P. F. Laging Tobias

P. F. Laging Tobias was a Dutch colonial administrator who served as civil Gouverneur van Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden during the bestuurlijke experiment of the civil government period in the early 1880s, and the author of the brochure Phrasen en Feiten (Phrases and Facts), in which he reviewed the policy of the Atjeh government. He succeeded — per sé a civil governor being desired in Atjeh — the Resident Pruys van der Hoeven, a choice that Coblijn pronounced, for character-qualities, zeer gelukkig (very fortunate); but the experiment failed, and in 1884 Laging Tobias himself asked for his discharge, after which the decisions of 19 August 1884 abolished the civil government and entrusted the authority to kolonel Demmenie as military governor.

The brochure Phrasen en Feiten

Coblijn, who cited the brochure repeatedly in Hoe Atjeh te onderwerpen, drew from it — as from his other principal sources, Pruys van der Hoeven’s Mijne ervaring van Atjeh and the Memorie of luitenant-generaal K. van der Heijden — the materials of his indictment of the civil-government experiment. From Phrasen en Feiten Coblijn cited Laging Tobias’s own observations on the quest made to remove generaal Van der Heijden from his post, and on the sultanshulde (homage to the Sultan) policy of his predecessors: the homage paid to the ruler whom the Dutch themselves had set up, Laging Tobias wrote, was meaningless flattery, since the government of the Sultan had long since ceased to possess any authority with the Atjehers — a judgement Coblijn italicised in agreement.

The cordial understanding with the military commanders

Coblijn recorded that Laging Tobias maintained a cordial understanding with the military commanders Schäfer and Demmeni — in contrast to the estrangement that had marked the cooperation between the government of Pruys van der Hoeven and kolonel Haus — but that the new governor soon applied for his discharge. For Coblijn this request was the decisive demonstration that the appointment of a civil governor of Atjeh had been premature: the province was a theatre of war, and the civil functionary, however able, was out of place at the head of it. The opinion was the ground of Coblijn’s wider thesis of the civil versus military government of Atjeh.

Account from De onderwerping van Atjeh (Van Heutsz, 1893)

In the 1893 tract De onderwerping van Atjeh, Van Heutsz treats Laging Tobias as the seventh name in his catalogue of the eleven Governors of Atjeh — van Swieten, Pel, Wiggers van Kerchem, Diemont, van der Heijden, Pruijs van der Hoeven, Laging Tobias, Demmeni, van Teijn, Pompe van Meerdervoort, Deijkerhof — and the Governor who, in the Aceh Wiki History record, is associated with two opposed measures: the introduction of the May 1883 scheepvaartregeling that Van Heutsz singles out as “alles wat men kon verlangen” (everything one could desire), and the advocacy of the herstel van het sultanaat (restoration of the sultanate) under Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed that Van Heutsz devotes a long later chapter to refuting. His governorship ended in February 1884 when the Regeering, having decided in the secret Staten-Generaal sessions of 16–17 June 1884 to impose the Concentratie, forced the abandonment of the policy he had been appointed to execute.

Arrival in March 1883

Laging Tobias took over the Governorship of Atjeh in March 1883, in succession to the Civiel Gouverneur (Civil Governor) of 1881–1883 whose “ellendige zwakke stelsel” (miserable weak system) — Van Heutsz’s phrase — had followed the Van der Heijden dismissal. Van Heutsz describes the situation he inherited: “In Maart 1883 kwam de Gouverneur Laging Tobias aan het bestuur, die den toestand te Groot-Atjeh zeer ongunstig vond” — in March 1883 Governor Laging Tobias came to the administration, who found the situation in Groot-Atjeh very unfavourable. The gloom was Laging Tobias’s own retrospective: in his later article “Het herstel van het sultanaat in Atjeh”, published in the December 1886 number of the Indische Gids, he confessed that “Reeds zeer kort na mijn optreden als gouverneur van Atjeh, kreeg ik de overtuiging dat onze toestand in Atjeh bijna hopeloos was” — already very shortly after my entry into office as Governor of Atjeh, I came to the conviction that our situation in Atjeh was almost hopeless. Van Heutsz, who had been Chef van den Staf in Atjeh through the same period, concedes the weight of the inheritance: “Zeker was het dus een zware ondankbare taak, die in 1883 op de schouders werd gelegd van den Heer Laging Tobias” — certainly, then, it was a heavy and thankless task that in 1883 was placed on the shoulders of Mr Laging Tobias.

The restoration-of-sultanate policy

Laging Tobias’s first response to the inheritance was to seek, in the restoration of the sultanate under Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed, the only available remedy. “Alleen in een herstel van het sultanaat onder Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed heil zag” — only in a restoration of the sultanate under Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed did he see salvation, Van Heutsz writes. The policy was not Laging Tobias’s invention: it had been floated in August 1883 by the Minister van Koloniën van Bloemen Waanders, “In Augustus van datzelfde jaar, juist toen de Gouv. Gen. ’s Jacob zich te Atjeh bevond, ontving deze daar een schrijven van den Minister van Koloniën van Bloemen Waanders, waarin Z. E. hetzelfde denkbeeld ter sprake bracht, n. l. herstel van het sultanaat” — In August of that same year, just when the G.-G. ’s Jacob was at Atjeh, he received there a letter from the Minister of Colonies van Bloemen Waanders, in which His Excellency brought up the same idea, namely the restoration of the sultanate — and Laging Tobias, once placed on his difficult post and searching for means of improving the situation, made it his own.

The political obstacle was Toeankoe Haschim — “een zeer krachtige persoonlijkheid” (a very forceful personality), “hoofd der tegenpartij” (head of the opposing party) — who, in the years of Dutch lijdelijkheid (passivity), had masterfully exploited the time to install his pupil Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed as the recognised successor to the sultan Machmoed Sjah (who had died in 1874), and who now issued orders from Kemala “als komende van het eenig wettige gezag, van den sultan” — as coming from the only lawful authority, from the sultan. Laging Tobias’s first diplomatic move was to hint, in a letter of the first half of October 1883 to the old Tekoe Nanta der VI Moekims (also called Tekoe Lampadang), that “in geval van onderwerping … een herstel van het sultanaat met Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed als sultan wel mogelijk was” — in case of submission, a restoration of the sultanate with Toeankoe Mohamad Daoed as sultan would be quite possible. The hint came to nothing. Haschim and Mohamad Daoed instead proclaimed the latter sultan in the emesdjid Indrapoeri — the great mosque of Indrapuri — in a constitutional form that legitimised the resistance, and the Indische Regeering, after the December 1883 resignation of Minister van Bloemen Waanders, let the sultanate-restoration idea drop: “van een zoo mogelijk dadelijk herstel van het sultanaat geen sprake meer kon zijn” (of a restoration of the sultanate as soon as possible, no more could be said).

The May 1883 scheepvaartregeling

Laging Tobias’s second initiative — and the one Van Heutsz most prizes — was the introduction in May 1883 of the scheepvaartregeling that Scherer had first conceived and that Laging Tobias was the first to apply. “Reeds in Mei 1883 toch, zoo verhaalt ons Scherer, vaardigde hij, onder nadere goedkeuring der Regeering, een besluit uit, waarbij, volgens zijn (Scherer’s) denkbeelden, eene contrôle op handel en scheepvaart werd ingevoerd” — already in May 1883, Scherer tells us, he issued, subject to the Regeering’s further approval, a decree by which, according to Scherer’s ideas, a control on trade and shipping was introduced. The measure was Scherer’s idea; the application was Laging Tobias’s; and Van Heutsz’s verdict, in the 1893 tract, is the highest praise he accords any Governor in the entire catalogue: “de scheepvaartregeling door Scherer voorgesteld en door Laging Tobias ingevoerd gaf alles wat men kon verlangen” — the scheepvaartregeling proposed by Scherer and introduced by Laging Tobias gave everything one could desire.

The May 1883 scheepvaartregeling thus stands, in Van Heutsz’s diagnosis, as the high-water mark of the post-Van-der-Heijden policy — the one measure that, had it been sustained, might have spared the Regeering the policy oscillations of 1884–1892. It was, however, almost immediately overtaken by the Concentratie decision.

The February 1884 resignation

The end of Laging Tobias’s governorship came in February 1884, when the Regeering’s drift toward the Concentratie — decided in the secret Staten-Generaal sessions of 16–17 June 1884 but foreshadowed in the August 1883 discussions between G.-G. ’s Jacob and the local military and naval authorities at Kota-Radja — overrode the only policy Laging Tobias had been able to recommend. “Meende de Gouverneur Laging Tobias zijn ontslag te moeten vragen, toen de Regeering het eenige middel verwierp waarvan hij in de bestaande omstandigheden een goede uitkomst verwachtte. Dit was in Februari 1884” — Governor Laging Tobias felt obliged to request his resignation when the Regeering rejected the only remedy from which, in the existing circumstances, he expected a good outcome. This was in February 1884.

The resignation was at first declined by the outgoing ‘s Jacob — “Toen echter de Gouv. Gen. ’s Jacob met het oog op zijn a. s. aftreden, op dit verzoek niet wilde beschikken” (When, however, G.-G. ’s Jacob, with a view to his upcoming retirement, did not wish to decide on this request) — but was accepted after ‘s Jacob’s own departure. The new G.-G. van Rees, who visited Atjeh in March 1884, “betuigde, dat hij de inzichten van den Gouverneur Laging Tobias omtrent den met Atjeh te volgen weg vrij juist vond” — declared that he found Governor Laging Tobias’s views on the path to be followed with Atjeh quite correct — but the declaration was overridden by the *Concentratiebesluit* of 19 August 1884. “Met dit advies was het natuurlijk onmogelijk den Heer Laging Tobias met de uitvoering te belasten van de concentratie, die bij besluit van 19 Augustus 1884 bevolen werd” — with this advice, it was of course impossible to charge Mr Laging Tobias with the execution of the Concentratie ordered by decree of 19 August 1884. He had resigned rather than carry out a policy he believed wrong; and the Concentratie was entrusted instead to the krijgsmacht (army) under Generaal Demmeni.

Significance (per Van Heutsz)

Laging Tobias’s significance in the Aceh Wiki History record rests on three things: he was the Governor who introduced the May 1883 scheepvaartregeling — the measure Van Heutsz considered the one bright spot of the post-Van-der-Heijden decade; he was the Governor whose advocacy of the herstel van het sultanaat made him, in Van Heutsz’s later refutation of that policy, the principal Dutch witness against whom the 1893 tract’s genealogical-constitutional argument is directed; and his February 1884 resignation — “zijn ontslag te moeten vragen, toen de Regeering het eenige middel verwierp” — was the first Dutch gubernatorial resignation over the Concentratie, and the act that fixed the Concentratie as the policy the Regeering would pursue for the next six years. The scheepvaartregeling he had introduced lasted, in diluted form, until December 1885, when the Regeering finally withdrew it; the sultanaat idea he had championed was revived, against his own later arguments, by Minister Sprenger van Eijk in 1886, and Laging Tobias himself re-entered the public debate with his article “Het herstel van het sultanaat in Atjeh” in the Indische Gids of December 1886. He is, in Van Heutsz’s narrative, the Governor who saw the right measure and the wrong remedy — and who paid for both with his office.

Sources

De Atjeh-Oorlog: Kort Overzicht van Oorsprong, Verloop en Gevolg, door J. A. Kruijt. ‘s-Gravenhage: Loman & Funke, 1896. Chapter VIII, “Achteruitgang onder de Civiele Gouverneurs Pruijs van der Hoeven en Laging Tobias, van April 1881 tot September 1884.” OCR-filename: 20260716_140310_DLP-101-De_Atjeh_oorlog_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt, pp. 43–45.

Account from Vijftig jaren economische staatkunde in Atjeh (1923)

P. F. Laging Tobias was the second civilian Governor of Atjeh and Onderhoorigheden (December 1882–13 September 1884), the resident of Palembang who succeeded A. Pruijs van der Hoeven and who, confronted with an almost hopeless situation, personally negotiated the release of the captives of the Nisero affair before being honourably relieved when military and civil authority were again united in one hand.

Appointment and pessimistic diagnosis

In December 1882 the government of the province was entrusted to Laging Tobias, resident of Palembang, in replacement of Pruijs van der Hoeven; he accepted the administration on 16 March 1883. In contradiction to his predecessor’s optimistic reports he had to declare that “de toestand in Atjeh zeer ongunstig was” (“the state in Atjeh was very unfavourable”), and shortly afterwards he wrote: “Reeds zeer kort na mijn optreden als gouverneur van Atjeh kreeg ik de overtuiging dat onze toestand in Atjeh bijna geheel hopeloos was” (“Very shortly after my assumption of office as Governor of Atjeh I gained the conviction that our state in Atjeh was almost wholly hopeless”). A visit by Governor-General ‘s Jacob soon followed, who wished personally to convince himself of the course of affairs under the civil government — a visit on which the official documents, remarkably, report little or nothing.

The difficult year 1883

The year 1883 went into Atjeh’s history as a “rapjaar” (“year of disaster”): the struggle of the Atjehnese, taking on an ever more religious character, demanded ever heavier sacrifices, Dutch influence in Groot-Atjeh declined markedly despite every assurance that the Government respected the Mohammedan religion, wished to maintain the Atjehnese adat and would further land and people economically; some chiefs who had enjoyed the Government’s confidence fell away; and the whole province was visited by a violent cholera epidemic with thousands of victims and by a no less violent earthquake shaking Koeta Radja to a wide distance. By resolution of the Governor of 29 May 1883 the opening of the whole coast for trade was again withdrawn: only the harbour places where government officials were stationed — Oelèë Lheue, Sigli, Samelanga, Lho Seumawè, Idi, Meulaboh, and Tapa Toean as soon as an official should be posted there — remained open for import and export. When the control of trading vessels was denounced from a certain quarter as a means to favour Dutch industry, the government publicly and emphatically ordered all officials charged with the control to leave aside every measure that could feed the impression of preference, declaring that trading vessels must be controlled without preference of any nationality.

The Nisero affair

After the stranding of the English steamer Nisero off Koela Panga in the night of 10–11 November 1883 and the capture of her crew by the Radja of Teunom, Laging Tobias — after the fruitless military expedition of Colonel H. Demmeni (January 1884), the eccentric mediation of Teukoe Oemar and the raising of the Radja’s demands when the English warship Pegasus appeared — negotiated in person, together with Mr. Maxwell of the colonial council at Singapore, for the prisoners’ release. It was determined inter alia that a sum of f 100,000 would be paid to the person who brought the prisoners back, that the harbours would be reopened and the closing of the surrounding statelets lifted. On 10 September 1884 the captives were finally delivered up, after almost a year in the hands of the Radja.

Honourable relief, September 1884

After more than three years of civil government in Atjeh the Government realized that a reserved and very forceful attitude had to be taken toward the Atjehnese, in which there was no place for a separate civil administration: military and civil authority were again united in one hand. Governor Laging Tobias was honourably relieved of his function, and Infantry Colonel H. Demmeni was appointed Civil and Military Governor of Atjeh and Dependencies, accepting the administration on 13 September 1884.

Account from Verstege’s Een beroep op het Nederlandsche volk (1886)

Verstege acquits Laging Tobias of the charge of misleading: the unfavourable state of Atjeh he reported always truthfully. On 16 March 1883 he took over the government from Pruijs van der Hoeven, who had asked and obtained his discharge — “scheen tot het besef te zijn gekomen (niet alzoo echter de Indische Regeering) dat Atjeh vooreerst niet de plaats was voor een civiel Gouverneur” (“seemed to have reached the conviction — not so, however, the Indian government — that Atjeh was for the time being no place for a civil governor”). Laging Tobias soon became convinced that the splitting of the highest authority at Atjeh had been a great mistake; when he found no support in his striving to bring the Atjeh question to the desired solution by the restoration of the sultanate, and observed ever more that the state of Atjeh was spoilt for good and deteriorating, he proposed to reunite the civil and military administration in one hand; to that disinterested initiative it was due that, at last, at the eleventh hour, kolonel Demmeni entered office on 19 August 1884 as civil and military governor. It is reported that Laging Tobias, like Demmeni and the majority of the then Raad van Indië, advised against the concentration decided upon in the secret sessions of 16-17 June 1884 (see Concentration decision (16-17 June 1884)). Verstege adds that the Governor’s sultanate policy “was defeated on the notions of the Indian government, which considered such a solution irreconcilable with our annexation of 1874” (see Herstel van het sultanaat).

Source

Hoe Atjeh te onderwerpen, door W. A. Coblijn, gepensioneerd Kolonel van het Oost-Indisch Leger (‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders van Cleef, 1893), pp. 71–83. OCR-filename: 20260716_140310_DLP-100-Hoe_Atjeh_te_onderwerpen_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt.

De onderwerping van Atjeh, door J. B. van Heutsz, Majoor der Infanterie, gewezen Chef van den Staf in Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden. ‘s-Gravenhage: De Gebroeders van Cleef; Batavia: G. Kolff en Co., 1893, esp. pp. 24, 28–34, 39, 43. OCR-filename: 20260718_105749_DLP-107-De_onderwerping_van_Atjeh_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt.

Vijftig jaren economische staatkunde in Atjeh, by Joh. Langhout (The Hague: N.V. Boekhandel v/h W. P. van Stockum & Zoon, 1923), pp. 44, 50–58.

Een beroep op het Nederlandsche volk in zake het Atjeh-vraagstuk, door J. J. W. E. Verstege (Amsterdam: J. H. de Bussy, 1886), pp. 79, 80, 97. OCR: DLP-158.

description	Dutch civil Governor of Atjeh and Onderhoorigheden after Pruys van der Hoeven, author of the brochure Phrasen en Feiten, whose early request for discharge was cited by Coblijn as the proof that a civil government of Atjeh was premature.
tags	person, governor, dutch, colonial-administrator, civil-government, aceh, atjeh, colonial, civil-governor, 19th-century, aceh-war, civilian-administrator
aliases	Laging Tobias, Oud-Gouverneur Laging Tobias, de Heer Laging Tobias, Gouverneur Laging Tobias, Gouverneur Tobias, Tobias, Laging Tobiassen, Civiele Gouverneur Laging Tobias, L. Tobias, P. T. Laging Tobias, Governor Laging Tobias

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