19. World War I’s First Naval Engagement Occurred in an African Lake
Lake Malawi in the early twentieth century was bordered by German Tanganyika (today’s Tanzania) and British Malawi, and each colonial power maintained a small naval presence there. The British assigned the task to Commander Edmund Rhoades, in charge of the gunboat HMS Gwendolen.
Rhoades shared the lake with a German Captain Berndt, in command of the SS Hermann von Wissmann. In the decade preceding the war, Rhoades and Berndt became good friends and drinking companions. When Britain declared war against Germany in 1914, Rhoades was the first to receive the news. He decided to end the war in Lake Malawi before it had even begun, without hurting his friend.