Gotfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen

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descriptionDutch colonial officer, Marechaussee commander, and Governor of Aceh (1905–1908) whose Gayo-Alas campaign of 1904 completed the military pacification of Aceh but whose harsh civil governorship provoked the Atjéh-enquête.
tagsperson, officer, dutch, knil, marechaussee, aceh, governor, colonial, military, 19th-century, 20th-century, acheh, general, aceh-war, gayo, gajoetocht, gayoland, commander, colonel
aliasesG. C. E. van Daalen, Van Daalen, lieutenant-colonel Van Daalen, the Van Daalen of the Gajo-Alas expedition, Overste Van Daalen, Gouverneur Van Daalen, legercommandant Van Daalen, G.C.E. van Daalen, Godfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen, kapitein Van Daalen, generaal Van Daalen, Obos Panalan, Panalan, G. C. H. v. Daalen, E. C. van Daalen, Kolonel van Daalen, Captain Van Daalen, E.C. van Daalen, Gotfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen, Colonel Van Daalen

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Gotfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen was a Dutch colonial officer and one of the most capable column commanders of the Aceh War, whose brilliant 1904 campaign against the Gayo and Alas highlands — known to the Acehnese as the Van Daalen Column — made him, in the eyes of Van Heutsz, the obvious successor to the Aceh governorship. As Civil and Military Governor of the Gouvernement Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden from 1905 to 1908, however, he abandoned the conciliatory policy that had defined Van Heutsz’s pacification system in favour of punishment and coercion — a deviation that provoked a fierce flare-up of resistance, a formal inquiry, a public rift with his patron, and his eventual removal from office. In Acehnese memory he was remembered as Toean Obers Van Daalen — Toean Obers being the Acehnese idiom for “the colonel” — and as “a man whose life had no price,” a judgement recorded by the old hunter Datoek in Merac’s Oost-Indisch Journael (1947).

Military career and the Gayo-Alas campaign of 1904

Van Daalen rose to prominence as a column commander during the Aceh War, earning a reputation as an uitmuntend colonnecommandant (excellent column commander) for his energy, tactical skill, and relentless pursuit of the enemy. Before his 1904 campaign, De Buitenbezittingen records, the Dutch “wisten goed als niets” — knew effectively nothing — of the inhabitants of the Alas valley. In June 1904 Van Daalen — then still a lieutenant colonel, leading a column of 120 marechaussées on a four-month expedition — broke the last organised resistance in the interior, bringing the country “ineens geheel onder onze macht” (at once entirely under our power) in a single zegetocht (victorious campaign).

The same campaign traversed the Gayo lands, where Van Daalen installed the minor Kédjoerön Bédén as the legitimate territorial chief of the Gayo Loeës in 1904. An alternative account, drawn from A. and H. Algra’s Dispereert Niet (Deel XI, 1946), records that Van Daalen departed in February 1904 with a force of approximately 200 marechaussees, charged with traversing the Gajo highlands. His force crossed mountain passes comparable to the Alps, defeated a series of fortified positions each guarded by thousands of defenders, and at one point survived near-starvation by subsisting on a captured python. The expedition lasted 163 days, ending when Van Daalen reached Tarotoung in the Tapanoeli residency on 18 June 1904.

The expedition was documented by J. C. J. Kempees in “De tocht van overste Van Daalen door de Gajö-, Alas- en Bataklanden.” At two grote hoofdvergaderingen — on 2 June 1904 for Gajö Loeüs and on 29 June 1904 for Alasland — Van Daalen announced the new stand of affairs, including that all matters must go through the Këdjoeroen and that slavery would no longer be tolerated. The slavernij abolition in Gajö- and Alaslanden followed, with conversion to pandelingschap (debt-bondage) with registration used as a transitional measure.

The Van Daalen Column in colonial memory

In Merac’s Oost-Indisch Journael (1947) Van Daalen is the second-named in Musket’s catalogue of the famous fighters and Marechaussee commanders of the Aceh War: “Gilles Graafland, Van Daalen, Campioni, Christoffel, Van der Maaten, Scheepens, Watrin, Webb, Colijn, Geertsema Beckering, Darlang and the sergeants Nussy, Salowono, Pongoh … a colourful array.” The reputation of the Van Daalen Column is distilled in the judgement of the old hunter Datoek: “I know Toean Obers Van Daalen very well. That was a very great lord, ‘a man whose life has no price!’”

The same chapter offers one small humanising detail: “But, sir, that Toean Van Daalen was not without tenderness where animals were concerned.” Van Daalen could get angry when he saw Acehnese going to the market carrying chickens by the legs, with the head down.

Appointment as Governor of Aceh

In 1904, Van Heutsz became Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies and almost immediately proposed Van Daalen as his successor in Aceh, in succession to Jhr. J. C. v. d. Wyck, despite widespread opposition from virtually every advisor. C. Snouck Hurgronje, the Adviser for Native and Arab Affairs, wrote a secret memorandum in 1904 warning that Van Daalen was “inhumane, ruwe, tactlooze manier van besturen en rechtspreken” — inhuman, rude and tactless in his dealings with local chiefs. Hendrikus Colijn, then a captain and later advisor for the outer islands, privately favoured the more junior H. N. A. Swart for the civil role. Minister Idenburg initially tried to postpone the appointment, suggesting Van Daalen be sent to lead an expedition in Boni instead.

Van Heutsz insisted. In a letter to Idenburg of 21 May 1905 he formally appointed Van Daalen civil and military governor of Atjèh en Onderhoorigheden, arguing that no other candidate combined the necessary military experience and local knowledge.

Governorship, 1905–1908

Upon taking office, Van Daalen pursued a policy of strict control and punishment. He imposed heavy fines on local chiefs, often for minor offences, and deposited the proceeds into the local road-works fund (wegenfonds), a practice Van Heutsz had explicitly forbidden. He arbitrarily dismissed and imprisoned oelèëbalangs (territorial chiefs) without replacing them, leaving many districts without traditional leadership. He interned chiefs and their relatives at Sabang without legal grounds or judicial review, established a criminal register for chiefs recording even trivial infractions, and used the incarceration of women and children as a means of pressure. His motto, as paraphrased in official correspondence, was: “You cannot trust those fellows; you must beat and oppress them, and then they will obey.”

The results were counterproductive. In districts such as Pidië and Lho’ Seumawé, chiefs refused to cooperate and the population became alienated. These policies provoked the vrij hevige opflikkering van het verzet (fairly fierce flare-up of resistance) of 1907 and 1908 that Van Daalen’s successor Swart would have to overcome through a more conciliatory approach.

The wasé oelèëbalang reform (1906)

As governor, Van Daalen issued the besluit of 12 December 1906 N°. 112, reforming the wasé oelèëbalang — the sovereignty right of Oelèëbalangs over pepper and pinang — from fixed amounts to 10% of value. This reform caused the pepper decline, as the percentage-based levy was far more burdensome than the previous fixed amounts (1–1½/bahra pinang in Groot-Atjèh). The reform was reversed by governor Swart’s besluit of 13 January 1910 N°. 1, which returned to fixed amounts.

The Hasil-reglement reform (1905)

Van Daalen also modified the Hasil-reglement on 23 October 1905 (Bt. N°. 86), treating Gouvernementsbestuursvestigingen as Gouvernementsgrondgebied and thereby depriving landschapshoofden of rights-shares on goods consumed there. This reform disadvantaged the hoofden of harbour-landschappen and was restored by Swart (Bt. 30 June 1908 N°. 55) with ƒ345,288 total restitution.

The first moekimschool (1907)

Van Daalen opened the first moekimschool (village school) in Groot Atjèh in 1907 with 38 pupils, modelling it on Java’s pre-existing village school system. This began the volksonderwijs (native education) system in Atjèh, which was rapidly expanded under his successor Swart to 51 schools with 2,009 pupils by 1909 and 258 schools with 15,476 pupils by 1919.

The voorschotten scheme (1908)

In 1908 Van Daalen proposed granting interest-free advances (voorschotten) of ƒ60,000 to worthy Atjèhnese to combat usury. On 18 March 1908 (Gouv. Bt. N°. 6) the sum was made available, later corrected to 4% interest except for an initial ƒ24,000. The scheme failed due to lack of supervision and abuse by chiefs, and was opposed by Swart in his nota of 10 August 1908 (N°. 2704/22).

The Atjéh-enquête and removal

By mid-1907, complaints about Van Daalen’s rule had reached the press in the Netherlands and the Dutch parliament. In October 1907, a series of virulent articles under the pseudonym “Wekker” appeared in De Avondpost, accusing Van Daalen of gross misconduct and cruelty. Van Heutsz initially defended his protégé, but under pressure from Minister Fock — and after receiving credible reports of abuses — he travelled to Aceh personally in November–December 1907, accompanied by the Army Commander Rost van Tonningen and the Secretary-General D. F. W. van Rees, to conduct the Atjéh-enquête in person.

The findings were devastating. In Van Heutsz’s own words: “Wat toen aan ‘t licht kwam was meer dan ergerlijk” (What came to light was more than reprehensible). On 24 December 1907, Van Heutsz sent Van Daalen a personal letter that amounted to a formal censure. Van Daalen requested relief from his post on 28 December 1907; his request was accepted, and he was formally relieved of his duties in May 1908.

Later career and legacy

Despite the political and personal setback, Van Daalen’s military reputation remained intact. After a period of leave in Europe, he returned to the Indies and was appointed Chief of the General Staff in 1908; in 1910 he became Commander of the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (K.N.I.L.), a position he held until his retirement. He died in 1930.

Significance

Van Daalen is significant in the AcehWiki corpus in two registers. As the historical actor Gotfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen, he is the brilliant column commander whose 1904 Gayo-Alas campaign completed the military pacification of the interior and whose subsequent harsh governorship provoked the Atjéh-enquête and the public rift with Van Heutsz — a classic case study of the failure of coercive pacification when transferred from the military to the civil sphere. As the legendary Toean Obers Van Daalen of Merac’s Oost-Indisch Journael, he is the second-named of Musket’s Marechaussee commanders — the very great lord for whom a human life had no value, but who had mercy for chickens. Kreemer’s account, in turn, supplies the technical anatomy of his governorship — the wasé reform, the Hasil-reglement modification, the moekimschool founding, the voorschotten scheme — that allows the administrative record of his short and controversial civil governorship to be reconstructed in detail.

Account from Atjèh by J. Kreemer (Deel II)

Kreemer records a number of specific administrative details of Van Daalen’s governorship (1905–1908) that are not in the earlier British and Dutch sources:

The 1904 expedition was the Gajö-Alas campaign: Van Daalen entered the Gajö Loeüs on 2 June 1904 and the Alasland on 29 June 1904, completing the subjugation of both highland areas in a single combined operation.

Under Van Daalen, the wasé oelèëbalang (the tribute paid to oelèëbalang’s as a percentage of trade-good values) was reformed by Gouvernementsbesluit (Bt.) 12 December N°. 112 (1906), which fixed it at 10% of the value of traded goods. Kreemer notes that this high rate caused a severe decline in the pepper trade of the Westkust, as cultivators and traders avoided regions where the wasé applied at this rate.

In October 1905, Van Daalen reformed the Hasil-reglement by Bt. 23 October N°. 86 — tightening revenue extraction in ways that Kreemer judged to have damaged the Acehnese economy.

Van Daalen established the first moekimschool (village school) in 1907, with an initial enrolment of 38 pupils. He also introduced the voorschotten (advances) scheme in 1908, providing ƒ60,000 to Acehnese oelèëbalang’s and landschapskassen as advances on future revenue — a scheme his successor Swart would oppose and eventually discontinue.

Account from Schets eener parlementaire geschiedenis (1955)

The following account is drawn from the parliamentary history of the Dutch Second Chamber as narrated by Vermeulen in the colonial section of the 1955 fourth revised edition of Rengers’s *Schets*.

G. C. E. van Daalen — Gotfried Coenraad Ernst van Daalen — was the Dutch lieutenant-colonel (later general) whose expedition to the Gajoe-, Alas- and Bataklanden in 1904 was the bloodiest single episode of the post-Toekoe Oemar’s defection ([[1896)|Oemar]] phase of the Atjeh-oorlog ([[1873-1904)|Atjeh-oorlog]], and whose subsequent tenure as governor and military commander of Atjeh (1905-1907) was brought to an end by the “Wekeer” affair of October 1907 and the harsh report of governor-general Van Heutsz in June 1908.

The 1904 expedition

In 1904 Van Daalen led the expedition to the Gajoe-, Alas- and Bataklanden that, in the official framing, was to have begun “bespreking van wederzijdse belangen” — discussion of mutual interests — with the inland chiefs. In practice it became a campaign of annihilation. According to the official figures cited by Vermeulen, 2,922 inlanders — among them 1,149 women and children — were killed “in weinige dagen” — in a few days. The expedition “verstoorde echter reeds zeer spoedig de illusie van de naderende vrede” — shattered very soon the illusion of approaching peace — that Van Kol’s 1902 traverse of Atjeh had encouraged.

Parliamentary reactions

Van Kol (s.d.) declared the expedition “erger dan de dagen van Alva’s schrikbewind” — worse than the days of Alva’s reign of terror. The Catholic De Stuers went further back into history and compared it to the campaigns of Timoer Lenk and Djengis Khan: “Het is of men op de inlanders een bende bloedhonden heeft losgelaten, het is beulenwerk”. De Stuers’ conclusion echoed that of Fransen van de Putte: “Laten wij beschaving brengen, maar niet door middel van bloedbaden! Wat is daarvoor dan nodig? Eén ding. Geduld. Dat nu ontbreekt”.

The comparison went, in Vermeulen’s verdict, “zo ver buiten de voor een afgevaardigde van één der regeringspartijen gebruikelijke vormen van kritiek” — so far beyond the forms of criticism customary for a representative of one of the governing parties — that De Stuers was openly and solemnly gedesavoueerd — disavowed — by his fractieleider Kolkman. The members of the expedition, meanwhile, had received 148 decorations — including 44 military Willemsorden — for “180 bajonetten” (it was actually about 230); a generosity that De Stuers found “wat overdadig”.

Appointment as governor of Atjeh

In 1905 Van Daalen was appointed militair commandant en gouverneur van Atjeh. The Raad van Indië had recommended Colonel Swart, but governor-general Van Heutsz persuaded the minister to appoint Van Daalen instead. According to testimony preserved in Schets eener parlementaire geschiedenis, Van Heutsz said to him: “Ga je gang, ik vertrouw je. Ge hebt goede en kwade eigenschappen; ik geef u die post en als gij nu maar zorgt, dat er geen gedonder komt dan kunt gij zolang uw gang gaan, maar als het aan de grote klok komt dan voor jou een ander”.

The “Wekeer” affair

Under the pseudonym “Wekeer” — a maréchaussée-officer from Atjeh — a series of articles appeared in De Avondpost in October 1907 detailing needless cruelties allegedly committed against the Atjehnese population, “toegelaten zo niet aangemoedigd door Van Daalen”. Minister Fock advised the chambermembers not to waste their time on these articles; the governor-general, he said, had full confidence in Van Daalen. The inspection tour Van Heutsz undertook the same month proved otherwise: in December 1907 Van Daalen submitted his resignation.

The Van Heutsz report

The report of June 1908 was harsh. “Hij heeft het beginsel van de pacificatie miskend. Hij heeft een verkeerde politiek gevoerd tegenover de hoofden, aan wie een onheuse bejegening ten deel viel. Hij heeft het goedgezinde deel der bevolking tussen twee vuren geplaatst”. The principle that Van Daalen had applied to the chiefs was, in the report’s paraphrase: “Gij kunt die kerels niet vertrouwen, gij moet ze ook niet vertrouwen, gij moet ze slaan en drukken en dan zullen ze u gehoorzamen” — you cannot trust those fellows, you must not trust them, you must beat them and press them and then they will obey you. Idenburg — minister of Colonies — conceded that the view “nog zo gek niet was” — was not so foolish — but held that it belonged to the time of conquest rather than to the period of pacificatie. The report did, however, acknowledge that Van Daalen had acted vigorously against the specific atrocities for which he had been arraigned in De Avondpost.

Significance

The fall of Van Daalen in 1907-1908 is the political climax of the post-conquest period of Atjehnese history. His tenure as governor exposed the contradiction between the pacificatie rhetoric of Van Heutsz and the practices that conquest had institutionalised; his removal cleared the way for the more conciliatory administration that Van Heutsz’s June 1908 report installed.

The soldier

Van Daalen was, in du Croo’s own words, “the troop commander unsurpassed by any, the Acehnese fighting soldier par excellence, the Kitchener figure of our colonial military history” — an undeniably great figure. As the unsurpassed marechaussée leader of his day he undertook the famous march into the unknown interior of the Gajò and Alas country, moving with a column of two hundred marechaussées provided with only six days’ provisions over the passes of the Barisan ranges. Notwithstanding extremely vigorous and fanatical resistance, he operated with his numerically small column for five and a half months almost entirely independently.

Unfitness as a pacifying administrator

But by insight and by the character traits that determined that insight he was, du Croo held, “wholly unsuited as a pacifying administrator.” Van Heutsz acknowledged that Van Daalen “most certainly not in full measure” possessed the qualities of head and character needed for the task, yet in the same assessment sought to excuse the less desirable qualities and to demonstrate “verbeteringen” in outlook, concluding that Van Daalen had since improved himself and now knew as well as van Heutsz did that an administrator must above all be penetrated by his duty to reconcile the population of already subjected parts of the country with the new state of affairs. “And… this conclusion is wide of the mark and had to be wide of the mark,” du Croo wrote, “because the character and the insights of a hard, strong and self-assured figure such as Van Daalen could not possibly be changed, still less improved.”

Snouck Hurgronje’s warning of 2 October 1903

Dr. Snouck Hurgronje, van Heutsz’s adviser, considered Van Daalen unsuitable, and in a letter to Governor-General Rooseboom dated 2 October 1903 — “as it were a Mene Tekel” — wrote:

“Mr Van Daalen has a deeply rooted contempt for everything that is native. This expressed itself, among other things, in the ridiculous demands of marks of respect that he made upon chiefs as well as upon inferiors. Of intercourse with chiefs there was no question: after making the knee-kiss they had to listen to orders or answer questions standing.”

Snouck went on to describe the administration of justice under Van Daalen: “A so-called administration of justice took place with the most tyrannical arbitrariness.” Justice in Atjeh was administered by the chiefs under the direction of the civil officials and gezaghebbers; the low level of development of many chiefs might excuse the fact that sentences were often wholly composed by the civil administrator and not seldom sealed or signed by the chiefs entirely against their own view; and the lack of juridical knowledge and experience of many administrators meant that their sentences were often such “that no jurist would be willing to answer for them.” All this ought gradually to change, by officials familiar with native jurisdiction really guiding the chiefs “instead of accustoming them to the notion that the placing of their seal or their signature has nothing to do with their opinion.”

“I could fill pages,” Snouck continued, “with examples of the inhumane, rough, tactless manner of governing and of administering justice of this in many respects deserving officer. I consider it the more necessary to point this out because it is established in Atjeh — General Van Heutsz has repeatedly said as much virtually in public — that the present lieutenant-colonel Van Daalen is to succeed the General as governor.” He closed by hoping that the Government would attach due weight to his warning “before years of sad experience have set their stamp upon it.”

The clash with Swart at Poelò Raja

The very first personal contact between Swart and Van Daalen in the administrative sphere marked their difference of view. Van Daalen, as acting Assistant Resident of the Onderhoorigheden, visited Poelò Raja and took part in a patrol. The patrol met an oelèëbalang with his retinue, who paid his respects in the customary and, to Swart’s mind, perfectly proper manner. Van Daalen remarked that this chief had shown insufficient respect, which Swart could not see — “and… if ever anyone in Atjeh inspired respect and awe in the chiefs and also received respect from them, it was certainly Swart!” Van Daalen nevertheless lectured him: “look here, you are a full-blooded European and you do not feel that; but with me it is different. We have more sense of these things. Respect is…”

In 1902 Van Daalen, as Swart’s assistant resident, forbade administrators to visit their territory without military escort and noted that prohibition on Swart’s journal, when Swart was gezaghebber in Lho’ Kroeët and Daja. Van Heutsz in turn noted “that Swart could judge this better than he or I could, that appreciation ought to be shown from higher authority in the matter, and that there could be no question of a prohibition where Swart was concerned.”

The Van Daalen governorship and its legacy

Under Van Daalen “several of our best commanders had, discouraged and sometimes pushed aside, … left an Atjeh that was no longer theirs.” The conditions Swart inherited in 1908 were described by one of his collaborators who administered Keureutòë for years: “In Keureutòë, formerly a rich and prosperous land, I found hopeless conditions… the situation had been critical and sharp measures were therefore necessary, but those measures were not always carried out with judgement and repeatedly went beyond the limit of the necessary and the permissible. For years the chiefs had been cut back in their incomes by withholdings. Spies were not everywhere well directed and supervised, deceived those who sent them out, stirred up trouble among others, harassed the population and, if their demands were not met, had cattle and possessions taken from innocent people. The livestock was thereby practically wiped out.”

Nowhere, du Croo wrote, had resistance and the attendant anarchy and insecurity set land and people so far back: the chiefs had lost both their authority over the population and their confidence in the administration; the formerly agricultural and cattle-keeping population had become destitute; the herds were largely destroyed; and “the system of fines and the unlawful withholding of incomes, and the collection of those fines with a strong arm and with no regard for anything or anyone, had produced nothing but hatred, contempt and resistance.”

It was Van Daalen too who converted the sentence of banishment pronounced on T. Tjhi’ Toenòng into a death sentence, although many were convinced of his innocence.

As army commander

Van Daalen later became army commander, and in that capacity issued a decree that, on grounds of a shortage of infantry officers, no civil employments might any longer be entrusted to them and that those so charged must be relieved forthwith — costing Swart the help of Van Doorn and Grashuis. Scheepens wrote to Schmidt: “How is that to be managed, my dear fellow? Meanwhile the Governor has begun the fight against that provision.” Van Daalen also refused for a time to allow H. J. Schmidt to be reposted to Atjeh: between him and Swart, then Major-General, matters had come almost to “a painful war, for which Van Daalen, who hated Swart, certainly bears the guilt.” The friction with the army command ended only when Swart became lieutenant-general.

Significance (du Croo, 1943)

Van Daalen is the negative pole of du Croo’s book. His appointment placed “the undeniably great figure of Van Daalen … in a place where he ought never to have been put,” so that Atjeh underwent a very damaging setback and his successor was placed before “an almost impossibly heavy task of restoration and rebuilding.” His military reputation as the conqueror of the Gajò and Alas lands remained, in du Croo’s judgement, undiminished; it was as a pacifying administrator that he failed.

Sources

Atjeh, door H.C. Zentgraff. Gedrukt bij Drukkerij “De Unie”, 1938, Batavia. OCR-filename: 20260709_002148_DLP-81-Atjeh_OCR.txt.

ATJEH ‘96, door A. Kruisheer, Kapitein der Infanterie O.I.L., met 2 kaarten en 4 portretten (Weltevreden: N.V. Boekhandel Visser & Co, 1913). Instituut Kern, Leiden. OCR-filename: 20260715_163243_DLP-89-Atjeh_96_Met_2_kaarten_en4_DOORA_KRUISHEER_Kapiteinder_Infanterie_nemoretriever-ocr-v1_OCR.txt, pp. 79, 149, 176, 184, 322. Over de eerste expeditie tegen Atjeh: Een antwoord aan Generaal de Stuers, G. G. Booms, ‘s-Gravenhage: A. van Hoogstraten & Zoon, 1875, pp. 10-21. De geschiedenis van Nederland in onzen tijd, by J. A. de Bruyne, Directeur der Hoogere Burgerschool te Zierikzee. Deel IV. 1872-1883. Nieuwe uitgave. Schiedam: J. F. Dupont, 1912, Hoofdstuk I, pp. 12-25.

E. C. van Daalen was a colonel of the Indies army who served as second-in-command of the first Aceh expedition under General Köhler in April 1873, and who, on the morning of 14 April 1873 after the general’s death at the missigit outside the Kraton, took over the supreme command and presided over the council of war of 18 April that decided on withdrawal. He is also notable for his repeated personal acts of bravery in the stormings of late January 1874, in the course of which he forced his horse through the bamboe-doern mass, planted the oranje-vaandel at the foot of the enemy’s parapet, and brought up reinforcements that carried the line. The source work distinguishes him from a Captain Van Daalen — likely a kinsman — who took a conspicuous part in the same actions.

Account from Vijftig jaren economische staatkunde in Atjeh (1923)

G. C. E. van Daalen was a Dutch infantry officer who, as Lieutenant-Colonel commanding in the Dependencies of Atjeh, was charged in February 1904 with the celebrated expedition through the Gajo, Alas and Batak lands, and who from 6 May 1905 to 1908 governed Atjeh and its Dependencies, completing the political unity of the province under direct Dutch authority and attempting to realize that unity also in the economic sense.

The Gajo expedition

Under Governor Johannes van Heutsz, Lieutenant-Colonel Van Daalen long administered the department of the Dependencies; in February 1904 he was entrusted with the expedition to the Gajo and Alas lands, one of the principal military operations of the Van Heutsz period. For the military particulars of the march Langhout refers his readers to the work of J. C. J. Kempees, De tocht van Overste Van Daalen door de Gajo-, Alas- en Bataklanden (“The march of Colonel Van Daalen through the Gajo, Alas and Batak lands”). In May 1904, when Van Heutsz left for Holland, Van Daalen was replaced in the Dependencies by a civilian assistant-resident — one of Van Heutsz’s last pacification measures.

Governor of Atjeh, 1905–1908

After the appointment of Governor J. C. van der Wyck as army commander, Colonel G. C. E. van Daalen was entrusted with the government of Atjeh on 6 May 1905. His administration gave occasion, Langhout observes, to severe and perhaps not always equitable criticism: at his taking leave, Van Daalen was reproached with not having observed the fortiter in re, suaviter in modo (“strong in deed, gentle in manner”), or at least not sufficiently, and with having regarded the perfect subjection of the province too much as conditio sine qua non for the modern economic policy. Langhout purposely leaves that criticism unexamined, since a full consideration of the period would have required too much military detail.

As soon as the political unity of the whole province under direct Dutch rule was a fact — in 1908 the last piece, the department of the Gajo and Alas lands, was definitively created — Van Daalen tried to realize that unity economically as well.

Economic measures

  • Roads and bridges. He devoted his attention first to traffic routes opening the remote regions and linking the separated parts of the country to the coast. Beside a number of screw-pile bridges over smaller rivers and creeks, there arose under extremely difficult circumstances the iron bridge over the Peusangan River at Teupen Blang Manè on the Gajo road, built on the Governor’s initiative by the engineer troops (1906, photographed in Langhout’s book) at no cost to the road fund. The scale and reduction of the heavy export duties on pepper — regulated differently in every landscape of the Dependencies — accompanied this traffic policy.
  • Agriculture. Finding native agriculture still most primitive, with a single (rice) crop a year, one of his first measures was to summon a number of Sundanese to demonstrate the Javanese method of deeper tillage with Hindustan ploughs and of padi planting; he attempted the introduction of second crops, distributed strong maize (djagoeng) seed imported from the Minahassa on a large scale, and introduced the potato, hitherto unknown, in the Gajo lands. Irrigation of rice lands was taken in hand, market-gardening was encouraged by interest-free advances from the road fund for pepper and coconut gardens (also freeing the population from usurers who bought the crop far below value), thousands of young Ficus elastica plants were distributed, and seeds and grass-sods were furnished for the improvement of forage.
  • European enterprise. In 1907 agricultural concessions totalling about 16,700 hectares were granted, and forest-exploitation concessions already numbered 21, spread over the whole province. As an example and encouragement, in view of the results obtained elsewhere with Pará rubber, the wherewithal was furnished for the establishment of a caoutchouc estate at Langsar (the later government rubber enterprise at Langsa).
  • Fisheries. Market-fish (goeramé and other good species) was repeatedly distributed on a large scale to encourage fresh-water pisciculture; advances were made for sea-fisheries and for the laying out of fish-ponds and salt-pans, and the government steamer Gier examined the fish wealth of the Atjehnese waters to judge whether a fishery with steam trawlers would pay.
  • Credit. In connection with the first advances from the road fund, he took the first step toward regulating popular credit (volkscredietwezen) by proposing the Groot-Atjehsche Afdeelingsbank, meant to combat usury and to furnish agricultural, industrial and commercial credits; the bank materialized in September 1908 under his successor.
  • Education and exhibitions. Five village-schools were opened in Groot-Atjeh and five more taken in hand; in the Dependencies there were as yet no native first-class schools, only lower government and private establishments. He proposed the creation of kampong-schools — one in every moekim — and of a boarding school at Koeta Radja for sons of native chiefs where instruction would be given in Dutch. A first agricultural-market exhibition, held at Koeta Radja in 1907 (Langhout also dates an exhibition of April 1908 under Van Daalen), attracted lively popular interest.

Financial outcome and departure

The financial result of the Government of Atjeh and Dependencies was, including the Departments of War and Navy, a deficit (f 5,917,900 in 1905; f 4,369,304 in 1906; f 3,694,891 in 1907); leaving those departments aside, the civil account showed a favourable balance of f 460,366 in 1905, f 833,534 in 1906 and f 382,437 in 1907 (to end of October). The world money crisis of 1907 depressed trade, imports fell with the reduction of the garrison and the departure of hundreds of Chinese and other Foreign Orientals, but exports already showed the first results of the raised production, and shipping at Sabang grew from 172 foreign merchant vessels in 1905 to 201 in 1906 and 231 in 1907. By Government resolution of 4 May 1908 Van Daalen was, at his own request, honourably discharged; Lieutenant-Colonel H. N. A. Swart accepted the administration on 10 June 1908.

In the Maréchaussée Jubileum-nummer (1930)

the 1930 jubilee number of Het Nieuws van den Dag voor Nederlandsch-Indië carried a portrait captioned “De groote Van Daalen,” and treated the march to the Gajo-Loeös of 1904 — which he commanded as lieutenant-colonel, from February to July, with an initial ten and eventually fourteen brigades of Maréchaussée and with the civil administration entrusted to the division commanders — as belonging to “de schitterendste wapenfeiten” of the Korps Maréchaussée.

Colonel L. A. Snell named Van Daalen second among “de groote pioniers, die van het Korps gemaakt hebben wat het geworden is,” after Graafland and before Colijn, Swart and Van der Maaten.

The rising that broke out after the expedition was quelled in 1905 by W. V. Rhemrev.

See Also

Source

De Buitenbezittingen, Deel II, Aflevering 2: Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden, bewerkt door het Encyclopaedisch Bureau, Mededeelingen van het Bureau voor de Bestuurszaken der Buitenbezittingen (Weltevreden: Landsdrukkerij, 1917), Bijlage I and pp. 4, 7, 33–35, 107, 114–115.

J. B. van Heutsz als Gouverneur Generaal 1904-1909, by J. C. Lamster (Amsterdam: P. N. van Kampen & Zoon N.V., 1938), pp. 50–56, 193–203, 230–232, 247–257. Rijksarchief, Den Haag.

Oost-Indisch Journael: Palaver om de tafel met het gat, by Merac, Toekan-Serie no. 2, ed. G. L. Tichelman (Haarlem: De Gulden Pers, 1947), the chapter on den zieleherder and the chapter Jagerslatijn.

“Dispereert Niet: Twintig Eeuwen Historie van de Nederlanden”, Deel XI, by A. Algra and H. Algra (Franeker: T. Wever, 1946).

Atjèh. Algemeen samenvattend overzicht van land en volk van Atjèh en onderhoorigheden, door J. Kreemer, Archivaris van het Atjèh Instituut. Tweede Deel. Leiden: N.V. Boekhandel en Drukkerij voorheen E.J. Brill, 1923. Identifier: Delpher MMKB02B:000001798; PPN 395084288. Koninklijke Bibliotheek.

Schets eener parlementaire geschiedenis van Nederland van 1849 tot 1901, by Mr W. J. van Welderen baron Rengers, 4th rev. ed., Vol. IV: Oost-Indië 1891-1918 by Dr W. H. Vermeulen (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1955), pp. 271-274.

Generaal Swart, Pacificator van Atjeh (“General Swart, Pacifier of Atjeh”), by M. H. du Croo, Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with the collaboration of H. J. Schmidt, Titular Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with a foreword by His Excellency Lieutenant-General K.N.I.L. (retired) G. K. Dijkstra (Maastricht: N.V. Leiter-Nypels, 1943), Chapters IV, VIII, IX, XI, XIV, pp. 22–23, 80–84, 91, 103, 140.

Vijftig jaren economische staatkunde in Atjeh, by Joh. Langhout (The Hague: N.V. Boekhandel v/h W. P. van Stockum & Zoon, 1923), pp. 80–81, 86–94, illustration captions pp. 88–89, 92.

Het Korps Maréchaussée in Atjeh: De Atjehsche Garde, 1890 - 2 April 1930 (“The Corps of Maréchaussée in Atjeh: The Atjehnese Guard”), Extra Jubileum-nummer of Het Nieuws van den Dag voor Nederlandsch-Indië issued for the fortieth anniversary of the corps (1930), pp. 1-16. Offprint DLP-143, Bibliotheek KITLV, accession 621 116 794.

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