W. Moens — oud-luitenant ter zee (retired lieutenant of the navy) — was a Dutch naval officer and business traveller who, having taken part about 1893–1894 in the naval blockade of the Atjeh coast during the Atjeh-oorlog, returned to the country for a fourteen-day journey in November 1913 at the invitation of luitenant-generaal H. N. A. Swart, Gouverneur van Atjeh, and published his observations as the feuilleton series Reisindrukken van Atjeh in the Algemeen Handelsblad, reprinted in booklet form at Amsterdam by Jacob van Campen in 1914. His account of the journey — from Pangkalan Brandan over Kwalla Simpang, by the Atjeh-tram to Loh Semaweu, Bireuën, Sigli and Koeta-Radja — is one of the principal Dutch eyewitness descriptions of Atjeh in the first years of the definitive peace under the pacificatie.
Blockade memories
Moens had known Atjeh some twenty years earlier, when he served as a naval officer (zeeofficier) in the blockade of the coast — veel moeite en weinig succes (much trouble and little success), as he wrote. What the Dutch then held of Atjeh was very inconsiderable: a small plain around Koeta Radja, entirely ringed by a line of forts, and some five minimal strips enclosed by palisades scattered along the whole length of the coast. On the night patrols with the steam sloops he had worn his overcoat against the cool of the nights; the uniforms were then still blue, white uniform cloth not yet existing. The contrast between that war-time Atjeh and the pacified country he found in 1913 determined the whole tone of his Reisindrukken.
The invitation of Gouverneur Swart
Moens left Holland in July 1913 for a business journey through other parts of the Indies. On the outward voyage, arriving at Sabang, he met there luitenant-generaal Swart, whom he knew from former times. Swart pressed him to reserve fourteen days at the end of his business trip to take a look at Atjeh and to convince himself with his own eyes of the conditions now prevailing there. Moens first hesitated, but the governor’s remark — that it pleased him when Hollanders came to convince themselves what Atjeh now was, so that more confidence in the conditions of that region might arise in the mother country — decided him to accept the proposal in principle.
The journey of November 1913
In November 1913 Moens made his fourteen-day journey. He landed at Pangkalan Brandan, went by steam launch over the Aroe-baai to Pangkalan Soesoe and by road over Salahadji to Kwalla Simpang on the Tamiang river, where the civiel-gezaghebber de heer Wessels received him; he witnessed the placing of the last span of the Tamiang bridge, visited the first native school on Acehnese soil and the rubber estate Soengei Lipoet, and travelled by the Atjeh-tram over Langsar, Peureula, Idi and Loh Soekoen to Loh Semaweu, where assistent-resident M. C. Roos van Raadshoven supplied him with information. From Loh Semaweu he visited the maréchaussée-bivak of Boeloh Blang Ara and, in the company of the archaeologist De Vink, the grave of a queen of Pasé at Koeta Kareuëng. From Bireuën he went over the Gajoe-weg as far as Kroeng Seumpoe. In the company of Gouverneur Swart and the ex-Minister of War Colijn he travelled on by extra train over Samalanga to Sigli, where majoor Veldman received them and where Moens visited the courtroom in which, some weeks before, overste Scheepens had been mortally wounded. Over the watershed at Selimoen he reached Koeta Radja, where he stayed at the house of the Governor; after Colijn’s departure he left for Europe by way of Sabang.
Judgement on the state of Atjeh
Moens closed his series of impressions with an extensive argument that the Atjeh war was over and that Dutch authority had been finally established. He enumerated seven proofs of the favourable political situation — the well-developed school attendance, the lively markets (passars), the confidence of the population who brought their most intimate affairs to the officials, the safety on the roads, the extension of native agriculture, the quiet departure of all officials for the independence festivities, and the general, subjective impression of calm — and quoted the resigned reasoning of the chiefs: Het is het gouvernement nu ernst (the government means it now), since it built railways and roads for millions and educated the children. To the ex-Minister Colijn, who in 1908 had been sent to Atjeh by the Governor-General as an expert, he put the question of the general state of the country, and the answer was: Tot onherkenbaarwordens toe verbeterd! (Improved to the point of unrecognisability!). His closing word was een eeresaluut (a salute of honour) to Van Heutsz and Swart.
Significance
Moens is significant as the author of the Reisindrukken van Atjeh, the booklet in which the publisher — who signed herself DE UITGEEFSTER (the publisher, feminine) — sought to spread in wider circles the gladdening truth Er is vrede op Atjeh, de Atjeh-oorlog is voorbij (There is peace in Atjeh, the Atjeh war is over). The series had originally appeared as a feuilleton in the Algemeen Handelsblad and was reprinted at the request of several readers of that newspaper. The work is one of the few published Dutch travel accounts of Atjeh of the immediate post-pacification years, written by an eyewitness who could compare the country of 1913 with the blockaded coast of about twenty years earlier. The series closes with the signature W. M., dated Januari 1914.
See Also
- Reisindrukken van Atjeh (Moens, 1914)
- Moens’ journey through Atjeh (November 1913)
- H. N. A. Swart
- Hendrikus Colijn
- Algemeen Handelsblad
- Jacob van Campen (publisher)
- Atjeh
- Pacificatie van Atjeh
- Aceh War
- 1913
- 1914
Source
Reisindrukken van Atjeh, door W. Moens, oud-luitenant ter zee (Amsterdam: Jacob van Campen, 1914), pp. 7–9, 52. OCR-filename: 20260716_140310_DLP-99-Reisindrukken_van_Atjeh_Nemotron-OCR-v2_OCR.txt.