Schmidt

Schmidt was an officer of the K.N.I.L. (Royal Netherlands East Indies Army) who, as luitenant (lieutenant) and later kapitein (captain), commanded the colonne Schmidt — a small force of forty-one militairen and twenty-five dwangarbeiders (forced labourers) that in two years (1910–1911) destroyed the Tiriō bende (the Tiriō band) of Acehnese religious resisters in the bergland of Tangsé — and who, after the campaign, transferred to the civil bestuur as Assistent-Resident on Ambon, where his former sergeant Nussy served under him as mantri-politie. He was, in Dames’s description, “wel zowat de beste kenner van de taal en het volk” in Aceh — about the best living authority on the Acehnese language and people in the officer corps — and received the Eresabel for 1910 and the M.W.O. 3e klas for 1911. He later held the rank of Kolonel (colonel) and, with Maurice Henri du Croo, co-authored two book-length Dutch accounts of the Aceh War: Marechaussée in Atjeh and Generaal Swart. No first name or initials are given for him either in Dames’s Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. or in the memorial booklet for du Croo.

Background and decorations before 1910

“De luitenant Schmidt had zijn sporen op Atjeh reeds behoorlijk verdiend. Eerst had hij de Oranje-Nassau gekregen en later de M.W.O.” That is, before the colonne that bears his name, Schmidt had already earned the Orde van Oranje Nassau (Order of Orange-Nassau) and a first M.W.O. (Military William Order) — making him an unusually decorated luitenant. He was also “wel zowat de beste kenner van de taal en het volk” — the best living authority on the Acehnese language and custom in the officer corps — and his intelligence network was the best of anyone’s. The colonne Schmidt was therefore the systematic working-out of long immersion in the country, not a lucky break.

The colonne Schmidt campaign (1910–1911)

The campaign is treated at length in its own entry. In brief: a colonne of forty-one militairen (Schmidt himself included) and twenty-five dwangarbeiders (all Buginese convicts, who served as dragers — bearers — for the patrouilles) operated for two years in the bergland ten Oosten of Tangsé against the family and following of the late Teungkoe Sjech Saman di Tiri. Schmidt’s methods combined military pressure with diplomatic outreach: he twice tried to persuade the Tiriō Teungkoes to submit, once via a letter carried by three leading Acehnese heads (the two Sultans-family members and Panglima Prang Polim) at the request of Generaal Swart, and once via the tante of the young Tgk. Tjhi Ma’at — the widow of Teungkoe Asan Oeleë Toetoeë, whom Schmidt himself had had killed only months before. The widow, an “eerbiedwekkende Atjehse vrouw, reeds op leeftijd” (venerable Acehnese woman, already advanced in years), went into the bergen; but the boy refused: “Zijn Vader was als geloofsgetuige gevallen, hij zou in diens voetstappen treden. Allah’s wil zou geschieden” (His father had fallen as a witness to the faith, he would follow in his footsteps. Allah’s will would be done).

In two years the Tiriō Teungkoes with their bende were “volkomen verdreven” — completely driven out. The major milestones: the killing of Peutoeha Gam Masén in May 1911; the overval (assault) on the schuilplaats (hiding-place) later in May (with eleven vijanden — enemies — dead and Tgk. di Boekét mortally wounded); the killing of Habib Teupin Wan in September 1911; and the killing of Tgk. Tjhi Ma’at by the korporaal Nussy, with Rampisela and Koentjoeng, on 3 December 1911. “De Tiri-bende was niet meer” — the Tiri band was no more.

Decorations: the Eresabel and the M.W.O. 3e klas

“Hij kreeg dan ook voor 1910 de Eresabel en voor 1911 de M.W.O. 3e klas.” The two decorations recognised the two successive years of the campaign: the Eresabel (honorary saber) for distinguished combat leadership in the first year, and the M.W.O. 3e klas (Military William Order, 3rd class) for the closing year in which the bende was finally destroyed. Dames records the same pair of decorations in the Nawoord of Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L., where Schmidt’s published report on the 1910–1911 campaign is named among the printed sources Dames drew on for his own account.

Transfer to the civil bestuur and Ambon

After his military career Schmidt “kwam later op Ambon” — later came to be on Ambon — as Assistent-Resident, the civilian district officer rank that, in the Dutch colonial hierarchy, was the natural progression for an officer with his knowledge of the inheemse bevolking (indigenous population). On Ambon he was reunited with his former sergeant Nussy, now mantri-politie (police sergeant); the army kept watch that the communist Patty would not “zijn hoofd af zou slaan” — would cut off the head — of the old Marechaussee. The author’s quiet observation is that Schmidt “was altijd soldaat gebleven, soldaat sadja” — had always remained a soldier, just a soldier — a phrase he uses of Nussy but which, in context, applies to them both: the two men who had hunted the Tiriō Teungkoes in the bergland of Aceh were now, in the late-colonial peace of Ambon, working together again in a different idiom.

Co-Authorship with Maurice Henri du Croo

Schmidt’s later career brought him into the interwar literary commemoration of the Aceh War. He collaborated with du Croo on two book-length Dutch accounts: Marechaussée in Atjeh, on the Marechaussee corps and its patrols, and Generaal Swart, a biography of the Swart administration that closed the war. His role as co-author on a book about the Marechaussee in the Aceh War suggests direct experience with the military police corps that fought in the Acehnese jungle. The two-volume output, comprising the corps history and the Swart biography, made Schmidt a key link between the operational and the historiographical phases of the Dutch memory of the Aceh War.

Significance

Schmidt is significant in the AcehWiki corpus in two complementary registers. As a primary actor in the Aceh War he is the officer who actually finished the war at the local level — not Gouverneur-Generaal Van Heutsz at the strategic level, not Generaal Swart at the military-governmental level, but the luitenant in the colonne who methodically ran down the last resistance family in the bergland. His combination of intelligence work, diplomacy, and combat — and his transfer to the civilian administration that followed — is the model of the late-colonial bestuur officer that Dames’s Oom Ambon quietly endorses; his reunion with Nussy on Ambon gives the book one of its most resonant pairings. As a literary collaborator he is, with du Croo, the co-author of two of the book-length Dutch accounts of the war’s military institutions and its closing administration; his career and writings span the active pacification era (the colonne Schmidt) and the interwar literary commemoration of that era (Marechaussée in Atjeh and Generaal Swart).

Account from Atjeh by H.C. Zentgraff (1938)

Zentgraff gives Schmidt the title primus inter pares among the Dutch aanvoerders in Atjeh: he knew the Atjehsche taal en adat als niemand anders (Acehnese language and adat like nobody else), so that de legende van mysterieuze gaven en ilmoe’s om hem hing (the legend of mysterious gifts and ilmoe’s hung about him), and this gave him greater influence over the population than most commanders had.

In 1908 Swart gave Schmidt the vernietigingsapparaat against the Tiro-oelama’s. Schmidt built his intelligence-work on the fourageurs (foraging parties) of the bende — they must come out to eat. On 2 May 1910 his brigade overvalled the ladang of Peutoea Gam Masèn, the heerscher over de tijgers (ruler of the tigers), at the Kroeëng Seukoeleh; the Peutoea charged with his rentjong and was killed by the klewang of a maréchaussée. On 5 September 1910 the bende-Heynen, working on Schmidt’s information, overvalled the schuilplaats of Tgk. Majet; the Tengkoe escaped, but his wife Tjoet Gambang fell zwaar gewond into Dutch hands, and refused treatment: “Bêta mat keë, kaphé boedo” — “Do not touch me, leper kafir.”

On 29 September 1911 Schmidt overvalled the schuilplaats of the grijze oelama Habib Teupin Wan — een gevecht in prachtigen stijl (a fight in beautiful style). When Schmidt returned to Tangsé the oeléëbalang’s wife asked him how many dead and wounded the Kompeuni had suffered: “Zelfs geen enkele gewonde” — not even one wounded — whereat the astonished woman: “Dan moet uw eleumeë wel heel sterk zijn, want de Habib was zoo machtig dat, als iemand maar met den vinger naar hem wees, diens hand verstijfde.”

Zentgraff records Schmidt’s mystical reputation in detail. At the Tado bivak Schmidt, walking the pagger at dusk, found versche sporen van een grooten tijger (fresh spoor of a large tiger); the keutjhi called the pawang rimoeëng (tiger-charmer) who had all the tigers of the country onder appèl. At the Boven-Wojla Schmidt had the keutjhi build a tiger-val with a back-door, using the old bezweringformule: “Kala keu dikah kala laka laka.” The Acehnese came to believe the tiger was in dienst van Schmidt. Once Schmidt witnessed an Atjehsche wapensmid, after praying to Sjech Abdul Kadeuë (the Heer van het IJzer), take a rentjong and krulde het puntige einde geheel op, zonder dat een menschenhand het had aangeraakt — curled the pointed end up without a human hand touching it. Schmidt tried with his own rentjong; the same thing happened. Schmidt zegt: ik heb het met deze, mijn eigen oogen, gezien.

The first interview with Swart, June 1908

The first meeting took place shortly after Swart, then still overste, had taken office as Governor on 10 June 1908. Schmidt had learned through the Acehnese chabar angin (rumour, literally “news of the wind”) that he would probably be made Civil Authority at Padang Tidji — that is, in an already virtually pacified sub-division. He felt little for that “gepacificeerde” life, requested and obtained leave to go to Koeta Radja to put his case, and was announced.

“I have heard, Governor, that you wish to appoint me civil administrator at Padang Tidji.” — “Ja,” said the Governor. — “I wished to ask you to designate someone else for that.” That sort of thing was nothing for Swart, who exploded: “Well, you must regard that as an honour! You are truly the only lieutenant who has been designated as a civil administrator!”

Schmidt thanked him and asked whether he might speak entirely freely. He might — and the younger man argued that the elder could get more out of him in a not pacified sub-division, but above all in Tangsé, where he was just then on the trail of the unfindable Keudjroeën Oebit: “And if you transfer me now, then you may have trouble from that band leader for years to come.”

“Hm,” said the Governor, and seized a thick folio inscribed Register van Bendehoofden; he searched and found Keudjroeën Oebit, and asked: “bedoel je dien?” He was the man. “Zoo,” said the Governor, “how long do you need to get that man into your hands?” — “Drie maanden, Gouverneur.” — “Agreed, then you may stay for the present where you are.”

The gamble came off, and fixed Swart’s lasting attention on Schmidt. The man of the promise returned to Sigli, where on 25 June he had already to act as interpreter at the Governor’s first visit to that sub-division, Schmidt speaking excellent Acehnese. At that first meeting with the chiefs of Pidië — received politely, courteously, but sternly — the question put to each chief was: “Toekoe, have you more than two eyes and more than two ears?”, a question every one of them understood. Another question was: “how many of your subjects are still with the resistance party?” The answer was as a rule heavily rounded down — but the nasty part was that the “interpreter” had already answered that question beforehand.

The new Governor also allowed Schmidt funds for the intelligence service: 100 guilders a month.

Against the Tirò Teungkoes

Schmidt’s great work was the destruction of the Tirò band. On 8 February 1908, following found and carefully followed tracks, he surprised the band’s hiding-place on the kr. Meu’, where five of the principal Teungkoes were killed. In February 1909 he found in the Tangsé valley — and, as promised to Swart, within three months — the unfindable Keudjroeën Oebit and was able to strike him from the Register van Bendehoofden: “the first piece of work which this long-serving collaborator of Swart’s, his “first tracker,” delivered to the new Governor.”

In 1910 Schmidt at Tangsé and Boreel at Lam Meulò became the pace-setters in Pidië, Schmidt devoting himself in accordance with his commission exclusively to the annihilation of what remained of the Tirò Teungkoes. In May 1910, after a masterly patrol, he surprised the hiding-place of the two great Tirò men Tgk. Tjhi’ Majét and Tgk. di Boekét, who fell with many followers.

The special commission given him in December 1909 was completed on 3 December 1911, after two heavy patrol years in continuous and complete independence, when the last surviving Tirò Teungkoe, the young Tgk. Ma’at, fell after refusing a final proposal of submission. Du Croo described the struggle against the heilige Tirò Teungkoes by Schmidt and his two famous marechaussée brigades under Molier and Von Gilsa, who devoted years exclusively to this task, as “the great epic of those stirring days,” already treated at length in Marechaussee in Atjeh.

Teunòm and the west coast

Schmidt also cleared Teunòm in 1909, one of the conditions that allowed the Meulaboh country to be reduced to only Beneden Wòjla, Boebon and Seunagan as remaining trouble spots.

In later years he executed a commission in Teunòm: the submission of a band more than three hundred strong under T. Bén Boebon and his nephew T. di Rangkoh, with which the infantry patrols could obtain almost no contact. Knowing the district and the population through and through, Schmidt resolved to bring about a peaceful submission without shooting and without “neerleggen.” It succeeded: T. di Rangkoh and his whole band reported themselves. “The people looked wretched, their clothes hung in tatters about their emaciated bodies, and some of the eighteen women and children were practically naked.” They told how, after the raid on their ladang, they had lived exclusively on katèla and palm hearts, and how for fear of betrayal and discovery they had sought contact with nobody. They fell hungrily on the rice and fish the marechaussée at once made available, and next morning marched with the troops back to the inhabited world, three days’ march away, where they were handed over to friendly chiefs, provided with clothing and permitted to settle with their families in the gampong. Swart noted on the journal: “You have achieved a fine result, the more so since no use was made of weapons.”

Meulaboh, the Daja murders, and Boven Wòjla

Schmidt’s return to Atjeh was itself the product of a tragedy. On leave in Holland he wished to be reposted to Atjeh, but the army commander — Van Daalen — would not permit it. Between Van Daalen and Swart, then Major-General, matters had come almost to “a painful war,” of which Van Daalen, who hated Swart, was certainly guilty. Only by an accident — and that was, alas, the murder of Scheepens in October 1913 — did Schmidt return to Atjeh, even before his time: Swart could then demand a fully suitable officer for the difficult Meulaboh post, and that the army commander could not refuse.

As Civil Authority at Meulaboh, Schmidt conducted the investigation into the murder of Civil Authority W. van Kregten at Lam No on 20 May 1914 and the subsequent resistance in Daja and Lhong — an investigation carried out through his old head of intelligence at Djeuram, Teukoe Agam, and celebrated by du Croo as “a purely Acehnese piece of work.” He also led the investigation into the attack on G. F. P. Gosenson at Djeuram on 29 December 1917, which uncovered the hand of Tgk. Poeti’.

His last action as a marechaussée officer was the “coconut and sugar-cane excursion” of April 1918 into the Boven Wòjla, undertaken after the death of Teungkoe Moet and the klewang attack on the bivouac of the commander of Koeala Bhèë on 25 April 1918.

He was also used by Swart in the reverse direction: chiefs from other districts were now and then “gedirigeerd” to Wòjla ter instructie, so exemplary had that landschap become under its bivouac commander.

Character and relations with Swart

Schmidt’s memoirs supplied du Croo with many of the “ontmoetingen” that fix Swart’s character. He recorded the Governor’s habit of beginning nearly every sentence with “en”, which puzzled the Tangsé chiefs into believing it a sign of anger; the Governor’s insistence on accuracy against chiefs who rounded their figures down; and the anecdote of the journal in which Van Heutsz had written “nu wordt het tijd voor kapitein Swart om naar Teunom te gaan” and Swart had promptly written beneath it “Captain Swart will judge that for himself.” Finding it in an archive, Schmidt told an inspecting officer: “dat journaal van u heb ik gelezen, maar ik zou uw gezicht weleens willen zien als ik er zooiets onder zette.”

Swart’s private letters to Schmidt of 1909, 1911 and 1913 are printed in the biography as characteristic both of the manner in which Swart corresponded with his most trusted collaborators and of the frictions with the army command that ended only when Swart became lieutenant-general.

Significance (du Croo, 1943)

Schmidt was the executant of the single most sustained special operation of the pacification — the destruction of the Tirò oelama line — and the model of the officer Swart preferred: one who knew the language, the country and the people, who could obtain results without firing, and whose ambition could be harnessed to a defined task. As co-author of two of the principal Dutch books on the Atjeh-oorlog he was also one of its chief chroniclers.

In the Maréchaussée Jubileum-nummer (1930)

The Overzicht van Onderscheidingen printed in the 1930 jubilee number of Het Nieuws van den Dag voor Nederlandsch-Indië records four awards to Schmidt, more than to any other individual in the register:

1906 — knight in the Orde van Oranje-Nassau, as 1ste Luit. Mar.
1909 — the Militaire Willems-Orde 4th class, as 1ste Luit. Mar., together with J. J. Jenac
1911 — the Eeresabel, as 1ste Luit. Mar.
1913 — the Militaire Willems-Orde 3rd class, as 1ste Luit. Mar. — the only entry for that year

Colonel L. A. Snell named Schmidt among the old vuurvreters of the corps whom he saw pass in review before his mind’s eye, with Scheepens, Veltman, Darlang, Christoffel, Geertsema, Beckering and Watrin.

Account from Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu

Discovered Teukoe Oemar’s grave. Led patrol (from 1909-1913 colonne Schmidt in Pidië) against the oelama-party. In February 1910 set out to capture Teungkoe Ma’jid. In 1923 received surrender of one of the Samarkilangbende. In 1933 was the victim of an atjeh-moord at Lho’ Soekon by Amat Leupon.

Source: J. Jongejans, Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 354, 360, 373, 374, 383, 406, 413.

Source

Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L., by G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (‘s-Gravenhage: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 1954), the chapter “De colonne Schmidt,” the chapter on De patrouille, and the Nawoord.

In Memoriam Maurice Henri du Croo (1951), p. 6 (biographical list of du Croo’s works).

Atjeh, door H.C. Zentgraff. Gedrukt bij Drukkerij “De Unie”, 1938, Batavia.

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 X–XV, pp. 93, 106–109, 117–118, 124–129, 140–141, 143–145.

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.

Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu, by J. Jongejans, Oud-Resident van het Gewest Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden, with a foreword by Dr. H. Colijn (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 354, 360, 373, 374, 383, 406, 413.

description	K.N.I.L. officer who commanded the colonne Schmidt against the Tiriō Teungkoes (1910–1911), later Assistent-Resident on Ambon and co-author with Maurice Henri du Croo of two book-length Dutch accounts of the Aceh War.
tags	person, officer, knil, dutch, aceh, marechaussee, author, colonial, military, aceh-war, 20th-century, honours, jubilee
aliases	Luitenant Schmidt, Kapitein Schmidt, Assistent-Resident Schmidt, Kolonel Schmidt, Schmidt K.N.I.L., H. J. Schmidt, H. J. Schmidt Ridder 3e kl. M.W.O., Schmidt (marechaussee), 1ste Luit. Mar. H. J. Schmidt

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