Lake Force
Encyclopedia
Lake Force was a unit of the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

 stationed in the Uganda Protectorate on the west coast of Lake Victoria
Lake Victoria
Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. The lake was named for Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, by John Hanning Speke, the first European to discover this lake....

 under the command of Brigadier-General Sir Charles Crewe in 1916, during the East African campaign
East African Campaign (World War I)
The East African Campaign was a series of battles and guerrilla actions which started in German East Africa and ultimately affected portions of Mozambique, Northern Rhodesia, British East Africa, Uganda, and the Belgian Congo. The campaign was effectively ended in November 1917...

 of the First World War (1914–18). It consisted of 2,800 soldiers and 10,000 porters
Porter (carrier)
A porter, also called a bearer, is a person who shifts objects for others.-Historical meaning:Human adaptability and flexibility early led to the use of humans for shifting gear...

. In May 1916, Lake Force sent 5,000 porters and 100 ox
Ox
An ox , also known as a bullock in Australia, New Zealand and India, is a bovine trained as a draft animal. Oxen are commonly castrated adult male cattle; castration makes the animals more tractable...

wagons to serve with their allies, the Force publique
Force Publique
The Force Publique , French for "Public Force", was both a gendarmerie and a military force in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 1885, , through the period of direct Belgian colonial rule...

of the Belgian Congo
Belgian Congo
The Belgian Congo was the formal title of present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between King Leopold II's formal relinquishment of his personal control over the state to Belgium on 15 November 1908, and Congolese independence on 30 June 1960.-Congo Free State, 1884–1908:Until the latter...

 under Charles Tombeur
Charles Tombeur
Charles Tombeur was a Belgian general who commanded the Force Publique in the Belgian Congo during the First World War. He captured Tabora after some heavy fighting....

. The Uganda Native Medical Corps (UNMC) served with both units.

Lake Force cooperated with the Belgians, usually subordinating their own desires to Belgian, in the invasion of northwestern German East Africa
German East Africa
German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....

. The initial British objective was Mwanza
Mwanza
Mwanza is a mid-sized port city on the southern shores of Lake Victoria in northwestern Tanzania. With an urban population of 1.2 million and a metropolitan population of 2 million, it is Tanzania's second largest city, following Dar es Salaam and ahead of other major Tanzanian cities of Arusha,...

, which fell on 14 July 1916. Over 40,000 loads were stockpiled there by 19 September for lack of porters to carry them southwards. On 28 August, Lake Force captured Shinyanga
Shinyanga
Shinyanga, also known as Shinyanga mji in the local Swahili language, is a city in northern Tanzania. The city is the location of the regional headquarters of Shinyanga Region as well as the district headquarters of Shinyanga Urban District...

 without fighting. A letter by Crew intended for Lieutenant-Colonel Philippe François Joseph Molitor, commander of the Northern Brigade, and stating that the British assault on Tabora
Tabora
Tabora is the capital city of Tanzania's Tabora Region with a population of 127,880 . Tabora region is one of the largest geographical regions of Tanzania.- History :...

 would begin on 19 September was on the 16th intercepted by the Germans, who then abandoned the town on the night of 18–19 September. The Belgians occupied it the next day, and Lake Force camped outside it to the east. Its supply problems were severe, and on 3 October it was disbanded. Some of its Ugandan medics were sent to serve with the Uganda Field Ambulance in the 4th battalion of the King's African Rifles
King's African Rifles
The King's African Rifles was a multi-battalion British colonial regiment raised from the various British possessions in East Africa from 1902 until independence in the 1960s. It performed both military and internal security functions within the East African colonies as well as external service as...

.
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