H. L. Maarschalk was a Dutch lieutenant of the Nederlandsch-Indisch Leger who was killed in action at the battle of Tjot Rang on 14 April 1896 — one of the engagements of the spring 1896 crisis that followed Toekoe Oemar’s defection. He is named in the Atjeh-Album of 1896 as one of the seven officers killed in the spring 1896 operations, and his portrait is one of the six reproduced in the album’s closing plates.
The battle of Tjot Rang
The Atjeh-Album records that the battle of Tjot Rang was fought at the post of Tjot Rang, reached by a serviceable path from Tjot Iri — the post in the geconcentreerde linie — and that the engagement was “not less fierce than that which had taken place at Biloel” in the same period. The album’s narrative of the relief of the besieged temporary posts records that the column at Tjot Rang — like that at Biloel — succeeded in disengaging the post, but at the cost of Maarschalk’s life and the wounding of 47 subordinates. The album’s terse Luitenant Maarschalk en drie minderen daarbij sneuvelden en dat er 47 minderen gewond werden — Lieutenant Maarschalk and three subordinates fell there, and 47 subordinates were wounded — is the principal record of the engagement.
The aftermath at Anagaloeng
The Atjeh-Album records that the news of the battle of Tjot Rang — and of Maarschalk’s death — reached the besieged garrison at Anagaloeng only obliquely. The garrison, hearing the vuren — the firing — of the engagement, could not distinguish it from the firing of the relief of Biloel and Lamkoenjit, because the sound was not echoed against the high mountain wall to the south of Anagaloeng. The album’s narrative suggests that the garrison’s ignorance of Maarschalk’s death — and of the success of the relief at Tjot Rang — was the principal source of the anxiety of the besieged in the days before their own relief.
The burning of Lamgoet
The Atjeh-Album records that the battle of Tjot Rang also saw the burning of Lamgoet — the former seat of Teungku di Tiro that had caused the Dutch generals Demmenie and Van Teijn so much trouble. The album notes that Lamgoet had been briefly occupied by Toekoe Bantah in 1893, that Toekoe Bantah had been unable to maintain himself there, and that it had been Toekoe Oemar who had brought Lamgoet a second time under Dutch control. The simultaneous relief of Tjot Rang and burning of Lamgoet on 14 April 1896 — both costly engagements — was, in the album’s narrative, the moment at which the Dutch began to recover the initiative from Toekoe Oemar’s defected forces.
Burial at Kota Potjoet
The album records that Maarschalk was buried at the cemetery of Kota Potjoet.
Significance
Maarschalk’s significance in the documentary record of the Atjeh-oorlog is as the second officer fatality of the April 1896 relief expeditions — and the first of the engagement at Tjot Rang. His death, together with the 47 wounded at the same engagement, established the cost of the second relief expedition and confirmed the pattern of high casualty rates that would characterise the entire spring crisis.
See Also
- Battle of Tjot Rang (14 April 1896)
- Tjot Rang
- Tjot Iri
- Lamgoet
- Demmenie
- Van Teijn
- Toekoe Bantah
- Toekoe Oemar
- Relief of Biloel and Lamkoenjit (April 1896)
- Anagaloeng
- K. H. Westendorp
- J. W. Vuijk
- E. P. A. Geluk
- J. B. Zon
- H. O. W. L. Kramer
- C. G. A. C. Krohne
- Toekoe Oemar’s defection (1896)
- Kota Potjoet
- Aceh War
- 14 April
- 1896
- Atjeh-Album (Eigen Haard, 1896)
Source
Atjeh-Album van Eigen Haard, uitgave van de N.V. Het Tijdschrift “Eigen Haard”, Amsterdam, 1896, pp. 10, 28, 30 (Een Terugblik — Wat Reeds Verkregen Werd; Gevallenen, hun Roeping Vervuld!).