Captain Coombs’s first Acheh mission of late 1817 – February 1818 was the commission dispatched during the governorship of Governor Petrie of Penang to Acheh “to seek the true sultan” amid the Acheh succession dispute between Jauhar Alum at Pedir and Syf at Telok Semawé. The mission is recorded by Van der Kemp as the immediate precursor of the Raffles-Coombs commission of 1819, and as the source of Coombs’s settled conviction that Syf was the recognised sultan — a conviction that would lead directly to the paper war with Raffles on the roadstead of Banda Acheh.
The Mission
Captain Coombs was dispatched to Acheh at the end of 1817 or the beginning of 1818. On arrival he was informed by the chiefs that they had forever abjured Jauhar Alum and had recognised Syf as their sultan. A few days before Coombs’s arrival, however, a British brig under British colours had been boarded and plundered by Tuku Paekie of Pedir — the episode Van der Kemp mentions separately. Coombs raised the matter with the chiefs, who professed indignation at the scandal and promised to summon Paekie to account for it.
After a stay of fourteen days at Acheh, Coombs left the inhospitable port in February 1818, having had a meeting with Syf. He was convinced that Syf was the recognised ruler, but also that the British government would have to support him with a thousand men if he were to maintain his authority.
Aftermath
Coombs then proceeded to Calcutta to inform the Bengal government in accordance with the wishes of the Pinang administration. His report set the stage for the conflict of authorities that would ensue. When, in early 1819, Raffles — lieutenant-governor of Bencoolen — arrived at Calcutta to urge the cause of Jauhar Alum and to demand action against the supposed Dutch intrigues with that prince, he found Coombs already there pressing the opposite case on behalf of Syf. Governor-General Lord Moira, unable to decide between the conflicting advices, chose to send the two as joint commissioners, with Raffles enjoying a casting vote — the arrangement that produced the Raffles-Coombs Acheh Commission.
Significance
The mission also established the Three Sagis’s preference for Syf — a preference they would later reiterate, in unambiguous terms, in the letter to Governor [[W. E. Phillips|Phillips of 4 December 1822]]. There they reminded the governor that Coombs had first come alone to Acheh and that they had then declared Syf to be their sultan; that when Coombs had returned with Raffles they had given the same answer; and that they wished for no one but Syf, requesting his return. Governor Phillips was forced to refuse, and the recognition of Jauhar Alum — to which the Treaty of Pedir (1819) had committed the British — remained a dead letter on the ground.
See Also
- Raffles-Coombs Acheh Commission (1819)
- Acheh succession dispute (1802-1819)
- Captain Coombs
- Governor Petrie
- Sultan Jauhar Alum
- Sultan Saif ul-Alum
- Tunku Pakih
- Capture of British brig by Tunku Pakih
- Three Sagis
- Three Sagis’ letter to Penang (4 December 1822)
- Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles
- Lord Moira
- Acheh
- Banda Acheh
- Penang
- Calcutta
- Bengal
- Bencoolen
- Paper war
Source
Raffles’ Atjeh-overeenkomst van 1819, by P. H. van der Kemp, in Bijdragen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, 6e Volgr., Deel VII (1900), pp. 159-239. Universiteitsbibliotheek Vrije Universiteit, LS.08781.