Deutsche Ost-Afrika Linie (German East Africa Line, or DOAL) was a shipping line, established in 1890 as an alternative to the existing shipping services to East Africa, including German East Africa (1891–1919), then dominated by United Kingdom shipping lines.
Founding
In 1888, the board of the trading firm Woermann-Linie made plans to set up a scheduled service to East Africa as the existing routes were dominated by British lines. The following year the Reichstag approved such a shipping line and in January 1890 the Chancellor began looking for a German shipping company to set up a line to Africa subsidized for over ten years with 900,000 marks a year. As no company was ready, the Reich announced the establishment of a shipping company.[1]
On 19 April 1890 DOAL was founded with a capital of six million marks by a consortium of German banks and the Hamburg merchants Adolph Woermann, F. Laeisz, August Bolten, and Hansen & Co. C. Woermann took over the management with Adolph Woermann as Chairman of the Supervisory Board.[2] The line began operating on 23 July 1890 with two steamships bought from the Woermann line. Beginning in 1891, the service consisted of weekly departures from Hamburg via the Mediterranean to Bombay and Zanzibar.