British Cameroons
British Cameroons was a British Mandate territory in British West Africa. Today, the territory forms parts of Nigeria in West Africa and Cameroon in Central Africa.
History
The area of present-day Cameroon was claimed by Germany as a protectorate during the "Scramble for Africa" at the end of the 19th century.
League of Nations Mandate
During World War I, it was occupied by British, French and Belgian troops, and a later League of Nations Mandate to Great Britain and France by the League of Nations in 1922. The French mandate was known as Cameroun and the British territory was administered as two areas, Northern Cameroons and Southern Cameroons. Northern Cameroons consisted of two non-contiguous sections, divided by a point where the Nigerian and Cameroun borders met. In the 1930s, most of the white population consisted of Germans with Nazi sympathies; they were interned in British camps starting in June 1940. The native population of 400,000 showed little interest in volunteering for the British forces; only 3500 men did so.
