As the son of a Prussian aristocrat by birth, his Roman Catholic family traced its origins back to Meissen in mediaeval times, with the title Baron (German: Freiherr) conferred in the 16th, and confirmed by a coat of arms in the 17th century.

Basil Cave, the British representative there, informed the Foreign Secretary, Marquess of Salisbury, in September, that he "remains in the house all the doors of which are guarded, from the inside, by about ten armed sailors or marines from a German man-of-war in harbour.

In October 1896, Rechenberg wrote to Cave saying, "Monsieur le Gerant, J'ai l'honneur de vous informer que mon Gouvemement m'a ordonne d'envoyer Chalid bin Bargash á Dar-es-Salaam.

[4] Rechenberg, who had previously studied at the oriental Seminar of the Friedrich Wilhelm Universität, founded in 1879, (now the Humboldt University of Berlin), with his time in Tanga and Zanzibar, became fluent in his command of other languages, adding a proficiency in Arabic, Gujarati and Kiswahili.

[6] As a consequence of these events, the hitherto almost exclusively military governorship of the territory came to be reconsidered, and Albrecht von Rechenberg was confirmed as the first civilian governor of German East Africa, assuming his post in 1906.

[8] In addition, while many settler voices were in favour of removing Indians and the coloured population, and replacing them with German or other similar stock, Rechenberg maintained friendly relations with them, refused to limit their immigration, and thought their involvement as middle traders an important contribution to the economy.

His aides in office also became targets of this ill-feeling and a series of attacks in the press during the latter part of his governorship in 1910 culminated in a number of successful libel actions against the source, Willy von Roy, the editor of the most widely read newspaper in the colony, the Deutsch-Ostafrikanische Zeitung, led initially by Wilhelm Methner, Rechenberg's first in command, and Knape, the acting senior judge (German:Regierungsrat), but later by Rechenberg himself, when accusations of homosexuality were levelled at him in the press.

[11] Rechenberg's term as governor ended when he left Africa in 1911, after a period of five years or so without any significant native unrest, and with considerable advances in transportation, taxation, civil administration and economic expansion.