The Kaiser’s Silver: German Nationalism and the 1913 Nationalspende for Christian Mission

In 1913, in honour of the kaiser’s silver jubilee, a group of secular colonial advocates organized a national fundraising campaign to raise money for Germany’s missionary societies. The nationalist motivations of this campaign ran counter to the theological and ideological self-conception of the missionaries, especially the leadership of Germany’s Protestant missions. Despite the ambivalence of the campaign’s declared beneficiaries, the Nationalspende zum Kaisersjubiläum für die christlichen Missionen in den deutschen Kolonien und Schutzgebieten proved to be a definitive success. Organizers mobilized national sentiment and generated a significant infusion of resources into Germany’s mission movement. The Nationalspende’s ulterior motive, drawing the internationalist and independent missions into a secular, nationalist colonial program, was also successful. In the aftermath of the Nationalspende, Germany’s formerly anti-nationalist Protestant mission movement came under new leadership, which began linking the missions more closely to Germany’s secular colonial movement. This article traces the history of the Nationalspende and places it in the context of competition between secular and religious impulses (and their organizational advocates) within Germany’s colonial movement before the First World War.