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King Leopold II, whose rule of the Congo Free State was marked by severe atrocities, violence and major population decline.. Even before his accession to the throne of Belgium in 1865, the future king Leopold II began lobbying leading Belgian politicians to create a colonial empire in the Far East or in Africa, which would expand and enhance Belgian prestige. [2]
The younger Leopold died in 1869 at the age of nine from pneumonia after falling into a pond. His death was a source of great sorrow for King Leopold. The marriage became unhappy, and the couple separated after a last attempt to have another son, a union that resulted in the birth of their last daughter, Clementine.
It was privately owned by King Leopold II, the constitutional monarch of the Kingdom of Belgium. In legal terms, the two separate countries were in a personal union . [ 1 ] [ 2 ] The Congo Free State was not a part of, nor did it belong to Belgium.
In Belgian public discourse, King Leopold II of Belgium (r. 1865–1909), who ruled the Congo Free State as his private property from 1885 to 1908, is generally held to bear the primary responsibility for the atrocities committed there in that colonial period. In the early 21st century, statues of Leopold II have been regularly defaced or ...
King Leopold II in the late 1800s. Leopold thought overseas colonies were of critical importance to become a great power, and worked to establish colonial possessions for Belgium. The national legislature did not authorize the colonial enterprise, and Leopold eventually acquired a colony in the Congo for himself with money loaned by the Belgian ...
Planned in 1909, the day after the death of King Leopold II, the Monument to the Belgian Pioneers in Congo was meant to be a patriotic hommage to the so-called 'civilising mission' of the first Belgian colonials, and more specifically, to the transfer of the Congo Free State by Leopold II to Belgium in 1908. [1]
Although few African scholars seriously question that large numbers died in Leopold's Congo, the subject remains a touchy one in Belgium itself. [4] The country's Royal Museum for Central Africa , founded by Leopold II, mounted a special exhibition in 2005 about the colonial Congo; in an article in the New York Review of Books , Hochschild ...
The monument's inscription states: 'Homage to HM King Leopold II and to ALL his Limburgian assistants'. It features a bust of Leopold II and the names of soldiers from Limburg who died in the Congo Free State. [17] It was vandalised as part of the George Floyd protests in 2020, [5] but the red paint was cleaned up. [17]