On June 28, 1916 the City of Berlin made the decision to change its name. The decision came during the First World War when Canadian soldiers fought against German soldiers overseas, and citizens at home began to question the loyalty of a city named after the German capital. Concerned about the impact of this association on the local market, 346 people voted to change the name.

Who was Lord Kitchener?

Horatio Herbert Kitchener, also known as 1st Earl Kitchener,  was a senior British Army officer and Chief of Staff from 1900-1902. Part of his ruthless imperial campaigns included the first-ever use of concentration camps in the Boer War, in which 26,370 imprisoned civilians died. These were originally refugee camps for displaced civilians during the Second Anglo-Boer War but were converted into mass concentration camps as part of Kitchener’s plans to clear out civilians and dominate the war. Kitchener’s scorched earth tactics were inhumane and ruthlessly violent. 

Lord Kitchener’s legacy does not represent our City. These colonial legacies which we continue to uphold are preventing us as a city and as a nation from holding ourselves accountable. We are at a turning point. Our people are working toward recognizing and dismantling systemic racism and acknowledging the harm that colonialism has caused Indigenous and Black peoples. A major part of these efforts is putting an end to the glorification of imperialist figures, by removing statues and monuments. The name of this city is a monument to the violent, racist, imperialist history of this country and it is time for us to take this step towards a better future.

The change in 1916 came as a result of anti-German sentiment. We are urging that this change be borne out of a desire to better ourselves and our community, to take responsibility for our mistakes, and to move forward. 

Horatio Kitchener does not represent our city, and it’s time we leave his legacy in the past. 

Sources: 

Jeff Outhit, “June 28, 1916: Exactly 346 people voted for Berlin to be renamed Kitchener,” The Record, June 27, 2016.

 Bruce Fetter and Stowell Kessler, "Scars from a Childhood Disease: Measles in the Concentration Camps during the Boer War,” Social Science History 20, no. 4 (Winter, 1996): 593-611.

Thomas Pakenham, The Boer War (New York: Random House,1979).