Tunku Pakih (also rendered Toekoe Paekie, Toekoe Packie, Tuku Pakih) was a powerful potentate of Pedir (Pidie) on the north coast of Acheh in the second decade of the nineteenth century. He was the decisive local figure in the Acheh succession dispute: he helped bring Syf (Saif ul-Alum) to the throne in 1815, then quarrelled with him and went over to the party of the deposed Sultan Jauhar Alum, at whose side he remained until his violent death at the hands of the Shahbandar of Acheh.
Bringing Saif ul-Alum to the throne (1815)
When, in 1815, the dissident Achehnese chiefs offered the throne to the Penang merchant Said Hussein and Hussein accepted it on behalf of his second son Syf, Tunku Pakih was among the most powerful supporters of the revolution. An expedition fitted out at Penang carried Syf to Acheh, where, “accompanied by his son” Hussein, he was proclaimed sultan as Sil-ul-illum Shak. Van der Kemp specifically names Tunku Pakih as the “relatively powerful potentate of Pedir, who had contributed much to the success of the revolution”. Without Tunku Pakih’s local power, the Penang-backed coup could not have succeeded in displacing Jauhar Alum from the capital.
Breach with Syf and defection to Jauhar Alum
The alliance between Tunku Pakih and the new sultan was short-lived. “Before long,” writes Van der Kemp, “this toekoe had disagreements with Syf, so that he again went over to the party of the banished Djohor, who from now on established his seat at Pedir”. The breach was decisive: from this moment Pedir became the seat of the rival sultan Jauhar Alum, while Syf in turn was forced out of the capital and took up residence at Telok Semawé on the east coast. Tunku Pakih thus shifted the balance of the Achehnese civil war by his defection, and Pedir became in effect the stronghold of the old sultan’s party.
The capture of the British brig and the Coombs mission (1817-1818)
Tunku Pakih was already, before the arrival of Raffles, at the centre of British–Achehnese friction. When, at the end of 1817 or beginning of 1818, Captain Coombs was sent in commission to Acheh to seek the true sultan, a few days before his arrival at Acheh a brig under British colours was “run down” by Tunku Pakih of Pedir. Coombs raised the matter with the Achehnese chiefs, who professed indignation at the scandal and promised to call Packie to account — a promise that, given the impotence of the central authority, was hollow. Coombs left Acheh in February 1818 convinced that Syf was the recognised sultan, and the incident of the brig was among the grievances that coloured subsequent British policy toward Pedir.
The death of Tunku Pakih
By the time of the Raffles–Coombs Commission of 1819, Tunku Pakih was dead. After the Commission had concluded its fruitless seven-week sojourn at Acheh and was preparing to sail for Pedir, the Shahbandar arrived at Pedir with a commission ostensibly to ask Sultan Jauhar Alum’s forgiveness and to offer him, on behalf of the three Sagis, the submission of the capital — but in fact, as Van der Kemp puts it, “with the aim of deceiving the prince”. When the Shahbandar found himself hindered in this design by Tunku Pakih, he stabbed him to death. Van der Kemp notes drily that the truth of this account “may perhaps be doubted; in any case Packie was no more”. With Tunku Pakih’s removal, the path to the treaty of 22 April 1819 between Raffles and Jauhar Alum was smoothed; the British government’s report of 7 October 1820 noted that “the unrest of Packie no longer existed”.
See Also
- Sultan Jauhar Alum
- Sultan Saif ul-Alum
- Shahbandar of Acheh
- Pedir
- Captain Coombs
- Capture of British brig by Tunku Pakih
- Death of Tunku Pakih
- Treaty of Pedir (1819)
- Acheh succession dispute (1802-1819)
Source
Raffles’ Atjeh-overeenkomst van 1819, by P. H. van der Kemp, in Bijdragen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, 6e Volgr., Deel VII (1900), pp. 159-239. Universiteitsbibliotheek Vrije Universiteit, LS.08781.
Tunku Pakih (also rendered Toekoe Paekie, Toekoe Packie, Tuku Pakih) was a powerful potentate of Pedir (Pidie) on the north coast of Acheh in the second decade of the nineteenth century. He was the decisive local figure in the Acheh succession dispute: he helped bring Syf (Saif ul-Alum) to the throne in 1815, then quarrelled with him and went over to the party of the deposed Sultan Jauhar Alum, at whose side he remained until his violent death at the hands of the Shahbandar of Acheh.
Bringing Saif ul-Alum to the throne (1815)
When, in 1815, the dissident Achehnese chiefs offered the throne to the Penang merchant Said Hussein and Hussein accepted it on behalf of his second son Syf, Tunku Pakih was among the most powerful supporters of the revolution. An expedition fitted out at Penang carried Syf to Acheh, where, “accompanied by his son” Hussein, he was proclaimed sultan as Sil-ul-illum Shak. Van der Kemp specifically names Tunku Pakih as the “relatively powerful potentate of Pedir, who had contributed much to the success of the revolution”. Without Tunku Pakih’s local power, the Penang-backed coup could not have succeeded in displacing Jauhar Alum from the capital.
Breach with Syf and defection to Jauhar Alum
The alliance between Tunku Pakih and the new sultan was short-lived. “Before long,” writes Van der Kemp, “this toekoe had disagreements with Syf, so that he again went over to the party of the banished Djohor, who from now on established his seat at Pedir”. The breach was decisive: from this moment Pedir became the seat of the rival sultan Jauhar Alum, while Syf in turn was forced out of the capital and took up residence at Telok Semawé on the east coast. Tunku Pakih thus shifted the balance of the Achehnese civil war by his defection, and Pedir became in effect the stronghold of the old sultan’s party.
The capture of the British brig and the Coombs mission (1817-1818)
Tunku Pakih was already, before the arrival of Raffles, at the centre of British–Achehnese friction. When, at the end of 1817 or beginning of 1818, Captain Coombs was sent in commission to Acheh to seek the true sultan, a few days before his arrival at Acheh a brig under British colours was “run down” by Tunku Pakih of Pedir. Coombs raised the matter with the Achehnese chiefs, who professed indignation at the scandal and promised to call Packie to account — a promise that, given the impotence of the central authority, was hollow. Coombs left Acheh in February 1818 convinced that Syf was the recognised sultan, and the incident of the brig was among the grievances that coloured subsequent British policy toward Pedir.
The death of Tunku Pakih
By the time of the Raffles–Coombs Commission of 1819, Tunku Pakih was dead. After the Commission had concluded its fruitless seven-week sojourn at Acheh and was preparing to sail for Pedir, the Shahbandar arrived at Pedir with a commission ostensibly to ask Sultan Jauhar Alum’s forgiveness and to offer him, on behalf of the three Sagis, the submission of the capital — but in fact, as Van der Kemp puts it, “with the aim of deceiving the prince”. When the Shahbandar found himself hindered in this design by Tunku Pakih, he stabbed him to death. Van der Kemp notes drily that the truth of this account “may perhaps be doubted; in any case Packie was no more”. With Tunku Pakih’s removal, the path to the treaty of 22 April 1819 between Raffles and Jauhar Alum was smoothed; the British government’s report of 7 October 1820 noted that “the unrest of Packie no longer existed”.
See Also
- Sultan Jauhar Alum
- Sultan Saif ul-Alum
- Shahbandar of Acheh
- Pedir
- Captain Coombs
- Capture of British brig by Tunku Pakih
- Death of Tunku Pakih
- Treaty of Pedir (1819)
- Acheh succession dispute (1802-1819)
Source
Raffles’ Atjeh-overeenkomst van 1819, by P. H. van der Kemp, in Bijdragen van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch-Indië, 6e Volgr., Deel VII (1900), pp. 159-239. Universiteitsbibliotheek Vrije Universiteit, LS.08781.