Bruno Mencke (1876 – 2 April 1901) was a wealthy German explorer and collector. Born in

Braunschweig Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( , from Low German ''Brunswiek'' , Braunschweig dialect: ''Bronswiek'') is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the Nor ...

to Eberhard, a wealthy chocolate manufacturer, and Charlotte née Wittekop, he was famous for undertaking the First German South Sea Expedition at the age of 24. He fitted out his 300-ton steam yacht ''Eberhard'' purchased from the Prince of Monaco and sailed to

German New Guinea German New Guinea (german: Deutsch-Neu-Guinea) consisted of the northeastern part of the island of New Guinea and several nearby island groups and was the first part of the German colonial empire. The mainland part of the territory, called , ...

(the

Bismarck Archipelago The Bismarck Archipelago (, ) is a group of islands off the northeastern coast of New Guinea in the western Pacific Ocean and is part of the Islands Region of Papua New Guinea. Its area is about 50,000 square km. History The first inhabitants o ...

), accompanied by naturalists and anthropologists including

Oskar Heinroth Oskar Heinroth (1 March 1871 – 31 May 1945) was a German biologist who was one of the first to apply the methods of comparative morphology to animal behavior, and was thus one of the founders of ethology. He worked, largely isolated from mos ...

, Paul Kothe, and Georg Duncker. After reaching Herbertshōhe he brought on board a former German colonial official, Ludwig Caro, as a secretary. On 31 March 1901 his yacht was anchored in a bay and the crew had camped in tents on an island. The camp was attacked by locals with spears. Mencke's men used firearms to repel the attack but Caro was speared through and killed along with a few other crew while many members were injured. It was claimed in the newspapers that the bodies were later found to be eaten by the local cannibals. Mencke himself died from injuries on 2 April and was buried on St. Matthias. The ornithologist Oskar Heinroth was injured but survived and wrote several papers on the findings from the expedition. A bird species, the

Mussau monarch The Mussau monarch (''Symposiachrus menckei''), also known as the white-breasted monarch, is a species of bird in the family Monarchidae. It is endemic to the Bismarck Archipelago of Papua New Guinea. Its natural habitats are subtropical or trop ...

, ''Symposiachrus menckei'', was named after Mencke. A punitive expedition was launched in 1901 by the German colonial forces under (later Admiral) Max von Grapow and nearly 81 native islanders, including women and children, were killed. In 1903, the tomb of Mencke was visited by the governor

Albert Hahl Dr. Albert Hahl (1868, Gern - 1945) was a German colonial administrator. In 1897, he was acting Landeshauptmann of the German New Guinea Company and from 1902 to December 1917, was Governor of German New Guinea. In 1903 he founded the town of R ...

and found to have been dug up and damaged with only a maxilla with molars remaining that was identified as belonging to Mencke based on the gold fillings.

References

External links

Artefacts from the Mencke expedition
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mencke, Bruno 1876 births 1901 deaths German explorers