General Verspijck was luitenant-generaal and tweede bevelhebber (second-in-command) of the second Dutch expedition against Atjeh under generaal van Swieten; he commanded the landing on 9 December 1873 at the roadstead of Atjeh and drove the Atjehneezen from their fortifications on the right bank of the Atjeh river; and he executed the fall of the Kraton on 24 January 1874 through an omtrekkende beweging (flanking movement) that delivered the deserted palace-fortress to the Dutch without a shot. In Borel’s narrative he is the steady professional soldier whose sound tactical judgement was systematically overborne by his commander’s caution.
Appointment as Second-in-Command
The government’s appointment of Verspijck as second-in-command to the retired luitenant-generaal van Swieten was meant to pair the former opperbevelhebber with an active-duty tactician of complementary views. Van Swieten’s appointment in November 1873 surprised the Indische leger, which no longer knew him personally and found him “geenszins populair.” The government simultaneously named Verspijck as tweede bevelhebber, though Borel records that Verspijck’s inzichten “verschilden aanmerkelijk” with van Swieten’s, especially on krijgskundig gebied, and that he was “te goed soldaat” to voice his disagreements publicly.
The Landing of 9 December 1873
On 9 December 1873 the landing was undertaken under Verspijck’s command. The second expedition — over 6,000 strong, dispatched in the second half of November 1873 — arrived at the roadstead of Atjeh under unfavourable auspices: cholera had broken out on many transport ships. Supported by the fire of the steamships, Verspijck drove the Atjehneezen from their fortifications on the right bank of the Atjeh river. After the left bank of the river-mouth had also been occupied, the expedition pushed southward on 24 December 1873 and encountered numerous fortifications, which were taken after heavy fighting.
The Divergence over the Padangsche Brigade
The principal recorded disagreement between Verspijck and van Swieten concerned the third brigade left behind at Padang. Verspijck proposed landing it at the Kroeng Raba-baai for a pincer movement against the Kraton from two sides — a plan that, Borel notes, “drie jaren later” was vindicated when generaal Pel proved the march feasible along a route less than three uren long in a straight line. Van Swieten rejected the proposal out of “vrees,” and the enemy’s line of retreat from the Kraton remained open. The three-brigade deployment, properly executed, might have ended the war at a fraction of the cost.
The Omtrekkende Beweging and the Fall of the Kraton
Verspijck’s most consequential initiative came after the storming of the Mesigit on 6 January 1874 — which cost 220 dead and wounded in a frontal assault ordered by van Swieten without reconnaissance — and the nineteen-day bombardment of the Kraton. On 23 January 1874, after “hevig vuur,” he began the omtrekkende beweging from Kota Goenoengan around the zuider- and ooster-facen of the Kraton to reach the Atjeh-rivier. The crossing of the Kroeng Daroe caused “groot oponthoud,” but Verspijck encountered “geen noemenswaardigen tegenstand.” On the morning of 24 January 1874 the movement continued; at eleven o’clock the last mortier-granaat was fired, and a Dutch afdeeling climbed the low borstwering and discovered — “tot niet geringe verbazing” — that the Kraton was “op een grijsaard en een zieken Atjehnees na, geheel verlaten.” The Kraton was occupied without bloodshed. Borel judges that the whole operation could have been done “na weinige dagen” if properly conducted; instead it took a month.
The Reconnaissance of 29 January 1874
Verspijck accompanied van Swieten on the misfired reconnaissance of 29 January 1874 up the Atjeh-rivier, where the Dutch column met unexpectedly strong resistance near Lampoe Idjoe and was forced to retire “onverrichter zake.”
Significance
Verspijck embodies in Borel’s narrative the professional soldier whose sound tactical judgement was systematically overborne by his commander’s caution. His omtrekkende beweging saved the second expedition from the fate of the first under Generaal Köhler, and his frustrated proposal for the Kroeng Raba-baai landing anticipated by three years the very strategy Pel would use to break the Atjehnese resistance.
Sources
Onze vestiging in Atjeh, critisch beschreven, by G. F. W. Borel, Kapitein der Artillerie. ‘s-Gravenhage: D. A. Thieme, 1878. pp. 10–11, 13, 21, 32–33, 42–44, 56.
See Also
- Second Aceh Expedition (1873–1874)
- Fall of the Kraton (24 January 1874)
- Storming of the Mesigit (6 January 1874)
- Bombardment of the Kraton (January 1874)
- Reconnaissance of the Atjeh-rivier (29 January 1874)
- Jan van Swieten
- Generaal Köhler
- Generaal Pel
- Kroeng Raba-baai
- Padangsche brigade
- Kraton of Atjeh
- 1873
- 1874
Source
Het Land van Jan Pieterszoon Coen, door Dr. W. A. Terwogt (Hoorn: P. Geerts, [1891]). Hoofdstuk XIII: “Den 9den December werd onder aanvoering van Verspijck geland. Ondersteund door het vuur der stoomschepen verdreef deze de Atjehers uit hunne versterkingen aan den rechteroever der Atjeh-rivier.”
Onze vestiging in Atjeh, critisch beschreven, by G. F. W. Borel, Kapitein der Artillerie. ‘s-Gravenhage: D. A. Thieme, 1878. pp. 10–11, 13, 21, 32–33, 42–44, 56.