alternatehistory.com

Since I'm going home for spring break tomorrow, time for another update. My laptop is acting up again, but I managed to upload almost all of the timeline-related stuff so I should be able to keep this going while it's getting repaired.

Part Seventy-Two: In Darkest Africa

The West African Dilemma:
The 1870s and 1880s brought a large period of colonial expansion by all the powerful nations in Europe as technological advances allowed serious expeditions into the deep heart of the African continent. Medical advances against tropical diseases such as malaria made it possible for larger settlements by European countries while larger steamships and refrigeration allowed easier transportation of goods to and from the African outposts and made it possible for Europeans to advance further into the interior of the continent. As West Africa was the closest region of Africa south of the Sahara. it was the first to experience the new-found expansion by the colonial powers.

France, being the most powerful country on the Mediterranean Sea and already possessing several outposts in West Africa, benefited the most from the new round of imperialism. Starting in the 1860s, exploratory missions were sent from Algeria, Senegal, and the Ivory Coast. In the 1870s, France had affirmed its control over the African coast between Liberia and the British Gold Coast, and began expanding inland where they soon ran up against the Toucouleur Empire. In the next decades, the French colonial forces in Dakar and Grand Bassam waged a costly war against the Toucouleur, but finally captured the capital of Segou and established full colonial rule over the upper Niger River region in 1894.

Meanwhile, the port cities on the Gold Coast that belonged to the British and the Danes[1] were developed by those countries. Sekondi and Cape Coast served as valuable harbors for British ships traveling the long route to Cape Colony and India. The British Gold Coast expanded inward in the late 19th century as well after several wars with the Ashanti. After the European Wars, the Danes grew closer to the French and expanded the Danish Gold Coast eastward along the coast toward the French colony in Lagos. The renewed colonization efforts in the region also brought tensions between the colonizing empires. As the British colony in Camaroon expanded north, it came into contact with French colonies on the lower Niger River. During the Congo Conference, France cede to Britain control of the land east of the Benue River, but the remainder of the Benue watershed as well as the Niger Delta still remained disputed between the two empires.


The Congo Conference:
While the colonial empires of Europe were expanding into the interior of West Africa, they were also commissioning explorations of the Congo River basin. As countries set up trading posts and made trade agreements with the native tribes along the river, contentions rose as to the official ownership of the region. By 1890, many of the great powers of Europe had established trading posts along the Congo River, and as the various colonies on the coast expanded inland, the jurisdiction of the colonial holdings prompted a minor crisis when some European countries claimed land overlapping with other powers' river ports. To solve the crisis, French Foreign Minister Napoleon Eugene Bonaparte[2] called for a general conference among the powers to solve the African colonial issues and especially focusing on the Congo. The Congo Conference was held in Paris in 1893.

The main focus of the Congo Conference was of course the territorial status of the Congo River Basin and of the river itself. Early on, the representatives of the several powers attending - France, Great Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and the United States[3] - agreed that the Congo River would remain an international waterway and that countries would be allowed to navigate the river at will. Despite this, many countries with colonies in the area still demanded land that bordered the river in order to facilitate their trade along the river and extraction of the rubber and other resources that were present in the Congo Basin. France gained the upper hand in the conference and obtained the majority of the land around the river. Germany, which had mostly established colonies in east Africa, claimed land north of the Ulindi River and south of the latitude of Lake Albert, giving Germany the port of Neuwilhelmshafen[4] on the Congo. Great Britain came away from the conference with connections from both Cameroon and from the south, but the southern territory proved to be blocked from the remainder of the river downstream by a series of rapids.

While the area of the river upstream from Lake Bonaparte[5] was navigable, the mouth of the Congo was blocked from this portion of the river by a long series of rapids. However, this region could still serve as a valuable port for the surrounding area. After much deliberation, the members of the Conference decided to give control of the area to lesser important countries with holdings in the area to ensure the neutrality of the Congo mouth. The Belgian colony centered on the city of Cabinda slightly north of the Congo Mouth was expanded, while the north bank of the mouth was turned over to administration by the United States. Under American administration, the city of Banana directly on the mouth surpassed the more inland city of Boma as the area's main harbor city after a railroad was constructed from Boma to Banana. The south bank of the Congo estuary was affirmed as Portuguese territory and continued to be administered from Luanda.

[1] The Danish Gold Coast is centered on the old Danish coastal forts, which in OTL were given to the Brits in the 1860s. These included Fort Cristianborg in what is now Accra and went east to about where the Ghana-Togo border is.
[2] Louis-Napoleon's son.
[3] Some American adventurers had established trading posts on the Congo, which is why they were invited.
[4] OTL Kisingani, DRC.
[5] OTL Pool Malebo, where Kinshasa and Brazzaville are.