to German patriotism, suggesting instead that it may be due to the dishonour of being exchanged like pieces in a game, or at most, a general fondness for the Germans. Many commentators, however, warn specifically against interpreting superficial kindnesses as necessarily indicative of deeper loyalties, explaining that traditional Samoan custom demanded guests be treated hospitably regardless of political differences.24 Hanssen was not igno- rant of this fact either, acknowledging others’ scepticism about the sincerity of Samoan sentiments, and conceding in his Memoirs: “To a certain extent, this may be the case and I admit that mistrust in such cases is not unjustified”. What then did Samoans really think of the new colonists and the old? The “Background” section of Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries suggests that many Samoans were initially ambivalent towards the change in leadership and were will- ing to align themselves with whoever presented the best opportunity for personal gain at the time.25 Logan received pledges of loyalty from a man who had, until recently, been known for his loyal service to Schultz, and received congratulations from a chief, who had not long since been declaring that he was the most faith- ful of the Kaiser’s servants.26 Logan himself, when asked whether Samoans would favour British rule, answered in the affirmative, but said it would depend on their

24 Malama Meleisea, The Making of Modern Samoa: traditional authority and colonial administration in the history of Western Samoa, Suva, “”University of the South Pacific 1987, p. 105. 25 “Background” section, Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, p. 8. 26 Zieschanck, op. cit. 144. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 19 mood at the time they were asked.27 On the whole, Samoan accounts of the New Zealand administration of their country, postdating the war, are exceedingly nega- tive, due largely to the bumbling incompetence and negligence exposed by the influenza pandemic of 1918, and the Black Saturday shootings of 1929. The arrival of influenza in the islands, which decimated 22% of Samoa’s population,28 was a serious indictment on Logan’s leadership, as he had personally failed to quarantine the vessel that brought the disease, despite advice that there was illness on board. He further refused offers of medical assistance once the influenza took hold. The tragedy irrevocably damaged relations between the Samoans and New Zealanders, and tends to dominate narratives of the wartime administration, to the exclusion of other perspectives. However, most sources indicate that, initially at least, the New Zealand administration was welcomed and generally felt to be the preferred option. By early 1918 there is evidence that local chiefs were unanimous in support for the New Zealand administration over the German one, and Hermann Hiery surmises that, had a referendum been held, public opinion would have mirrored that of the leaders.29 The long-standing presence of British settlers and missionar- ies in the islands also meant that the “concept of a British-occupied Samoa had not struck everyone to be the most alien of invasions.”30 The eventual souring of relations with the New Zealanders might have made the German administration seem somehow idealised in retrospective compari- son. There appears, among the Samoans, to have been respect and even affec- tion for Schultz and his predecessor Solf, who, unlike Logan, made considerable effort to gain knowledge of the and culture and to integrate this into their policies. Nevertheless their regime was at times strict and conde- scending. Solf’s policies sought to preserve Samoan culture and tradition from the threat of ever-encroaching western customs, but also to control it. During the German regime a series of highly intrusive regulations were instituted to govern all aspects of native Samoan life, including whom Samoans could marry, where they could travel, and even when and where cricket could be played.31

27 Michael Field, op. cit. 51. 28 Statistics taken from Ministry for Culture and Heritage, “The 1918 influenza pan- demic”, NZ History, http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/culture/1918-influenza-pandemic/ samoa, p. 9, accessed 3 September 2015. 29 Hiery, op. cit., p. 172. 30 “Background” section, Karl Hanssen’s Samoan War Diaries, p. 8. 31 George Steinmetz, The Devil’s Handwriting: Precoloniality and the German Colonial State in , Samoa, and Southwest Africa, Chicago, University of Chicago Press 2007, pp. 331 and 335. 20 Bronwyn Chapman

The strictness of these measures had led to some tensions and resistance against German authority. In 1908, an influential chief, Lauaki Namulau’ulu Mamoe, began to drum up support for his movement, the Mau a Pule (forerun- ner to the Mau independence movement), hoping to depose the German regime and restore traditional Samoan autonomy. Lauaki was swiftly dealt with by Solf, but there have also been suggestions of active resistance from other sources. Hanssen mentions that one of his travelling companions for the malaga was a Samoan named Iuta, who had been involved in the shooting of a violent crimi- nal, known as Sitivi, some years earlier. Sitivi was a notorious figure in German Samoa, and the sensational events leading up to his death at the hands of Iuta in 1906 have been interpreted by some as a challenge to German colonial author- ity. In August 1905, Sitivi, a native of the village Lauli’i, with a history of petty theft, discovered his wife was unfaithful and shot her in an act of revenge. The woman survived, but Sitivi was quickly apprehended and sentenced to an eight- year prison term. Later that year, he escaped twice from jail and was recaptured, in the second instance having stolen a firearm and threatened to shoot white people. When he escaped for the third time in May 1906, his behaviour escalated quickly into what some newspapers termed a “reign of terror”.32 In the days after his escape, he threatened the wife of a German planter in an attempt to procure a gun, attacked Government surveyor, Mr Haidlen, with a spear, and unsuccess- fully attempted to shoot German government architect, Mr Schaffhausen, with a stolen gun. Sitivi also broke into the home of the District Judge, empty at the time, and rather brazenly left some ammunition on a table to inform the own- ers that he had been there. On 30 May the crime spree took a fatal turn when Sitivi shot and killed a planter, Mr Hirsch. A further, non-fatal attack was made on an accountant, Mr Kienzle. As the crisis unfolded, it garnered international attention, receiving news coverage across the Pacific, including New Zealand and Australia. Under pressure, Schultz, then serving as Chief Justice, proceeded by placing a 1,000 Mark bounty on Sitivi’s head, which resulted in him being shot dead by Iuta and another man, Muliumu, bringing to an end more than two weeks of terror and uncertainty for Samoa’s white population. The story of Sitivi’s exploits also reached a wider audience through the work of German author (and, as previously mentioned, war-time diarist) Erich Scheur- mann, who interprets Sitivi’s exclusive targeting of members of the white com- munity, and those with connections to the German administration, as a political protest against Samoa’s colonial rulers. In 1914 Scheurmann spent some months

32 Auckland Star, “Escaped Samoan Convict,” 25 June 1906. Historical and Political Background to K. Hanssen’s Memoirs 21 in Samoa and subsequently produced multiple works about the islands and their people. His best known publication, Der Papalagi, famously claimed to be the genuine commentary of a Samoan chief on European customs, but is now widely regarded as a work of fiction.33 However, Scheurmann’s lesser known work, Die Lichtbringer, a highly romanticised and overtly anti-colonial collection of short stories, features the tale of a young man, Fatu, a character clearly modelled on Sitivi. While remaining relatively true to the bare facts of the case, Scheurmann portrays Fatu as the victim of clashing European and Polynesian understandings of morality. Fatu’s attempted murder of his wife is presented as a valid response to infidelity under local custom, and his incarceration at the hands of the colo- nial administration as an arrogant and oppressive intrusion into Samoan self- governance. As such, Fatu’s final crime spree is depicted as a noble crusade to return liberty to the Samoan people by destroying the “white-skinned demons who brought the chaos with them”.34 Furthermore, in Scheurmann’s version, the bounty hunters refuse to accept their reward (unlike the real-life Iuta and Muli- umu, who accepted, after initial hesitation), suggesting to the reader that Fatu’s actions are sanctioned by other Samoans and elevating him to the status of a martyr for Samoan independence. Scheurmann’s work represents a literary niche that catered to the popular- ity of Südsee-Romantik (the romanticism of the South Seas) in metropolitan Germany by depicting images of an island paradise and glorifying the ideal of the noble savage. As such it is not necessarily reliable. Schultz interprets Sitivi’s actions quite differently. He dismisses the suggestion that they could constitute the beginnings of a Samoan independence movement, citing the fact that Sitivi had been apprehended by fellow Samoans, and his belief that such a movement could only gain widespread support if advanced primarily by the native chiefs.35 Schultz further suggests that Sitivi falls into a very specific category of offender that was not uncommon in Samoa. In such cases the offender’s initial crime was usually a heated response to some personal grievance, usually involving a woman; however the intervention of the law could see the authorities, both

33 See Hans Ritz, Die Sehnsucht nach der Südsee: Bericht über einem europäischen Mythos, Göttingen, Muriverlag 1983, pp. 121–4. 34 Erich Scheurmann, Die Lichtbringer: die Geschichte vom Niedergang eines Naturvolkes: Leben und Dichtung in neunzehn Bildern, Munich, Ludendorffs, 1936, .p 97: “weißhäu- tigen Dämone, die das Wirrsal gebracht haben”. 35 Thomas Schwarz, Ozeanische Affekte: Die literarische Modellierung Samoas im koloni- alen Diskurs, Berlin, Internet Akademie und Lehrbuch Verlag 2013, pp. 237f. 22 Bronwyn Chapman native and colonial, become the sole target of the offender’s anger.36 In his book Ozeanische Affekte,Thomas Schwarz contrasts both interpretations in the chap- ter “Mörder oder Freiheitskämpfer? Der Fall Sitivi”. Schwarz appears to be in agreement with Schultz that Sitivi’s primary goal was not political protest, con- cluding: “Sitivi attempted to justify his own use of violence by pointing to the oppression of Samoa by the German colonial authorities”.37 He does, however, acknowledge Schultz’s potential bias as a member of the German administration, which possessed a great deal of self-conviction and tended to overestimate its support among the Samoans.38 With all the conflicting narratives, it is difficult to draw strong conclusions about what the native Samoans really thought about the change in administra- tion. However it is also futile to try to pin down a consensus, as the Samoan people were not then, any more than they are now, a homogeneous political unit. Rather they represented a series of politically linked villages and families, each with their own allegiances forged in the many decades of Western contact before Samoa’s partition and colonisation at the turn of the century. Again Hanssen was hardly ignorant of this fact, and suggests in his memoirs that it is necessary to approach the question of Samoan loyalties according to what he terms the “old political division” of those friendly towards Germans (Tupua) and those loyal to the English (Malietoa). The Sa Tupua and Sa Malietoa were two rival politi- cal families struggling for power in Samoa during the nineteenth century. At the time of first European contact, the islands were governed by the indigenous fa’amatai system, whereby power rested at village and district level with councils (fono) made up of title holding chiefs (matai). Although Samoa had no history of centralised governance, four district titles, known as papa, were recognised throughout the land as being of paramount status. In the event that each of the four papa was held concurrently by one person, that individual was known as Tafa’ifa (the four sided one) and was recognised as Tupu, Samoa’s highest chief. Between them, the Sa Tupua and Sa Malietoa represented three royal lineages, which were locked in a power struggle over the Tafa’ifa. These were, from the Sa

36 Erich Schultz, Erinnerungen an Samoa, Berlin, Scherl, 1926, p. 130. 37 Schwarz, p. 239: “Sitivi hat den Versuch unternommen, die Anwendung von Gewalt auf seiner Seite mit dem Hinweis auf die Unterdrückung Samoas durch die deutsche Kolonialmacht zu rechtfertigen”. 38 Ibid. Schwarz also cites the work of historian Alexander Krug. See Alexander Krug, Der Hauptzweck ist die Tötung von Kanaken: die deutschen Strafexpeditionen in den Kolonien der Südsee 1872–1914, Tönning, Der Andere Verlag 2005, p. 357.