Teukoe Dagang was one of the hoofden van Tangsé — one of the indigenous chiefs of the Tangsé valley — and the leader of a larger Acehnese resistance band that survived the destruction of the Tiriō bende in 1911 and was hunted by luitenant Schmidt for over a year afterwards, repeatedly escaping every search in a way the book takes as proof that “ook voor de allerbeste patrouilles het succes nooit verzekerd is” — even for the very best patrols, success is never assured. He is the book’s example of the Acehnese hoofd who could not be brought in by force alone.
The refusal to submit
After the destruction of the Tiriō bende in 1911, some forty onverzoenlijken (irreconcilables) “sloot zich aan bij de bende van T. Dagang en bij die van T. Haroen, die op de Noordkust opereerde.” T. Dagang refused to submit to Schmidt for a particular reason: “hij meldde zich niet bij Schmidt durfde te, omdat deze eens verklaard had, dat hij hem zou begraven naast een hoofd, dat door hem vermoord was.” That is, Schmidt had once declared that he would bury Dagang next to a hoofd whom Dagang had murdered. The threat of posthumous humiliation — being buried in proximity to his victim — was enough to keep Dagang in the bergen for over a year.
The murder of the three spionnen
When Dagang lost men in a treffen, he turned on those he suspected of spionnage for the Dutch. “Zijn broer meldde zich met zes volgelingen” — his brother surrendered with six followers — but Dagang himself “ontsnapte aan elke speurtocht.” He then murdered three people suspected of spionnage “op afschuwelijke wijze” — in a horrifying manner — which the book does not detail but which forms the moral stain on his record. The contrast with the religious resisters of the Tiriō bende is implicit: where they killed as geloofsgetuigen in a holy war, Dagang killed as a hoofd defending his authority.
The August search and the empty schuilplaats
“Tot Augustus de 26e Schmidt weder op hem jaagde.” On that date the colonne found his schuilplaats on a steep tjot (a small mountain) — but Dagang himself was not there. The overval missed him. The book registers this as a fact about the limits of even the best patrouille: a kleine, beweeglijke bende under a hoofd who knew the bergen could disappear for a year or more against a colonne that had just destroyed the Tiriō family in two.
Significance
Teukoe Dagang’s significance in Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. is as the foil to the Tiriō Teungkoes. Where they were religious martyrs whose resistance was doctrinal and familial, Dagang was a regional hoofd whose resistance was political and personal. The book’s quiet point is that the latter kind of resistance was harder to finish: the religious resisters would eventually all die for the doctrine; the political hoofd could simply disappear into the bergen and refuse to come in. Dagang is also the figure through whom the book makes its argument about the limits of the colonne as an instrument: even Schmidt, with his peerless intelligence network and his unmatched patrouilles, could not catch everyone.
The refusal to submit
After the destruction of the Tiriō bende in 1911, some forty onverzoenlijken (irreconcilables) “sloot zich aan bij de bende van T. Dagang en bij die van T. Haroen, die op de Noordkust opereerde.” T. Dagang refused to submit to Schmidt for a particular reason: “hij meldde zich niet bij Schmidt durfde te, omdat deze eens verklaard had, dat hij hem zou begraven naast een hoofd, dat door hem vermoord was.” That is, Schmidt had once declared that he would bury Dagang next to a hoofd whom Dagang had murdered. The threat of posthumous humiliation — being buried in proximity to his victim — was enough to keep Dagang in the bergen for over a year.
The murder of the three spionnen
When Dagang lost men in a treffen, he turned on those he suspected of spionnage for the Dutch. “Zijn broer meldde zich met zes volgelingen” — his brother surrendered with six followers — but Dagang himself “ontsnapte aan elke speurtocht.” He then murdered three people suspected of spionnage “op afschuwelijke wijze” — in a horrifying manner — which the book does not detail but which forms the moral stain on his record. The contrast with the religious resisters of the Tiriō bende is implicit: where they killed as geloofsgetuigen in a holy war, Dagang killed as a hoofd defending his authority.
The August search and the empty schuilplaats
“Tot Augustus de 26e Schmidt weder op hem jaagde.” On that date the colonne found his schuilplaats on a steep tjot (a small mountain) — but Dagang himself was not there. The overval missed him. The book registers this as a fact about the limits of even the best patrouille: a kleine, beweeglijke bende under a hoofd who knew the bergen could disappear for a year or more against a colonne that had just destroyed the Tiriō family in two.
Significance
Teukoe Dagang’s significance in Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. is as the foil to the Tiriō Teungkoes. Where they were religious martyrs whose resistance was doctrinal and familial, Dagang was a regional hoofd whose resistance was political and personal. The book’s quiet point is that the latter kind of resistance was harder to finish: the religious resisters would eventually all die for the doctrine; the political hoofd could simply disappear into the bergen and refuse to come in. Dagang is also the figure through whom the book makes its argument about the limits of the colonne as an instrument: even Schmidt, with his peerless intelligence network and his unmatched patrouilles, could not catch everyone.
Career
In August and September 1910 hard blows fell on the resistance bands of Pidië and division arose among them, in consequence of which the Pedireezen attached themselves to the well-known and notorious T. Dagang from Tangsé — “the man whom Schmidt was to pursue fruitlessly for years” — while the strangers, mainly oelamas originating from Groot Atjeh, followed Tgk. Ma’at, the last of the Tirò Teungkoes.
In the survey of 1913 T. Dagang appears among the principal remaining band-leaders of Pidië, together with Pang Bintang, “the unfindable robber chief”; a few survivors of the Tirò band under Tgk. Ma’ Aréh di Lam Goet; and the so-called Tjoebo-bende.
Swart’s letters concerning T. Dagang
T. Dagang recurs repeatedly in Swart’s private letters to Schmidt. In the letter of 26 December 1909 Swart wrote: “During your stay at Tangsé you will of course do everything to put an end to the existence of T. Dagang and his war-leader Pang Tjoet Bén. Once T. Dagang has fallen, Keutjhi’ Bén Man will come back of his own accord, while Keutjhi’ Maha and Pang Brahim must then simply be cleared up by the garrison of Tangsé. So once more: take T. Dagang and Pang Tjoet Bén specially upon your own account.”
In the letter of 26 September 1911 Swart wrote: “at Lam Meulò I learned that you hoped to have rendered T. Dagang and his men harmless before the end of the month … from Major Scheepens I received the positive report of the death of Tgk. Ma’at. If that has indeed taken place, then only T. Dagang remains to you.”
Submission, 1913
The end came in 1913 without a fight. T. Dagang’s hiding-place was found and cleared; his principal subordinate leader Pang Meurandéh submitted with nine men; and then T. Dagang gave up as well — the reason, as du Croo noted with some irony, being that Schmidt was on leave in Holland and his threat to bury T. Dagang beside the landschapshoofd whom T. Dagang had murdered “had now lost its force!” “Tangsé was clean.”
Significance (du Croo, 1943)
T. Dagang was the longest-lasting band-leader of the Tangsé valley and one of the few whose resistance ended not in death but in submission — and in submission caused, paradoxically, by the departure of his pursuer. His case belongs to the phase du Croo called “the needles in the haystack,” in which the pacification was completed not by battle but by the patient and methodical elimination of individual leaders.
See Also
- Colonne Schmidt campaign against the Tiriō Teungkoes (1910-1911)
- Schmidt
- Nussy
- T. Haroen
- Tangsé
- Tjot
- 1911
- H. J. Schmidt
- Pang Bintang
- Tgk. Ma’at
- Pidië
- Swart’s letters to Schmidt (1909-1913)
- H. N. A. Swart
- 1913
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), chapter “De colonne Schmidt.”
Teukoe Dagang was one of the hoofden van Tangsé — one of the indigenous chiefs of the Tangsé valley — and the leader of a larger Acehnese resistance band that survived the destruction of the Tiriō bende in 1911 and was hunted by luitenant Schmidt for over a year afterwards, repeatedly escaping every search in a way the book takes as proof that “ook voor de allerbeste patrouilles het succes nooit verzekerd is” — even for the very best patrols, success is never assured. He is the book’s example of the Acehnese hoofd who could not be brought in by force alone.
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 XI, p. 107; Chapter XII, pp. 117–118; Chapter XIV, pp. 140–141.