Bar with Colonial Service Medal and Samoa
1888 Clasp
Photo © Captain George Albert
The medals on this bar in order of seniority from
left to right are-
Colonial Service Medal, with clasp for
"SAMOA 1888"
Prussian Merit Cross for War AidThe
original owner of this medal bar was a naval veteran of the German actions in
the Second Samoan Civil War, a clash between rival Samoan clans with Germany
supporting one and the United States of America supporting the other. War
between the German and American navies was narrowly averted when a cyclone
destroyed both fleets in March 1889.
The Samoa 1888 clasp was only awarded to naval
crews of the three German ships that served during the Samoan Crisis, the SMS
Olga, SMS Eber and SMS Adler. The SMS Olga had come straight from East Africa
where the crew had earned the Deutsch Ost Afrika 1888/89 clasp. As there is no
East African clasp on this ribbon the Olga can be ruled out. Of the crew of the
SMS Eber only 4 survived the storm of March 1889, and of those only two were
still alive to claim the clasp in 1912 when the Colonial Service Medal was
instituted. So this medal is most likely to have been awarded to one of the SMS
Adler's crew.
The Merit Cross shows he served in a
non-combatant role in the First World War.
Close up of the Clasp
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