The Storming of the Mesigit (6 January 1874) was the costly frontal assault delivered by the second Aceh expedition against the fortified Mesigit — the great mosque-voorwerk that guarded the northern approach to the Kraton — on 6 January 1874, launched by opperbevelhebber van Swieten “tegen alle Indische traditiën in, zonder noemenswaardige voorbereiding, alleen in front, waar ze natuurlijk het sterkst was” (against all Indian traditions, without any worthwhile preparation, only in front, where it was of course strongest), and which cost the Dutch 220 dood en gekwetsten before luitenant-kolonel Pel’s flanking movement finally carried the work.
The Position
The Mesigit lay only 1200 passen from the Dutch bivouak of Penajoeng, yet for the entire month between the landing of 6 December 1873 and the assault, no proper reconnaissance had been undertaken. The Atjehneezen had used the respite to construct what Borel calls a “meesterlijk” work: a 180-metre earthen borstwering reinforced with bamboo, fitted with dwarswallen and schietkokers, and fronted by a dry gracht filled with bamboe-doeri. The whole position lay concealed in the palm groves “als een tijger die op zijn prooi loert” — like a tiger crouched for its prey. The Dutch, having failed to reconnoitre, knew none of this when the order to storm went in.
The Assault
Battalion after battalion was sent forward across the open sawah. Each in turn was repulsed by the “moorddadig vuur” of an enemy who fired from cover against men standing in the open. The light veldgeschut of the Dutch batteries, pushed up to support the infantry, could make no impression on the earthen wall or its bamboo-doeri crown. For hours the slaughter continued. At last kolonel de Roy van Zuydewijn succeeded in gaining footing on the borstwering in the teeth of the defenders, while luitenant-kolonel Pel, moving around the flank, entered the Mesigit unopposed from the rear and broke the resistance. The work was carried, but at a price Borel records in a single grim line: 220 dood en gekwetsten. The enemy’s losses were, he adds, “vermoedelijk slechts onbeduidend” — probably inconsiderable — since the defenders had fought from cover and retired in good order once the flank was turned.
Borel’s Judgement
Borel’s indictment of the operation is unqualified. The frontal assault violated every Indische tradition of siege craft. No sappe-work had been opened, no batteries had been emplaced to enfilade the borstwering, no reconnaissance had mapped the schietkokers or the bamboo-doeri gracht. The enemy had been given the entire month of December to entrench; the Dutch had been given no information at all about what they were to assault. A flanking movement from the first, such as Pel would execute on 6 January 1874 itself, would have carried the Mesigit at a fraction of the cost. The 220 casualties of the Mesigit, Borel implies, were the price of van Swieten’s “gruwel van bloedvergieten” — his horror of deliberate, methodical siege work, which he preferred to risk in a single impetuous assault. The lesson was not learned. The same pattern of neglecting reconnaissance and refusing the encircling movement would, three weeks later, be repeated before the Kraton itself — and only Verspijck’s omtrekkende beweging of 23–24 January 1874 would, at the last moment, retrieve the situation.
See Also
- Second Aceh Expedition (1873–1874)
- Mesigit of Atjeh
- Kraton of Atjeh
- Kolonel de Roy van Zuydewijn
- Generaal Pel
- Bombardment of the Kraton (January 1874)
- Fall of the Kraton (24 January 1874)
- Bamboe-doeri versperringen
- Jan van Swieten
- 1874
Source
Onze vestiging in Atjeh, critisch beschreven, by G. F. W. Borel, Kapitein der Artillerie. ‘s-Gravenhage: D. A. Thieme, 1878. pp. 14–17, 20, 27, 70, 102.