Keutjhi Maha was a groote, ruige kerel — a big, rough, shaggy fellow — head of a strong bende in the Tangsé-region, and one of the cruellest djahats of the late guerrilla war. His name in the Atjehsche history is attached to one of the most gruesome murders of an Atjehsche spy, and to the sworn vengeance of the maréchaussée brigade that found him.
The murder of Si Banta and his wife, July 1910
In kampong Poelo Seunong (Tangsé) lived an Atjeher who gave the Dutch information; by his own fault something of that relation leaked out. As a rule the spies themselves did not know how to hold their tongues, and often they were too generous with the money they earned — which immediately stood out in a kampong where everyone knows what the other has. There were few spies of whom, with the becoming-known of the relation, the death-sentence was not also signed; the Atjehsche bendehoofden did not play with them, and always the spy died a thousand deaths. The most gruesome butcheries were hardly enough for them.
Keutjhi Maha, head of a strong bende, knew that in kampong Poelo Kawa lived one of the Dutch spies, a certain Si Banta, and in July 1910 he came by night with his men for the execution. He knew that the wanted man in that kampong had two wives, each in a different house, and by chance he first came to the dwelling where the spy was not — only the wife was at home. Keutjhi Maha came in and asked her: “Where is your man?” “He is not here.” Maha searched the house, sat on a bench, and said to the woman: “Wassch mijn voeten” — “Wash my feet.” She fetched a basin, filled it with water, took a cloth, and washed, as he bade her, his muddy feet. When she would dry them with the cloth, Keutjhi Maha said: “Maak ze droog met je haren” — “Dry them with your hair.” Immediately she undid her hair-knot and dried his feet with it, very carefully and full of humility, for she understood that her life was at stake. When his feet were clean and dry, he drew his rentjong and drove it with force into the eye of the woman, who still, like a slave, crouched at his legs. She screamed with pain; then the followers of Keutjhi Maha rushed up and finished her off. It was above all against a helpless woman who had no part of guilt a mean and gruesome slaughter; her body was literally hacked in pieces.
Then the bende went to the other house in the same kampong, where the spy was with his second wife. To make him believe that it was the Kompeuni who needed his services, they called out to him in Malay: “Agam, toeroen!” — “Man, come down!” So Si Banta opened the door and came down the ladder in the dark; they shot his legs to pieces with a blunderbuss so that he tumbled to the ground. Then the bende tortured him with klewang and rentjong; they chopped off his hands, then his feet, finally his head. Everything was scattered around, and when shortly afterwards the maréchaussée’s came they had to gather up the pieces of his body. The kampong-chief of Poelo Seunong was also slaughtered that night in the same way. It was such a loathsome spectacle that those maréchaussée’s swore vengeance against Keutjhi Maha — and that was saying a great deal. It concerned one of those old brigades, made up of hard and strong men such as the guerrilla makes, who even with a djahat against whom they had no particular account were stern but just and impartial. The oath was something of great exceptional significance.
The killing, 24 March 1911
The hunt began, and it was something that recalled the best work of the little war. They sat Keutjhi Maha several times close on his heels; the hunt was sharp, and he soon noticed that it was an unpleasant time. The maréchaussée’s, who always gave the full hundred per cent, put on a few per cent more for Keutjhi Maha, and they hunted him with such devotion that he had not legs enough to make himself scarce and catch his breath. He grew nervous under it; it seemed to him now and then as if the ghost of Death crept by his side through the silent forests, and his bende lost its self-confidence. He decided to disappear for a month or so from this region; he thought: in time they will forget me again, and the good life can begin again. So he kept himself for a considerable time out of contact with the brigades, and it became March 1911, while his rough head still sat firmly on his shoulders. He held himself then again in the neighbourhood of Poelo Seunong, where one of his wives lived, and he had not been so calm for a long time. The men, however, had not forgotten the case of the chopped-up woman; on the contrary, they were always on the look-out, and in the last part of March they got very reliable chabar: that Keutjhi Maha on the 24th would pay a visit to his wife in Poelo Seunong. There were just two groups of infantry patrolling near that kampong, on the side opposite to that from which Keutjhi Maha could come. Care was taken that that infantry stayed well visible, and on each of the two paths by which the expected one might walk, a half-brigade of maréchaussée was laid in hinderlaag in a splendid position.
Toward five o’clock in the afternoon Keutjhi Maha came out of the forest-edge; he kept the infantry well in view — so well, that he, like an innocent man, fell into the hinderlaag of the half-brigade under sergeant Van Dongelen. It lasted only a few minutes, and then it was over; the screaming war-cry of the maréchaussée’s went up in the triumph-shout of madmen who had seen the blood of the woman and now had blood in their eyes. To their klewangs too, and scattered over the ground, lay the pieces and chunks of Keutjhi Maha. “Revenge is a kind of wild justice”, said Bacon, and in this case it was the very best justice.
Significance
The official report notes for 24 March 1911 only: “Een welgemikt schot van den Amb. sergeant Van Dongelen deed het langgezochte, om zijne wreedheden beruchte bendehoofd sneuvelen” — “A well-aimed shot of the Ambonese sergeant Van Dongelen caused the long-sought bandit-chief, notorious for his cruelties, to fall.” One could hardly say otherwise in an official document. In those days there sat in the Second Chamber a few men — quiet, prosperous, well-living men — who were always very concerned that the enemy should be too roughly handled, and if there was an éclatant case they began about the cruelties of the Dutch troops. One could not hang everything on the nose of such bemoeials, and so the “well-aimed shot” of the report was a nearly philanthropic disposal of the case of Keutjhi Maha.
See Also
Source
Atjeh, door H.C. Zentgraff. Gedrukt bij Drukkerij “De Unie”, 1938, Batavia. OCR-filename: 20260709_002148_DLP-81-Atjeh_OCR.txt.