The Military Occupation of Western Samoa, 1914-1920

Abstract

The Samoa (N.Z.) Expeditionary Force, commonly known as the British Expeditionary Force, sailed from Wellington on 15 August, 1914 with a definite military objective: to gain control of the strategically located wireless station on Western Samoa, about six miles from Apia. Chief of General Staff to Colonel Logan, 13 August 1914, reproduced in Smith, S.J. "The Samoa (N.Z.) Expeditionary Force 1914-1915", Wellington, 1924, p.29. This book and others such as Leamy, L.P. "New Zealanders in Samoa", London, 1918, and Drew, H.T.B. (Ed.) "Official History of New Zealands Effort in the Great War", Wellington, 1923 (Vol. IV, Chap. II, "The Seizure and Occupation of samoa"), give readily available descriptions of the recruitment of the Force, the sea journey, and the landing at Apia, and these events have accordingly been omitted from this account. None of these works, however, gives a military history of the Occupation of Western Smoa, which is the general purpose of this chapter. This was part of a plan devised in London to seize the whole series of German stations in the Pacific and thereby hamstring the German Pacific fleet. Nine days earlier the Governor had received from the Secretary of State a cable which read: "If your Ministers desire and feel themselves able to seize German wireless station at Samoa we should feel that this was a great and urgent Imperial service. You will realise, however, that any territory now occupied must at the conclusion of the war be at the disposal of the Imperial Government for the purposes of an ultimate settlement. Other Dominions are acting on the same understanding in a similar way." Reproduced in Watson, R.M. "History of Samoa", Wellington, 1918, p.139.