Tangsé is a valley of central Aceh with a double significance in the history of the Aceh War. In Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. (Dames, 1954), Tangsé is — paired with Geumpang — the principal theatre of the colonne Schmidt of 1910–1911 against the Tiriō Teungkoes, and the place where Nussy received his decoration and where the last leader of the Tiriō bende was buried as a saint. In Oost-Indisch Journael (Merac, 1947), Tangsé is the destination of the colonial army’s elephant-transport from Lam-toeulo along the transverse road, and the place where Agam the male transport-elephant was put down by the firing-squad of the marechaussée.
The theatre of the colonne Schmidt
“The valleys of Tangsé and Geumpang, up against the slopes of the Goenoeng Alimon and the Peuët Sagoë” formed the eastern side of the Tiriō theatre. “Ten Westen in het stroomgebied van de Kroeëng Seukoeleh” formed the western side. The schuilplaatsen of the Tiriō family — and of Teukoe Dagang — lay in the bergland between these two valleys. Posten stood on the paden naar de Noordkust, vanwaar ook wel werd gefourageerd; the geography of the valley — open at the paden, impassable in the bergland — was what made the colonne’s method of small patrouilles and omsingelingen the appropriate tactic.
The begrafenis of Tgk. Tjhi Ma’at
When the corpse of Tgk. Tjhi Ma’at — killed on 3 December 1911 by the korporaal Nussy — was carried out, “de bevolking van Tangsé liep uit naar de begrafenis.” The bandages and cloths in which the lijk was gewikkeld “werden in honderden stukjes gescheurd en meegenomen als heilige reliquiën.” Tangsé is therefore the place at which the last leader of the Tiriō bende was buried as a saint of the resistance.
Nussy’s return from the passer
“Nussy one day coming from the market at Tangsé with a few parcels in his hands” — returning from the market in Tangsé with packages in his hands — when the news of his M.W.O. decoration reached him. “„Nussy dapat ridder klas tiga!” Nussy heeft het ridder derde klas gekregen.” The hardened dardanel “heeft het uitgehuild van ontroering.” Tangsé is therefore also the place at which the colonne’s most decorated soldier received his decoration.
The elephant-transport and Tangsé
In 1913 the transport-elephants were transported to Lam-toeulo to serve the transport to Tangsé and the still more southerly post Geumpang. Tangsé is therefore the destination of the elephant-transport from Lam-toeulo along the transverse road. “Naturally,” his superior smiled. “That last transport from Tangsé to Medan took 26 days!” — the pitifully slow speed of the elephant-transport that the lorry-transport of the transverse road would replace.
The Agam firing-squad at Tangsé
So Agam — the male transport-elephant — came to Tangsé for the firing-squad. A volley rang out from his old comrades, the men with the red patches on the collar — the marechaussées. The old hero lifted his trunk high and sank soundlessly sideways. He died as a warrior by the bullet. The Tangsé firing-squad is the colonial memory’s marker of the elephant’s warrior-death: the transport-elephant who was put down by the firing-squad of the marechaussée at Tangsé.
The Tangsé and Geumpang area action
The Tangsé- en Geumpanggebied actie — the action in the Tangsé and Geumpang area — was one of the great successes of Van Heutsz’s period of glory, the area that the actie opened to the colonial army and that the elephant-transport later served.
Significance
Tangsé is significant in Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. as the geographical centre of the colonne Schmidt chapter — the place at which the last organised Acehnese armed resistance was destroyed, at which the last leader of the Tiriō bende was buried as a saint, and at which the colonne’s most decorated soldier received his decoration. In Oost-Indisch Journael it is the destination of the elephant-transport and the place of the Agam firing-squad. The valley therefore ties together the military, religious, and personal dimensions of the account of the end of the Aceh War.
Account from Atjeh by H.C. Zentgraff (1938)
Zentgraff gives Tangsé its most detailed treatment: the valley that was the heiligdom of the Tiro-oelama’s, hoewel ieder man in Tangsé en omgeving de schuilplaats kende, zweeg men als het graf.
The bivak Tangsé was Schmidt’s base. On 23 April 1910 Schmidt rukte uit van Tangsé with two brigades and eight days’ vivres; on 16 May 1910 he set out on the great encircling march over the Goenoeng Meureuseuë and Goenoeng Alimon that brought him to Tgk. di Boekit’s schuilplaats on 21 May 1910. The keutjhi of Tangsé, Bèn, was bound by custom to deliver an ox to Tgk. Majet before the slametan; Schmidt gave Bèn the money to buy the ox, marched out 31 August 1910 exactly two days after the ox-bearers entered the forest, and on 5 September 1910 the last Tiro-oelama fell.
When Tgk. Majet’s body, its wounds bound, was brought to Tangsé, the people tore the bandages to pieces — de zeer bevoorrechten die een stukje van het met bloed gedrenkte verband machtig werden kept them as reliquieën, still in Tangsé, kept very secretly. Zentgraff repeatedly tried to photograph the grave beside the mesdjid but the bevolking refused: want dit zijn dingen die vreemden niet aangaan.
In September 1911 the Hari Raja fell on the 25th, and some of Habib Teupin Wan’s men went into a Tangsé kampong for the celebration. This leaked out; on 27 September Schmidt marched out with thirty maréchaussée’s; on 29 September the colonne, marching along the Aloeë Blang Djeuraloh, came upon the Habib’s schuilplaats. The aged Habib fell with eight men, zijn grijzen kop ongedekt voor de karabijnen.
Atjeh, door H.C. Zentgraff. Gedrukt bij Drukkerij “De Unie”, 1938, Batavia.
Van Heutsz’s turning movement, 1898
Driven from the plain, T. Oemar withdrew to the mountains and chose as his residence “unreachable Tangsé,” protected by the strongly fortified and apparently impregnable gorge in the Kroeëng Beuniët. “But for Van Heutsz and his men nothing was unattainable.” The answer was “the famous turning movement to the left through the impassable terrain around the gorge — through downpours, primeval forest and ravines… towards the unreachable unknown. A gamble, a specimen of daring and unshakeable self-confidence, which succeeded: Tangsé was reached and occupied, and Teukoe Oemar too took his threatened body and his followers to the West Coast.” It cost van Heutsz his shoes: he returned barefoot to Sigli on 28 August 1898.
Schmidt at Tangsé
In June 1908 H. J. Schmidt, then on the trail of the unfindable Keudjroeën Oebit, pleaded with H. N. A. Swart against his transfer from Tangsé to the pacified Padang Tidji, and undertook to have the band-head in his hands within three months. He succeeded: in February 1909 he found Keudjroeën Oebit in the Tangsé valley and struck him from the Register van Bendehoofden — “the first piece of work which this long-serving collaborator of Swart’s, his “first tracker,” delivered to the new Governor.”
In 1910 Schmidt at Tangsé and Boreel at Lam Meulò became the pace-setters in Pidië. Swart’s letter of 26 December 1909 instructed him: “During your stay at Tangsé you will of course do everything to put an end to the existence of T. Dagang and his panglima Pang Tjoet Bén. Once T. Dagang has fallen, Keutjhi’ Bén Man will come back of his own accord, while Keutjhi’ Maha and Pang Brahim must then simply be cleared up by the garrison of Tangsé.” T. Dagang eluded Schmidt for years and finally submitted in 1913, when Schmidt was on leave in Holland: “Tangsé was clean.”
The chiefs of Tangsé
The chiefs of Tangsé supplied du Croo with one of his best-known anecdotes of Swart. After the Governor had visited Tangsé in Schmidt’s absence, one of the chiefs asked Schmidt: “when the Governor says “and”, is he then angry?” — for Swart, true to habit, had begun again with “And, Teukoe, is all well?” and “And, Teukoe, has the rice been cut yet?” The landschapshoofd was reassured by the translation of the little word “en” into Acehnese.
In June 1915 the onderluitenant Müssig was murdered at Tangsé in a personal act of revenge; the perpetrator was caught and sentenced.
See Also
- Colonne Schmidt campaign against the Tiriō Teungkoes (1910-1911)
- Teungkoe Sjech Saman di Tiri
- Tgk. Tjhi Ma’at
- Teukoe Dagang
- Nussy
- Schmidt
- Geumpang
- Goenoeng Alimon
- Peuët Sagoë
- Kroeëng Seukoeleh
- Oost-Indisch Journael
- Transport-olifanten (Aceh)
- Lam-toeulo
- Agam
- Isah
- Sarah
- Rimba
- Tangsé- en Geumpanggebied actie
- Atjeh-oorlog
- 1910
- 1911
- 1913
- Pidië
- Teukoe Oemar
- Joannes Benedictus van Heutsz
- H. J. Schmidt
- T. Dagang
- Keudjroeën Oebit
- Kroeëng Beuniët
- Van Heutsz’s Pidië campaign (1898)
Account from Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu
Miniature town on the transversaal road, at 435 m elevation. Temperature like a radiant Dutch spring day. Consists of a small pasar, the bivak with lieutenant’s dwelling (within barbed wire), and the pasanggrahan. Ideal week-end retreat from Sigli. Military swimming pool available. Cable bridge over the confluence of Kroečng Tangsé and Kroečng Geumpang (completed 1931) is an important link to bivak GeumpangPlace between which andGeumpang elephant transportPlace of multiple Dutch tochten (expeditions); the colonneVan der Maaten at Tangsé overran Panglima Polém’s mother and other family, leading to his surrender.
Source: J. Jongejans, Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 61, 62, 289, 401, 404.
Source
- Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L., by G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (‘s-Gravenhage: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 1954), chapter “De colonne Schmidt.”
- Oost-Indisch Journael: Palaver om de tafel met het gat, by Merac, Toekan-Serie no. 2, ed. G. L. Tichelman (Haarlem: De Gulden Pers, 1947), chapter Atjeh’s Transport-Olifanten and the chapter on den zieleherder.
Generaal Swart, Pacificator van Atjeh (“General Swart, Pacifier of Atjeh”), by M. H. du Croo, Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with the collaboration of H. J. Schmidt, Titular Colonel K.N.I.L. (retired), with a foreword by His Excellency Lieutenant-General K.N.I.L. (retired) G. K. Dijkstra (Maastricht: N.V. Leiter-Nypels, 1943), Chapter III, p. 19; Chapter XI, pp. 106–107; Chapter XII, pp. 117–118; Chapter XIV, p. 140; Chapter XV, pp. 143–144.
Land en Volk van Atjeh Vroeger en Nu, by J. Jongejans, Oud-Resident van het Gewest Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden, with a foreword by Dr. H. Colijn (Baarn: Hollandia Drukkerij N.V., c. 1938), pp. 61, 62, 289, 401, 404.