Congo Free State

Democratic Republic of the Congo, 1885–1908. Draft, not yet reviewed

The Congo Free State was a state in Central Africa from 1885 to 1908, privately owned by King Leopold II of Belgium. The administration of Leopold II extracted ivory, rubber and minerals from the upper Congo Basin for sale on the world market. The Casement Report of the British Consul Roger Casement led to the arrest and punishment of officials who had been responsible for killings during a rubber-collecting expedition in 1903. In 1908 the Belgian Parliament annexed the state as a colony of Belgium after international pressure.

Seat of power: Boma

Rulers

Culture

• Leopold convinced other European states at the Berlin Conference that he was involved in humanitarian and philanthropic work and would not tax trade.
• The loss of life and atrocities inspired literature such as the novel Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad and raised an international outcry.
• Debate has been ongoing about the high death rate in this period. The highest estimates state that the widespread use of forced labour, torture, and murder led to the deaths of 50 per cent of the population in the rubber provinces.
• European and US reformers exposed atrocities in the Congo Free State to the public through the Congo Reform Association, founded by Casement and the journalist Morel.

Picture

The Force Publique was the military of the Congo Free State and the Belgian Congo from 1885 to 1960.

Image: Unknown authorUnknown author, Public domain, file

Sources

• Congo Free State (Wikipedia)
• Congo Free State (Wikidata)
• About the picture (Wikipedia)

Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.