Titzing was a luitenant ter zee 2e klasse (lieutenant second class) of the Royal Netherlands Navy, adjudant of the colonel of the Marine — Kolonel Jhr. van Rensselaar Bowier — during the sea-borne expedition that landed the Lamtoba column at Lampanas on 27 July 1879, as recorded in W. Cool and G. B. Hooijer’s Eene schoone bladzijde uit Atjeh’s geschiedenis (1889).
The regulation of the landing
In the landing of 27 July 1879 it fell to Titzing to regulate the mass of landing craft. Seated at the rudder of the flet — the fast boat of the Colonel’s adjudant — charged with the ordering of the landing sloops, he “flew” hither and thither, rowed by the powerful sunburnt arms of the Dutch sailors, dancing now upon the waves thrown up by the steam barkasses, then threading between the crowd of boats that had gathered from the several ships about the Soerabaya. Behind the steam barkas a whole string of boats was made fast, all crammed with the dark-blue-clad soldiers, each pressing his browned rifle against him, and manned at stem and stern with one or more sailors whose white trousers and yellow straw hats with fluttering ribbons shone against the silver-grey of the sea and the fine blue of the sky. Under continuous piping, stamping and hooting, the barkas worked itself straight to the coast; before the surf was reached, the naval officer gave a sign from his flet, the barkas turned with an elegant curve to starboard, and swung the sloops it had towed towards the strand, upon which they struck almost at the same moment. The 3rd Company of the 9e Bataljon Infanterie and a section of mortars under Majoor Ducroo were the first troops thus landed.
See Also
- Van Rensselaar Bowier
- Marine (Dutch Navy)
- Embarkation at Oleh-leh and landing at Lampanas (26–27 July 1879)
- Lampanas
- 1879
Source
Eene schoone bladzijde uit Atjeh’s geschiedenis, door W. Cool en G. B. Hooijer (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1889), p. 9. OCR-filename: 20260720_115822_DLP-135-Eene_schoone_bladzijde_uit_Atjeh_s_geschiedenis_Nemotron_OCR_v2_OCR.txt.