Frederick William was Elector of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia, thus ruler of Brandenburg-Prussia, from 1640 until his death in 1688. A member of the House of Hohenzollern, he is popularly known as "the Great Elector" because of his military and political achievements. Frederick William was a staunch pillar of the Calvinist faith, associated with the rising commercial class. He saw the importance of trade and promoted it vigorously. His shrewd domestic reforms gave Prussia a strong position in the post-Westphalian political order of Northern-Central Europe, setting Prussia up for elevation from duchy to kingdom, achieved under his son and successor.
Frederick William I, known as the Soldier King, was King in Prussia and Elector of Brandenburg from 1713 till his death in 1740, as well as Prince of Neuchâtel.
Brandenburg-Prussia is the historiographic denomination for the early modern realm of the Brandenburgian Royal dynasty of the House of Hohenzollern between 1618 and 1701. Based in the Electorate of Brandenburg, the main branch of the Hohenzollern intermarried with the branch ruling the Duchy of Prussia, and secured succession upon the latter's extinction in the male line in 1618.
The Kingdom of Prussia constituted the German state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918. It was the driving force behind the unification of Germany in 1866 and was the leading state of the German Empire until its dissolution in 1918. Although it took its name from the region called Prussia, it was based in the Margraviate of Brandenburg. Its capital was Berlin.
The Prussian Navy, officially the Royal Prussian Navy, was the naval force of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1701 to 1867.
Princes Town or Pokesu is located 5 km east of Fort St. Antonio on Manfro Hill in the Ahanta West District of the Western Region of south Ghana, Africa. It lies between Axim to the west and Sekondi-Takoradi to the east. On 1 January 1681, a Brandenburger expedition of two ships commanded by Otto Friedrich von der Groeben arrived in the Gold Coast and began to build a strong fort between Axim and the Cape of Three Points. The fort was completed in 1683 and was named Fort Fredericksburg in honour of Prince Frederick William I, Elector of Brandenburg. Because the fort was named after a Prince, it has been referred to as Princes Town. The fort was to be the headquarters of the Brandenburgers in Africa.
John Canoe, also known as January Conny, was the European name given to an Akan warrior from Axim, Ghana. He was a chief of the Ahanta people in the early 18th century, who established a stronghold in the defunct Fort Fredericksburg and fought multiple wars with European traders for twenty years. The stronghold finally fell in 1725, though Canoe's fate is unknown. He is commemorated in the Junkanoo festival held in the Caribbean each December.
The Dutch Gold Coast or Dutch Guinea, officially Dutch possessions on the Coast of Guinea was a portion of contemporary Ghana that was gradually colonized by the Dutch, beginning in 1612. The Dutch began trading in the area around 1598, joining the Portuguese which had a trading post there since the late 1400s. Eventually, the Dutch Gold Coast became the most important Dutch colony in West Africa after Fort Elmina was captured from the Portuguese in 1637, but fell into disarray after the abolition of the slave trade in the early 19th century. On 6 April 1872, the Dutch Gold Coast was, in accordance with the Anglo-Dutch Treaties of 1870–71, ceded to the United Kingdom.
The Danish Gold Coast comprised the colonies that Denmark–Norway controlled in Africa as a part of the Gold Coast, which is on the Gulf of Guinea. It was colonized by the Dano-Norwegian fleet, first under indirect rule by the Danish West India Company, later as a crown colony of the kingdom of Denmark-Norway. The area under Danish influence was over 10,000 square kilometres.
The state of Prussia had its origins in the separate lands of the Margraviate of Brandenburg and of the Duchy of Prussia. The Margraviate of Brandenburg developed from the medieval Northern March of the Holy Roman Empire, passing to the House of Hohenzollern in 1415. The Duchy of Prussia originated in 1525 when Albert of Brandenburg-Ansbach, a member of a cadet branch of the Hohenzollern house, secularized the eastern lands of the Teutonic Knights as a Polish fief. Prince-elector John Sigismund, Elector of Brandenburg, inherited the Duchy of Prussia in 1618, thus uniting Brandenburg and Prussia under one ruler in a personal union; the Elector's state became known as Brandenburg-Prussia. The Kingdom of Prussia formed when Elector Frederick III assumed the title of Frederick I, King in Prussia, on 18 January 1701.
The Gold Coast was the name for a region on the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa that was rich in gold, petroleum, sweet crude oil and natural gas. This former region is now known as the country Ghana.
The Brandenburg Navy was the navy of the Margraviate of Brandenburg in Germany from the 16th century to 1701, when it became part of the Prussian Navy.
The Brandenburg colony of St. Thomas consisted of a leased part of the Danish island of St. Thomas to the Brandenburg-Prussia margraviate of the Holy Roman Empire from 1685 to 1754.
Otto Friedrich von der Groeben was a Prussian explorer, officer and German Generalleutnant in Polish service.
Fort Metal Cross, originally Fort Dixcove, is a military structure located on a promontory at the fishing community of Infuma in Dixcove, in the Western Region of Ghana. Because of its history in the Atlantic slave trade and its testimony to European-African trade, the Fort was included as one of the Forts and Castles of Volta, Greater Accra, Central and Western Regions that became a World Heritage Site in 1979.
When the German Empire came into existence in 1871, none of its constituent states had any overseas colonies. Only after the Berlin Conference in 1884 did Germany begin to acquire new overseas possessions, but it had a much longer relationship with colonialism dating back to the 1520s. Before the end of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, various German states established chartered companies to set up trading posts; in some instances they also sought direct territorial and administrative control over these. After 1806, attempts at securing possession of territories overseas were abandoned; instead, private trading companies took the lead in the Pacific while joint-stock companies and colonial associations initiated projects elsewhere, although many never progressed beyond the planning stage.
Mohrenstraße is a street in central Berlin. It runs from west to east between Wilhelmstraße and Hausvogteiplatz, and partially forming the southern edge of Gendarmenmarkt. The Berlin U-Bahn station Mohrenstraße is located at its western end, and is served by the U2. A number of buildings in the street date to the mid-19th century (Gründerzeit) or were reconstructed after World War II, and are protected historic buildings.
Germany–Ghana relations are good and Ghana is one of the priority countries for German development aid. Official Diplomatic Relations between the two countries were established in the 1950s, but contacts between the two societies go back much further and can be traced back to the 17th century.
Fort Gross Fredericksburg, is a fortification located in Princestown, in the Western Region of Ghana. The Brandenburg Africa Company, led by Benjamin Raule, under the patronage of Frederick William of Brandenburg, built Fort Gross Fredericksburg in 1683–1684 as their headquarters. The fort is the only fort in Ghana of German construction.
