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Memel District 1920-1939

Memelland, nowadays Klaipėda (Lithuania)

by Jaume Ollé

Introduction
Description
Pilot Flag
Mistakenly reported flag

See also:

Memel Historical Flags (17th-19th Century)
Germany
Klaipėda (Lithuania)

Introduction

Memelland was a German territory until the end of the First World War. The name stemmed from the capital city, Memel, today called Klaipeda. By the Peace Treaty of Versailles (1919) the Memelland (a rather artificial name) was separated without referendum from the beaten German Empire and occupied by French troops. It got a status comparable to a free state under international observation. That was the time when on the 25th February 1920 a golden-yellow over red horizontally divided flag was created by virtue of an ambassadorial conference. In the upper corner, on a black-fringed red circle symbols out of the Memel city Arms were illustrated: a gate tower, wharf elements and a boat, all coloured in yellow. During the Ruhr crisis in 1923 Lithuanian volunteer irregulars occupied the Memelland, followed by the formal annexation of the Memelland by Lithuania. Hence the Memelland was part of the Lithuanian Republic, legally enjoying an autonomous status, but in fact under martial law. In 1939 Nazi Germany forced the return of the Memelland to Germany.

Norman Martin, 20 January 1998

I do not know if hoisting of the Memelland flag was allowed under Lithuanian occupation/supremacy. It is not probable that under the Nazi regime the 1920 flag could be re-used, since the Nazis suppressed all State flags like the Bavarian one to push only the Hakenkreuzflagge (swastika flag). From 1944 onwards the Baltic states were conquered by the Soviet troops. Stalin revived the three Baltic states Estonia, Lithuania (including the Memelland) and Latvia, but they became communist puppet states. It is very unlikely that the Memelland flag could be hoisted during this period or later again.

Dieter Linder, 5 April 1998

I recently found in a German ship amateurs' journal called Strandgut an article