The cancellation of friendship with Gigiëng (19 August 1876) was the formal Dutch breach with Toengkoe Bintara Kamangan — his princely name Potjoet Osman Bintara — the prince of Gigiëng on Atjeh’s north coast, who, after two years of outward submission, had been convicted of bad faith for secretly joining the war party and going himself to fight in the XXII Moekims. On that day Hr. Ms. steamship Marnix anchored on the Gigiëng roadstead and a proclamation of the civil and military commander declared the friendship ended and the harbours of his state closed to trade. It was described by H. F. Meijer in Atjeh van 26 December 1875 tot 4 September 1876 (1883).
The suspicion
Toengkoe Bintara Kamangan had submitted during the Second Expedition, on receipt of the pembrian radja (the prince’s presents), and had owed to that submission the reopening of his harbours to trade — a great source of income, because Gigiëng and the neighbouring Pidir, the states whose rivers shared one mouth, had become the natural supply places of the whole war party when Olehleh and Kroeëng Raja were closed. But since his submission the prince had never once given proof of his good disposition. As the war party in Groot-Atjeh raised its head again after the return of Habib Abdoer Rachman, rumours reached the civil and military commander that the prince of Gigiëng attached himself ever more closely to that party.
The conviction of bad faith
In July 1876 certainty was obtained from three sides: Radja Mangkoeta, one of the few Pidir heads very well disposed to the Dutch; Toekoe Imam of Gigiëng, one of the moekim heads of Gigiëng, who lived on a good footing with the Dutch officials and probably at odds with his prince; and the zealous Dutch political agent at Penang, Lavino. Toekoe Imam reported that the raja had invited various heads in his realm to collect money for the prang sabil (holy war) against the Netherlands, and had dismissed the well-disposed Toekoe Moeda Rajat as head of the pasar (market master) at Gigiëng, replacing him by the hostile Toekoe Hasjim.
Two of the prince’s own letters — to the civil and military commander and to the naval station commander — put all doubt at rest. Written in ambiguous and confused wording as usual, they nevertheless announced his departure for Groot-Atjeh. Undated and sealed only with his private seal, they arrived in August, when it had to be assumed that Bintara Kamangan had already gone to wage war in person in the XXII Moekims.
The proclamation
Under these conditions, Meijer wrote, it was impossible to keep up even the name of friendship and to let the Dutch flag wave on his territory. An open breach — a vredebreuk (breach of the peace) — was necessary, and it took place on the order of the Netherlands Indies Government. On 19 August Hr. Ms. steamship Marnix anchored on the Gigiëng roadstead; the proclamation of the civil and military commander was made known to the heads and the people, declaring the friendship with the prince openly ended and his harbours closed to trade; at the request of the commander of the Marnix the Dutch flag, which had waved at the capital of Gigiëng since 1874, was hauled down.
The civil and military commander notified the Dutch consuls in the Straits Settlements; the assistant-resident at Pidir was to inform the princes of the other north-coast states, the rulers of Endjoeng and Ajer Leboe being specially warned that a like lot awaited their states if they did not quickly change their hesitating course. The prince of the always hostile Pasangan received a direct letter with the necessary warnings — General Wiggers van Kerchem judging this needful also as an answer to a letter from that prince that showed anything but friendship.
After-effects
The breach with Gigiëng lasted two years. In that period the Dutch fortification at Segli was repeatedly alarmed and attacked, not only by the people of that realm but by the band of the notorious Toekoe di Tiro, coming out of Pidir territory. An expedition sent from Groot-Atjeh to Gigiëng in 1878 ended with Bintara Kamangan’s second submission.
Significance
The event shows what submission meant on the north coast in the first war years: princes reopened trade by outward declarations, then used the income to feed the resistance — while the Dutch, absent permanent establishments along that coast, could only answer bad faith with blockade and proclamation. It also fed directly into the Habib’s system, which counted the fidelity of coastal princes among its principal means of war.
See Also
- Toengkoe Bintara Kamangan
- Gigiëng
- Segli
- Radja Mangkoeta
- Toekoe Imam of Gigiëng
- Toekoe Moeda Rajat
- Lavino
- Occupation of Pidir (31 May - 4 June 1876)
- Prang sabi
- Guerilla warfare in Groot-Atjeh
Source
Atjeh van 26 December 1875 tot 4 September 1876, door H. F. Meijer (Breda: P. B. Nieuwenhuijs, 1883), chapter VIII, pp. 278–281.