TheCommander-in-Chief, Africa was the last title of aRoyal Navy's formation commander located inSouth Africa from 1795 to 1939. Under varying titles, it was one of the longest-lived formations of theRoyal Navy. It was also often known as theCape of Good Hope Station.
From 1750 to 1779 theCape of Good Hope became strategically important due to the increasing competition between France and Great Britain for control of the seas.[2] In 1780 Holland joined theAmerican Revolutionary War[3] in alliance[4] with France and Spain against Great Britain; the British Government were aware of the consequences should the Cape of Good Hope fall and the impact it would have on its trade links with India and put a plan into place to capture the Cape and circumvent its use by the enemy. The first attempt was subject to prolonged delays and the fact that the French were able to reinforce their defences enabled them to successfully defend it from the British attack. From 1781 to 1791 various attempts[5] were made to capture the station: all failed and it remained under the control of France and the French were successful in attacking and disrupting the trade cargo of theEast India Company's ships that were travelling betweenAsian subcontinent and Europe.[6] In 1792 hostilities temporarily ceased and by 1793 the Directors of the East India Company expressed their concern[7] about the cape being retained by the French. TheBritish government and theAdmiralty decided to act and successfully retook it in 1795:[8] the first Naval base was established atTable Bay.[9]
In 1802 the British government agreed to restore the Cape to the Dutch control but this was not finalized until 1803 and lasted until 1806,[10] when a new British Administration underWilliam Pitt cancelled the agreement between both countries and re-took the Cape once more in 1806,[11] which effectively from this point on remained under British control. In 1811 the Royal Navy decided it wanted to move from its current base to a new base atSimon's Town bay; however the initial facilities took approximately three years to complete and were not ready until 1814.[12] From 1815 to 1849 the base was mainly used for re-fitting and repair work on vessels and acted as a port of call for nautical surveyors who were mapping the region. During the 1850s and 1860s improvements were made to the dockyard facilities with some being re-built in order to accommodate larger ships. On 17 January 1865, it was combined with theEast Indies Station to form theEast Indies and Cape of Good Hope Station; however, the station was recreated as a separate station on 29 July 1867. From 1870, it absorbed the formerWest Africa station.[13] By the start of theSecond Boer War in 1899 a long period of relative peace had existed; the station became the main base for British Forces disembarking and embarking during the war and for supplies and equipment being shipped from Britain for the duration of the conflict.[14]
In 1910 a new East Dock was built together with a dry dock facility which proved timely in the event of the breakout of theFirst World War. From 1914 to 1919 its primary tasks was to seek out and destroy German commerce raiders.[15]HMSPegasus remained as part of the Cape Station on the outbreak of theFirst World War. As the likelihood of war with Germany increased, the Commander-in-Chief on the Cape Station, Rear AdmiralHerbert King-Hall, deployed his ships in order to counter the threat posed by the German light cruiserKönigsberg, based atDar es Salaam. On 31 July 1914,Pegasus sightedKönigsberg leaving Dar es Salaam, but was unable to keep track of the faster German cruiser.[16][17] King-Hall recognised thatKönigsberg outclassedPegasus and intended thatPegasus should operate with the cruiserAstraea while his flagshipHyacinth operated independently to protect the trade routes around the Cape, but on 12 August, theAdmiralty orderedAstraea to joinHyacinth off the Cape to escort troop convoys, leavingPegasus unsupported atZanzibar.[18] On 23 AugustPegasus sailed to the port ofBagamoyo inGerman East Africa with the intention of forcing a truce so that the port would take no further part in the war. Similar agreements had previously been made with the authorities of Dar es Salaam andTanga.[19] When the port authorities refused to agree to such a truce,Pegasus shelled the port's Customs House.[19]
During the interwar period the Cape Station resumed the work of maintaining and refitting vessels stationed there and those travelling en route to Asia. In 1939, at the start of theSecond World War, the base played an early prominent role in theBattle of the Atlantic, and the hunt for theGerman pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee, that led to theBattle of the River Plate. After the conclusion of that engagement the station ceased as a command operations center with the senior naval staff moving to the newly formedSouth Atlantic station headquartered at Freetown. The naval base remained as part of that command until 1957.[20] In 1958 the British government handed over the facility to theSouth African Navy.[21]
^Robbins, Louise E. (2002).Elephant slaves and pampered parrots : exotic animals in eighteenth century Paris ([Online-Ausg.] ed.). Baltimore [u.a.]: Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 54.ISBN9780801867538.
^Ward, Peter A. (2013).British naval power in the East, 1794-1805 : the command of Admiral Peter Rainier (1. publ. ed.). Woodbridge: Boydell Press. p. 231.ISBN9781843838487.
^Goosen, C (1973).South Africa's Navy - the first Fifty years. W. J. Flesch & partners. pp. 131–132.ISBN0-949989-02-9.
^"Bertie, Admiral Sir Albemarle".The annual biography and obituary for the year 1825. Vol. 9. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown, and Green. 1825. p. 396.
^Great Britain H.M. Stationery Office, House of Commons; State Library, Bavarian (1 January 1821).Journals of the House of Commons, Digitized 23 Jun 2010. Vol. 76. H.M. Stationery Office. p. 794.
^Colbourn, H. (1830)."The United Service Magazine, 1830". p. 249, The University of Wisconsin - Madison Digitized, 12 April 2010. Retrieved19 November 2016.
Corbett, Julian S. (1920).Naval Operations: Volume 1: To the Battle of the Falklands December 1914. History of the Great War. London: Longmans, Green and Co.
United Kingdom
Royal Navy
N = died in post