Mesigit Pagar Ajer was a Dutch fortified post built around a mesigit (Atjehnese prayer house) just outside the western edge of kampong Pagar-Ajer, on the left bank of the Atjeh River. Established by General Pel after the conquest of the XXV Moekims as his northernmost post facing the XXII Moekims, it stood in the rear of the enemy’s strong position at Bajoe and thus forbade him re-entry there; later it became the provisions depot of the whole south-east line.
The work
From the mesigit, standing at the west edge of the kampong, the Dutch could command the kampong and the sawah west of it. At its establishment a company of infantry with an unharnessed section of mountain artillery was left, ordered to make the post defensible with the means at hand and to lodge in the mesigit and the standing buildings around it. The result was a rectangular trapezium breastwork of coconut-tree piles, with round bastions at two opposite corners; outbuildings and a vivres magazine — at first left outside the palisade under a small night watch — were soon taken inside, giving the work its irregular form.
The post stood on ground surrounded on three sides by sawah: with standing water except in long drought, in which it lay like an island — a defence in itself, and the hardship of all marches towards it.
Depot of the south-east line
When the posts of the first line stood one by one from February–March 1876, the road stores could no longer be supplied for the whole chain directly from Kota Radja; Mesigit Pagar Ajer, the most favourably situated, became the depot — the second phase of its use. To that end an earthen breastwork with ditch was added to its defences, work done by the garrison itself and progressing very slowly. From this depot the provisions went out by forced-labour carriage to Lambaroe, Kajoe-Lē and Atoë, convoyed daily until the building of the roads later in 1876 opened the whole line to wagon transport.
See Also
Source
Atjeh van 26 December 1875 tot 4 September 1876, door H. F. Meijer (Breda: P. B. Nieuwenhuijs, 1883), chapters I (pp. 13–15) and V.