British Cameroons

British Cameroons was the British mandate territory in West Africa formed from the western strips of the former German colony of Kamerun. Britain and France occupied Kamerun during the First World War, and the League of Nations divided it in 1922, giving Britain two disconnected areas along the Nigerian border: the Northern Cameroons and the Southern Cameroons. They were administered as part of Nigeria rather than as a separate colony, an arrangement that nationalists later criticized. The territory became a United Nations trust territory in 1946, still administered from Nigeria. After the Second World War the question of its future became pressing as Nigeria moved toward independence. A plebiscite was held on 11 February 1961: the Northern Cameroons voted to join Nigeria, which happened on 1 June 1961, while the Southern Cameroons voted to join the Republic of Cameroon on 1 October 1961. British rule thus ended through partition rather than independence, and the territory is distinct from both German Kamerun and French Cameroons.