M. Schouten — Ridder van de Militaire Willemsorde — was one of H. N. A. Swart’s longest-serving subordinates, who “served under the orders of Governor Swart in Borneo, Celebes and Atjeh,” was extraordinarily promoted from onderluitenant to officer for special merit, and was pensioned with the rank of captain.
As one of Swart’s Jannen
Schouten first appears as a sergeant evacuated from the 1st company of the 12th Battalion at Sigli in 1899, to whom a comrade wrote of the new captain: “And now we have only a little captain!” Du Croo identifies him as “the later Lieutenant Schouten, one of Swart’s disciples.”
In Atjeh under Swart
In the resistance years Schouten commanded the garrison of the bivouac Boeloh Blang Ara in the Lho’ Seumawè sub-division, which “repeatedly had, and kept, his hands full.”
In 1916 Schouten received reports so positive about the whereabouts of T. Radja Sabi — the last wandering irreconcilable of Keureutòë, then a boy of fifteen — that he resolved, together with the oelèëbalang of Seuleuma, to make one more attempt to bring him in: “the fighting time was over, and why should that boy go on wandering?” With the co-operation of all the chiefs and of T. Tjhi’ Béntara, the half-brother, who went along in person, a discussion was held “somewhere in the rimba.” The condition set by the other side — that the Governor must first acknowledge that the boy at Koeta Radja was a substitute — proved a stumbling-block, and T. Radja Sabi continued to wander until 1919.
On 11 March 1918 Schouten, by then Civil Authority at Lho’ Soekon, was attacked there in one of the Atjeh murders; he soon recovered and the perpetrator was laid low.
See Also
Source
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), Chapter IV, p. 20; Chapter X, p. 102; Chapter XI, p. 109; Chapter XII, p. 121 and illustration p. 133.