Bismarck was deeply frustrated. He had never considered himself ordinary, but when it came to overseas colonization, he truly knew nothing at all. He had never studied how to communicate with natives, yet Frederick William IV's orders were absolute, and he could only carry them out.
Frederick William IV genuinely wanted nothing more than to torment to death this minister who had made him look like an idiot. He absolutely could not tolerate such humiliation.
Thus, Bismarck received twenty thousand Thaler in startup funds, along with a colonial team made up of three hundred prisoners.
The reason Frederick William IV made his intentions so obvious was mainly because his understanding of colonial ventures was extremely limited. He thought colonies were developed through transported convicts.
But this made things miserable for Bismarck. On one hand, he had to use his meager funds to hire experts and sailors; on the other, he had to subdue the prisoners Frederick William IV had sent him.
There were not many people in the entire Kingdom of Prussia who understood colonies, and even fewer who had traveled across the oceans. Fortunately, neighboring Denmark and the Netherlands had no shortage of such talent, and there were also quite a few unappreciated capable people within the Kingdom of Prussia, which was currently at a low ebb.
And so Bismarck actually managed to cobble together a team. As for the prisoners, he persuaded them all as well—some with reason, and some with physics.
Thus, Bismarck began selecting a target for colonization. Unfortunately, nearly every region in North Africa and West Africa had already been beaten to the punch. Even where no colony had been established, the land had been marked as some nation's sphere of influence.
The Nigeria region had nominally not yet been colonized, but the British had