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Answer

Who colonized Cameroon?

Central Africa — the powers that ruled Cameroon, the dates, and what independence did and did not change.

In short

Who colonized Cameroon?

Germany from 1884, then France and Britain, who divided the territory as League of Nations mandates in 1919; independence came in 1960, after a French war against the UPC that killed tens of thousands.

Cameroon's independence war is among the least discussed in French history: a counter-insurgency campaign against the UPC that continued after formal independence with French support.

World map showing imperial possessions and spheres of rule in 1914
A world map of imperial possessions in 1914, offered as global context only. It is a single snapshot: countries that became independent earlier, later occupations, disputed borders and differences between colonies and protectorates require the chronology below.Source — Wikimedia Commons

How rule changed in Cameroon

These periods describe different governing arrangements. The presence of a trading company, a military occupation and direct colonial government are not interchangeable; the notes preserve those distinctions where the record identifies them.

Political chronology

Rulers, periods and governing arrangements

PeriodRuler or administrationContext
before 1884Duala, Bamum, Fulbe and other politiesSee the chronology and context below.
1884–1916German KamerunSee the chronology and context below.
1919–1960French and British mandatesSee the chronology and context below.

Periods may overlap where control differed by territory. A national independence date does not imply that every enclave or dependency changed status on that day.

At a glance

Key facts

Colonising powers
Germany, France, Britain
Independence
1 January 1960
Hidden war
French counter-insurgency 1955–64 with tens of thousands of deaths
Assassinations
UPC leaders Um Nyobè, Moumié and Ouandié killed
Two legal systems
The anglophone/francophone divide dates from the 1919 partition

Chronology

Key dates

  1. 1884

    German protectorate treaties on the Douala coast.

  2. 1919

    Partition between France and Britain.

  3. 1955–71

    French and then Cameroonian forces wage war on the UPC independence movement.

  4. 1960

    Independence of French Cameroon.

  5. 1961

    Southern Cameroons joins; Northern Cameroons joins Nigeria.

Context

What the record shows

The 1919 partition created the anglophone–francophone split that drives the country's current conflict.

Questions

Frequently asked

Who colonised Cameroon?
Germany from 1884, then France and Britain after 1919 under League of Nations mandates.
What was the UPC war?
A French counter-insurgency campaign against the Union des Populations du Cameroun from 1955, continuing after independence, with death tolls estimated in the tens of thousands.
When did Cameroon become independent?
1 January 1960 for French Cameroon; Southern Cameroons joined in 1961.

Read on

Related in the archive

References

Sources — colonial Cameroon

  1. [1]Bartolomé de las Casas, Brevísima relación de la destrucción de las Indias (Seville, 1552).
  2. [2]Noble David Cook, Born to Die: Disease and New World Conquest, 1492–1650 (Cambridge University Press, 1998).
  3. [3]Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America (Monthly Review Press, 1971; English 1973).
  4. [4]Adam Hochschild, King Leopold's Ghost (Houghton Mifflin, 1998).
  5. [5]Thomas Pakenham, The Scramble for Africa (Random House, 1991).
  6. [6]Shashi Tharoor, Inglorious Empire: What the British Did to India (Hurst, 2017).
  7. [7]Caroline Elkins, Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya (Henry Holt, 2005).
  8. [8]Alfred W. McCoy, Policing America's Empire: The United States, the Philippines, and the Rise of the Surveillance State (Wisconsin, 2009).
  9. [9]Daniel Immerwahr, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019).
  10. [10]Jürgen Zimmerer, "The birth of the Ostland out of the spirit of colonialism", Patterns of Prejudice 39:2 (2005), on the German South-West Africa → Holocaust lineage.
  11. [11]Walter Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (Bogle-L'Ouverture, 1972).
  12. [12]Karl Marx, Capital, Volume I (1867), Chapter 31 ("Genesis of the Industrial Capitalist").

All works cited in good faith for documentary, educational and critical use. Errors and omissions: contact the archive.