QUEENSLAND'S GERMAN CONNECTIONS - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Queensland’s mining industry

Also at that time, the firm Aron Hirsch und Söhne was buying copper from the O.K. Development Syndicate Limited, a Cairns-based company operating 50 miles (80km) northwest of Chillagoe. (Moffat even offered his whole North Queensland mining enterprise for sale to the Hirsch Brothers in 1906, but the sale never happened.) In Germany during this period, capital for overseas investments was limited and so joint ventures of investment banks and stock companies were established. This facilitated large-scale functional, integrated organisations, characterised by product diversification. These vertically-integrated groups covered production from the mining stage through the refining stage, up to the finishing stage. German cartels and syndicates grew vigorously with the stimulation of banks, which controlled the stock market by using their current credit accounts. Amalgamating banks and companies formed trusts. These mergers combined power with scientific leadership and were enormously important at that time in the Gründerjahre (‘early years’) of German technical achievement after 1871. One example was the close relationship between Siemens and Deutsche Bank; Krupp, BASF and AEG were another. On 17 May 1881 German Metallgesellschaft (MG) was founded by the Anglo-German merchant Wilhelm Merton and two partners, with a share capital of 2 million marks. MG became the centre of the international metal trade up to the First World War, rapidly developing extensive relations abroad until within a short time it was represented in cities across Europe and, within a few years, a network of subsidiaries spanned the globe. (HRM Corp. London, founded by Wilhelm’s uncle Henry Merton, also expanded internationally with interests in the USA, Mexico and, in 1889, the Australian Metal Company.) MG began with 40 employees and one installed telephone line. It first traded in copper, lead, and zinc, later diversifying into nickel and aluminum. From 1889, these ores extracted around the world were analysed and tested by the specially-created technical department, which grew rapidly, from 1897 to become the fully owned subsidiary Metallurgische Gesellschaft Aktiengesellschaft . MG developed and flourished in the generally favourable climate of the late period of the Gründerjahre . In the company’s first ten years, its capital was raised to 6 million marks and the dividend payments were between 7% and 33%. By the 1900s it was a growing, prosperous concern, involved in many sectors, internationally active in trading and engineering technology, in the fields of mining and metallurgy.

In 1906, the 25th anniversary of MG, Wilhelm Merton brought about the long-envisaged creation of a separate finance company and a broader financial base for the group through the founding of the Berg- und Metallbank , which merged with the Metallurgische Gesellschaft four years later. World War I hit Metallgesellschaft hard. The good relations established abroad were broken off, imports of raw material dried up and MG lost its overseas subsidiaries. Even London-based HRM fell under the British Non-Ferrous Metals Industry Bill of November 1917 and was liquidated. This bill was promoted by Australia’s then-Attorney General ‘Billy’ Hughes, and was designed to eliminate enemy influence and control over the British ore and metal trade. Henry Merton then reorganised his business and MG had to obtain its metal supplies from neutral countries for as long as possible and eventually to use up domestic sources or intensify their exploitation. With the passing of Wilhelm Merton in 1916, his sons Richard and Alfred assumed the top positions in MG and Metallbank. While Alfred emigrated in 1933 after the National Socialists came to power, Richard kept his position in Frankfurt as long as possible before escaping to England in 1939. He returned to Germany in 1947 and remained chairman of MG until his death in 1960. Interests in Queensland resumed after the war, and Metallgesellschaft AG engaged in gold exploration west of Mackay, and further searches for tin in the Herberton area, until its bankruptcy in 1993. On a corporate basis there was a good relationship with Mount Isa Mines Ltd (MIM). Company shares were exchanged as were board memberships. MG and MIM both held shares in Teck Corp. (later Teck-Cominco), and MIM owned part of MG’s Ruhrzink plant in Datteln, and the majority of the Berzelius smelter plant in Germany. There would be an interval of over 20 years before Germany resumed an active role in Queensland’s rich resources future. Dr Leschhorn is the principal of MMI and has drawn on his extensive mining industry experience for this essay.

REFERENCES 1. Ruth S. Kerr, The German Demand for Wolfram, Tin and Copper from North Queensland 1890-1914 in: Zeitschrift für Unternehmensgeschichte (Journal for Business History), 36. Jahrgang, H.2 (1991), pp.61-75 (Verlag C.H. Beck) 2. Riches of Wolfram Camp, A Mareeba Historical Society Publication, compiled by John C. Hay, Edited by Natalie J. Bird BA Hum, Mareeba 2005 3. P.H. Emden, Jews of Britain (1943), index; P. Stein, Wilhelm Merton (1917) 4. C. Fürstenberg, Wilhelm Merton, Lebensgeschichte eines deutschen Bankiers (1931)

231