The Closing of the Noord- en Westkust of 1889–1890 — the sluiting van de geheele Noord- en Westkust (closure of the entire North and West Coast) imposed by Generaal van Teijn in stages from January 1888 to the beginning of 1890 and sustained through 1891 — was, in Van Heutsz’s 1893 tract De onderwerping van Atjeh, the high-water mark of Dutch closure policy in the Atjeh-oorlog — the operational model that Van Heutsz would generalise in his 1893 prescription, and the immediate precedent for the pacification he would himself implement as Governor from 1898. The closure was applied “door een Gouverneur als Generaal van Teijn, die met veel beleid en energie te werk ging en daarbij krachtig en vol toewijding gesteund werd, in de eerste plaats door H. M. marine” — by a Governor like General Van Teijn, who worked with much circumspection and energy, and who was powerfully and devotedly supported, in the first place, by H. M. Navy — and was sustained on the civil side by den Heer Ruijssenaers, the assistent-resident (assistant resident) of Groot-Atjeh from medio 1890, and on the military side by the postcommandant te Segli (post commandant at Segli) who covered the Pedir–Gighen area of the Noordkust. The closure attained, by early 1891, “een effect … dat zelfs de verwachting van Generaal van Teijn overtrof” — an effect that exceeded even Van Teijn’s expectation — and was, in Van Heutsz’s reading, “toch nog boven verwachting doel” — still, beyond expectation, on target.
The progressive extension (January 1888 – beginning 1890)
The closure of the Noord- and Westkust was imposed in stages, beginning with the in Januari 1888 bevolen sluiting van een gedeelte der Westkust (the closure of a portion of the Westkust ordered in January 1888). The quick results — “Het waren vooral de snel bereikte gewichtige resultaten, die hij met de in Januari 1888 bevolen sluiting van een gedeelte der Westkust erlangde, welke hem tot het stelsel van sluiting brachten” — the weighty results he rapidly attained with the January 1888 closure of a portion of the Westkust — converted Van Teijn to the sluiting-stelsel (closure system) as a general policy. The closure was then progressively extended:
“in Januari 1888 toegestaan, van lieverlede tot de sluiting kwam die, zich steeds verder uitbreidende, in het begin van 1890 eindelijk was uitgestrekt over de geheele Noord- en Westkust”.
By the beginning of 1890 the entire Noord- en Westkust was closed. Van Heutsz’s catalogue of the closure’s coverage fixes the formal scope:
“de door den Generaal van Teijn in ‘t begin van 1890 ingevoerde algemeene sluiting van Noord- en Westkust in verband met de scheepvaartregeling op de Oostkust”.
The Oostkust remained open — “niettegenstaande zij niet zoo afdoende was, als die in 1884 door de Regeering gewenscht, omdat de Oostkust open bleef” — and Van Teijn’s sluiting was therefore, Van Heutsz concedes, less rigorous than the rigorous blokkade (blockade) the Regeering had wanted in 1884. But the closure was, in operation, “toch nog boven verwachting doel” — still, beyond expectation, on target. Van Heutsz even argues that Van Teijn’s “stelsel eigenlijk geen sluiting, maar scheepvaartregeling” was — that Van Teijn’s system was, in substance, not a closure but a scheepvaartregeling (shipping regulation), since the open Oostkust ports and the retained Dutch-held outlets on the Noord- en Westkust functioned as the call-ports of a scheepvaartregeling.
The H. M. marine support
The closure of the Noord- en Westkust was sustained, in the first place, by the H. M. marine (H. M. Navy). Van Heutsz’s encomium of Van Teijn’s governorship fixes the marine’s role:
“toegepast werd door een Gouverneur als Generaal van Teijn, die met veel beleid en energie te werk ging en daarbij krachtig en vol toewijding gesteund werd, in de eerste plaats door H. M. marine”.
The marine was the eerste (first) — the first — of Van Teijn’s supports: the patrol vessels (kruisbooten, marine patrol boats) that lay before the harbours of the closed statelets, the steam launches that intercepted the smuggling trade, and the warships that anchored off the coastal posts to provide the armed presence without which the closure could not have been enforced. The closure was, in this sense, a marine-enforced operation: the sluiting was the marine’s sluiting, and Van Teijn’s contribution was the beleid en energie (circumspection and energy) — the circumspection and energy — with which he directed it. The closure was thus the operational proof of the principle Van Heutsz would prescribe in 1893 — that the marine-enforced closure of the coast was the instrument by which the interior could be coerced into submission without requiring the dispersed occupation of the Onderhoorigheden (Dependencies).
The postcommandant te Segli and the Pedir-Gighen area
The closure of the Noordkust was administered, in the Pedir–Gighen area, by the postcommandant te Segli (post commandant at Segli) — the military commandant of the Dutch post at Segli who, under the Concentratie’s reassignment of controleurs (civil-administrative officials) to the military commandants of the posts, had inherited the civil-administrative functions of the abolished controleur te Segli. The postcommandant te Segli was, in effect, the Dutch official on the Noordkust through whom the sluiting of the Pedir–Gighen stretch of the coast was enforced; his post at Segli was the Dutch-administered call-port through which the trade of the federatie XII (the federation of twelve) — the federation of Noordkust statelets headed by Tengkoe Pakeh of Pedir — was, after the closure, required to pass. The postcommandant’s role was, in Van Heutsz’s narrative, the operational counterpart to the marine’s kruisbooten: the marine closed the harbours from the sea; the postcommandant policed the trade that, after the closure, was compelled to call at Segli.
The cooperation of Tengkoe Pakeh of Pedir was, in this context, the political fact that made the postcommandant te Segli’s work possible. The reclusive head of Pedir — whose revenue depended on the transit trade between the Noordkust and Kemala — submitted, in 1891, to the closure with the emblematic formula Van Heutsz preserves: “Mijnheer, repliceerde Tengkoe Pakeh, Uwe hand drukt zwaar, maar ik onderwerp mij aan Uwen wil” — Sir, replied Tengkoe Pakeh, your hand lies heavy, but I submit to your will. The submission was the political fruit of the closure: the postcommandant te Segli’s enforcement of the sluiting on the Pedir–Gighen stretch had reduced the passar (market) of Pedir to “geheel verarmd en zoo goed als verloopen” — wholly impoverished and practically decayed — and the once-resistant Tengkoe Pakeh had been compelled to accept the postcommandant’s terms.
The civil side: Ruijssenaers from medio 1890
The civil-administrative counterpart to Van Teijn’s military and coast-closure measures was his reliance on den Heer Ruijssenaers, who was appointed assistent-resident of Groot-Atjeh in medio 1890. Van Heutsz describes the appointment as the single administrative stroke of fortune of the Van Teijn governorship: “Gelukkig vond voorts de Generaal van Teijn in den medio 1890 als assistent-resident van Groot-Atjeh optredenden Heer Ruijssenaers een man van helder doorzicht en krachtig initiatief”. Ruijssenaers refused the quandême-bestuur (make-shift government) that had characterised the civil administration of the cajoleering-decade — “als ambtenaar een uitzondering maakte op den regel en niet quandême wilde besturen, zelfs daar, waar door het Regeeringsstelsel niet te besturen viel” — and he became the principal defender of the sluiting after Van Teijn’s departure. The closure of the Noord- en Westkust was, in this sense, sustained on the civil side by the assistent-resident of Groot-Atjeh whose “helder doorzicht en krachtig initiatief” (clear insight and forceful initiative) made the closure administratively enforceable in the field.
The “boven verwachting doel” result
The closure attained, by early 1891, “een effect … dat zelfs de verwachting van Generaal van Teijn overtrof” — an effect that exceeded even Van Teijn’s expectation. Van Heutsz records the result and the operational indices by which it was measured:
“En toen nu die zoo krachtig en stelselmatig toegepaste sluiting reeds in ruim één jaar tijd begin 1891 een effect had teweeggebracht, dat zelfs de verwachting van Generaal van Teijn overtrof, van verschillende zijden allerlei dringende voorstellen en smeekbeden kwamen, zooals b. v. van de Noordkust om al wat daar aan producten opgestapeld lag aan ons te Oleh-leh te mogen afleveren”.
The Noordkust chiefs, by early 1891, were begging to be allowed to deliver their accumulated produce to Oleh-leh — that is, to the Dutch-administered port of the geconcentreerde stelling (concentrated defensive line). The closure had reduced the Noordkust to a state in which the chiefs’ only remaining commercial option was to deliver their goods through the Dutch-administered outlet, pay the duties, and submit to the contrôle (supervision) the closure prescribed. The closure had, in other words, attained the doel (goal) — the goal — of placing the Dutch “op de geldkist van Atjeh” — on the cash-box of Atjeh — that Scherer’s scheepvaartregeling had been designed to attain.
The closure’s success was, in Van Heutsz’s reading, the operational vindication of the principle Scherer had conceived in 1880 and Laging Tobias had introduced in May 1883: that the contrôle op handel en scheepvaart (control over trade and shipping) would put the Dutch “op de geldkist” of Atjeh and provide both the middel tot beloonen als straffen (means both of rewarding and of punishing) and the middel om de hoofden … in het rechte spoor te houden (means of keeping the chiefs on the right track). The 1884 Concentratie had abolished the scheepvaartregeling Scherer had introduced; the Van Teijn closure of 1889–1890 had, in effect, restored it, and had done so under a Governor who combined the beleid en energie Van Heutsz prescribed with the marine support the closure required.
Significance
The Closing of the Noord- en Westkust of 1889–1890 is, in Van Heutsz’s 1893 tract, the high-water mark of Dutch closure policy in the Atjeh-oorlog and the immediate operational precedent for the 1893 prescription Van Heutsz would himself implement as Governor from 1898. Its significance in the Aceh Wiki History record lies in five things. First, it was the operational model Van Heutsz would generalise in his 1893 prescription: the marine-enforced closure of the coast combined with a scheepvaartregeling on the retained Dutch-administered ports, applied by a Governor of beleid en energie with a civil-administrative counterpart of helder doorzicht en krachtig initiatief. Second, it was sustained in the first place by the H. M. marine — the patrol vessels (kruisbooten) that lay before the harbours of the closed statelets, and the warships that anchored off the coastal posts to provide the armed presence without which the closure could not have been enforced. Third, it was administered on the Noordkust by the postcommandant te Segli who covered the Pedir–Gighen area, and whose enforcement of the closure on the federatie XII stretch of the coast reduced the passar of Pedir to “geheel verarmd en zoo goed als verloopen” and compelled Tengkoe Pakeh of Pedir to the submission of 1891. Fourth, it was sustained on the civil side by den Heer Ruijssenaers — assistent-resident of Groot-Atjeh from medio 1890 — whose “helder doorzicht en krachtig initiatief” made the closure administratively enforceable in the field, and whose Nota defending the closure Van Heutsz treats as the canonical defence of the sluiting against the new administration’s abandonment of it. Fifth, it attained, by early 1891, “een effect … dat zelfs de verwachting van Generaal van Teijn overtrof” — the Noordkust chiefs begging to deliver their accumulated produce to Oleh-leh — and so produced the boven verwachting doel (beyond-expectation goal) that Van Heutsz would cite, in 1893, as the empirical proof of the principle the 1893 prescription was designed to generalise.
See Also
- Van Teijn
- Ruijssenaers
- Segli
- Pedir
- Gighen
- Tengkoe Pakeh Pedir
- Noordkust
- Westkust
- Oostkust
- Olehleh
- Kemala
- marine
- Scheepvaartregeling
- Concentratiebesluit (19 Augustus 1884)
- Staatsblad No. 105 van 1884
- Van Teijn’s active defense (September 1889)
- Atjeh-oorlog (1873-1904)
- De onderwerping van Atjeh (Van Heutsz, 1893)
- 1889
- 1890
- 1891
Source
De onderwerping van Atjeh, door J. B. van Heutsz, Majoor der Infanterie, gewezen Chef van den Staf in Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden. ‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders Van Cleef; Batavia: G. Kolff en Co., 1893, esp. pp. 50, 56, 60, 62, 66–67, 73, 77. OCR-filename: 20260718_105749_DLP-107-De_onderwerping_van_Atjeh_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt.