The death of Colonel John Alexander Bannerman, Governor of Prince of Wales’ Island, on 8 August 1819, removed one of the principal figures in the early phase of the Acheh controversy and altered the balance of British policy in the Straits at a critical moment. Bannerman had been throughout 1819 in sharp conflict with Sir Stamford Raffles over the conduct of the Raffles–Coombs Acheh Commission, and his death occurred before the Calcutta government could resolve the dispute between them.
Bannerman, an experienced Madras officer and former Member of Parliament and East India Company director, had succeeded Governor Petrie at Penang and “viel als zoodanig midden in de hem onbekende Atjesche quaestiën” — fell, in that capacity, into the middle of Achehnese questions with which he was unfamiliar. His differences with Raffles had been numerous and fundamental. He had insisted that the Acheh commission proceed at once to Acheh with the military force Calcutta had provided; Raffles, after his detour to the Karimon Islands and the founding of Singapore, preferred to go first to Pedir and to Sultan Jauhar Alum. Bannerman and Captain Coombs both held this to be contrary to the Calcutta instructions; the Bengal government, in its report of 7 October 1820, subsequently agreed. The dispute extended to the disposal of the Bengal artillery detachment, to the dispatch of the Minto to Pedir, and to the very substance of the commission’s instructions.
The conflict was still unresolved when Bannerman died. Raffles, in his reply to Calcutta of 31 December 1819, denied having told Bannerman of any oral instructions at variance with the written ones; but, as Van der Kemp drily observes, “toen was echter Bannerman reeds overleden”. The governor’s death thus left Raffles’ account of the controversy uncontradicted by his principal antagonist.
Bannerman’s succession by W. E. Phillips — and ultimately by Robert Fullerton — was of considerable importance for the subsequent course of British Acheh policy. Phillips and Fullerton, together with the councillors Clubley and Ibbetson, pursued a more coherent and assertive line than Bannerman had been able to do. It was Phillips who received the letter of the three Sagis of 4 December 1822, Phillips who presided over the abortive attempt to call Syf to account during the Lucas mission of February 1821, and Fullerton who, in his minute of 21 March 1825, would declare the treaty of 1819 a “dead letter”. In this sense Bannerman’s death, falling where it did, was a small but consequential turning-point in the history of Britain’s Acheh entanglement.
See Also
- Colonel John Alexander Bannerman
- Governor Petrie
- W. E. Phillips
- Robert Fullerton
- W. A. Clubley
- R. Ibbetson
- Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles
- Captain Coombs
- Raffles-Coombs Acheh Commission (1819)
- Dispatch of the Minto to Pedir
- Founding of Singapore
- Raffles’ detour to Karimon Islands
- Three Sagis’ letter to Penang (4 December 1822)
- Lucas mission to Telok Semawé (February 1821)
- Fullerton’s minute on Acheh (21 March 1825)
- Penang
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.