The Kroeng Daroe (modern spelling Krueng Daroe or Krueng Daroy) is a river of the Atjeh plain in the immediate vicinity of Kota Radja and the Kraton, whose embankment was one of the drainage works undertaken by the Staf der Genie at Kota Radja in the early months of 1875 to make the Kraton free of bandjir. The work was one of the peacetime engineer duties performed by Tweede-Luitenant C. J. Snijders in the last months of his Atjeh service.
The Embankment of 1875
After the close of his field engineer service with the Lamara Olejlo fortification of 15 February 1875, Snijders was attached to the Staf der Genie at Kota Radja for what were essentially peacetime duties. Among the works listed by the biographer Van den Berg are “appoleinngweekanneedd tot het bandjirvrijmaken van den Kraton (o.a. door bedijking van de Kroeng Daroe ter plaatse)” — drainage works to make the Kraton free of bandjir, including by the embankment of the Kroeng Daroe at the relevant place.
Significance
The Kroeng Daroe is the principal watercourse of the Kota Radja plain and one of the rivers whose flooding periodically threatened the Dutch positions in and around the Kraton. The bandjir of 4 December 1874 that nearly cost Snijders his life was a flood of the Atjeh River rather than of the Kroeng Daroe, but the two watercourses form a single hydrological system, and the embankment of the Kroeng Daroe in 1875 was part of the same general programme of bandjir-control that the bandjir of 4 December 4 December 1874 had shown to be necessary. The Kroeng Daroe is also the river whose name is preserved in the modern Krueng Daroy, the stream that flows through the Taman Sari pleasure-garden of the sultans of Aceh.
See Also
- Cornelis Jacobus Snijders
- Koeta Radja
- Kraton of Aceh
- Acheh River
- Bandjir
- Bandjir at Penajoeng (4 December 1874)
- Bataillon Mineurs en Sappeurs
- Aceh War
- 1875
Source
D. van den Berg, Cornelis Jacobus Snijders (1852–1939): Een leven in dienst van zijn Land en zijn Volk (Voorburg: September 1944), p. 33. Koninklijke Bibliotheek shelfmark 0301 4872.
Account from Een Vaderlandsch Belang by H. Borel (1878)
The Kroeng Daroe (Krueng Daroe) is the small river that splits the Kraton enclosure into two halves and the principal cause of the December 1874 bandjir that inundated K. Radja for eight days. Its crossing by Verspijck’s omtrekkende beweging on 23 January 1874 caused “groot oponthoud” — great delay — in the operation that produced the fall of the Kraton. The Pakan Atjeh post on its right bank was the principal Dutch battery against the enemy’s eastern line at Pendetti and Lampoe Idjoe.
The river in the Kraton
The Kroeng Daroe ran through the Kraton enclosure from north to south, splitting the captured palace-fortress into two halves and discharging into the Atjeh-rivier at the southern face. Its presence inside the Kraton made the enclosure naturally defensible against assault from either half, but it also made the enclosure vulnerable to flooding: when the Atjeh-rivier rose, the Kroeng Daroe backed up and overflowed its banks inside the Kraton. Borel notes that the Kroeng Daroe was “the principal cause” of the December 1874 bandjir, in which more than 500 sick had to be rushed the first day to higher ground in the middle of the Kraton and water rose to the roofs of the hospital barracks. The Dutch post at Pakan Atjeh on the right bank of the Kroeng Daroe was therefore positioned to command both the river’s crossing and the eastern approaches to the Kraton.
The crossing of 23 January 1874
On 23 January 1874, after hevig vuur, generaal Verspijck began the omtrekkende beweging from Kota Goenoengan around the zuider- and ooster-facen to reach the Atjeh-rivier. The crossing of the Kroeng Daroe caused “groot oponthoud” — great delay. Verspijck encountered “geen noemenswaardigen tegenstand.” On the morning of 24 January 1874 the omtrekkende beweging continued; at 11 a.m. the last mortier granaat was fired. Verspijck reached the Atjeh-rivier; all works fell “zonder slag of stoot.” An afdeeling climbed the low borstwering and discovered, “tot niet geringe verbazing,” that they were inside the Kraton — which was “op een grijsaard en een zieken Atjehnees na, geheel verlaten.” The Kroeng Daroe crossing had been the only operational difficulty of the day; its successful passage made the fall of the Kraton a matter of hours.
See Also
- Kraton of Atjeh
- Kota Radja
- Atjeh-rivier
- Pakan Atjeh
- Kota Goenoengan
- Generaal Verspijck
- Fall of the Kraton (24 January 1874)
- Bandjir flood of Kota Radja (December 1874)
- Kroeng
Source
Onze vestiging in Atjeh, critisch beschreven, by G. F. W. Borel, Kapitein der Artillerie. ‘s-Gravenhage: D. A. Thieme, 1878. pp. 23–24, 27, 32–34, 39, 41, 46, 59, 65, 89, 95, 102, 108, 111, 113, 116–119, 124, 131, 154, 179, 184–186, 219–223, 323–329.