Grossfriedrichsburg, the first German colony in Africa? Brandenburg-Prussia, Atlantic entanglements and national memory

Abstract

Between the late seventeenth and the early eighteenth century, the fortress of Grossfriedrichsburg in Pokesu (Princes Town, Ghana) was a lively hub of Atlantic entanglements, serving first as the main factory of the Brandenburg African Company and subsequently as the stronghold of the African “merchant prince” Jan Conny. Then, starting from the late nineteenth century, Grossfriedrichsburg was integrated into a national narrative providing a historical legitimacy for the new German colonial empire. Despite the fact that the Brandenburg company was substantially financed by Dutch merchants, that its employees were a heterogeneous mix coming from various regions of the world and that it had never exerted any colonial dominion over the local population, Grossfriedrichsburg began to be celebrated as the “first German colony” in Africa.